| Symptom | Tool/Approach |
|---------|----------------|
| I/O error | ddrescue to clone disk |
| Partition missing | testdisk – analyze & rebuild |
| Superblock corrupt | fsck -b backup_block |
| Logical Volume not seen | vgscan; vgchange -ay |
| Disk not detected | Check dmesg, lshw -class disk |
Many internal disks from Windows use NTFS. On Linux, install ntfs-3g. A better mount command is: disk internal linux reader key better
sudo ntfs-3g -o recover,remove_hiberfile /dev/sdb1 /mnt/windows
Without these flags, the default Linux NTFS driver refuses to mount for safety. Many internal disks from Windows use NTFS
apt install apfs-fuse
apfs-fuse /dev/sda2 /mnt/apfs
| Limitation | Mitigation |
|------------|-------------|
| TPM PCR changes after firmware update | Keep recovery key in offline safe |
| Keyfile on USB defeats purpose | Use TPM + PIN via systemd-cryptenroll |
| Internal disk reader requires reboot to add disks | Use hot-plug PCIe/SATA backplane |
| LUKS header corruption | Backup LUKS header (cryptsetup luksHeaderBackup) | Without these flags, the default Linux NTFS driver
Problem: Internal SD card formatted as exFAT with corrupted partition table.
Solution: Boot to testdisk (included in SystemRescue). Analyze the disk, rewrite the partition table, mount via exfat-fuse.
Why better? Testdisk runs faster under Linux kernel's direct I/O.
# Read first 512 bytes (MBR)
dd if=/dev/sda of=mbr.bin bs=512 count=1
# Clone a failing disk with ddrescue (ignores errors)
ddrescue -f /dev/sda /dev/sdb rescue.log