I have a 50.9 GB file which is a backup of my home folder on Ubuntu 12.04. I compressed this file using tar on Terminal from my sda (ext4) drive to sdb (ext4). The command I used was
tar cvfz /media/2ndHDD/home.tar /home/<my_username>
I was getting this error after the compression:
tar: Exiting with failure status due to previous errors
.
I repeated the compression thrice but same error I'm getting when the compression is finished. Because I'm already too exhausted of this on the third attempt (especially that it took me whole day), I just disregarded the error and was hoping it won't affect when I decompress the file.
After that, I installed a new OS which is Ubuntu 14.04 to my sda drive. After the installation, I attempted to untar the file I compressed a while ago by using this
tar xvf home.tar
but I'm getting this error:
gzip: stdin: invalid compressed data--format violated
tar: Unexpected EOF in archive
tar: Unexpected EOF in archive
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
So I tried to gzip the file using
gzip home.tar
and waited for almost 1 hour to finish. And after that, I decompressed it again using gzip this time.
tar -xvzf home.tar.gz
The process just can't finish and will stop after 15 minutes which leaves the created 'home' folder incomplete of files I'm expecting. I repeated the process over and over again but won't really finish.
Is there any way I can recover this huge compressed file? I already tried gzrecover
(http://fosshelp.blogspot.com/2013/04/howto-recover-corrupted-targz-file.html) but always fails. Could it also be possible that I already lost my files when I attempted to convert it to gzip? I really regret why I didn't just copy the home folder uncompressed. :(
UPDATE: Just now, I attempted to convert it back to tar by using this command
gzip -d home.tar.gz
and decompressed it by running
tar xvf home.tar
now I'm getting this error:
gzip: stdin: invalid compressed data--format violated
tar: Unexpected EOF in archive
tar: Unexpected EOF in archive
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
And even just listing down the files inside the tar file won't finish processing
tar -tvf home.tar
I will still get the same error above
UPDATE (01/11/2015):
I tried to run strace gunzip home.tar.gz
and after about 15-20 minutes I was getting these:
read(3, "\231\300\2678\242p\206\371\341\322\352\312\374\271?\252.\1775sC\330|D$PF$\10r\362V"..., 32768) = 32768
write(4, "\256Y\341\224\362Nn\315\316\373>\31\202\275c\373\266\265\345\27 R\312\2\221b'6\263\321\10F"..., 32768) = 32768
read(3, "[\366\"\r\265\244\3s\201\223b\n\267\364\34\247Ej\210tF\22\255B\254\223\216E\26\242\321\210"..., 32768) = 32768
write(4, "\n1g\201\\m\231\364\352@\"%\207\"Q+\37a^!8\226\233\204\244\v\334&i\361\2a"..., 32768) = 32768
read(3, "\222\327\351\337(\376\376?\246AzC\371\231\200${V\361\310W9.\3571a\362\357\251\306o\234"..., 32768) = 32768
write(4, "\346\216sH\250\272\264T\335\356<?\377\266\272o{\32\21\264\367\34\377w\327\220\324\313\231\2775\337"..., 32768) = 32768
read(3, "\266\276\345\213\277}G\235\355\360\326\232\244\353Z\\\215\222g\354\202\356\351\303G~\210\363b\31\17P"..., 32768) = 32768
write(4, "\326!1\332\213\253\276\327\222<\345\25\210\366\266\337uSkj>\345$\257\225\2q\321^8Jk"..., 32768) = 32768
read(3, "~D\212\373\372\"\373\367m0\322%\365S\377\335\331\336\376RB\037727e'\371#S\224\223"..., 32768) = 26366
read(3, "", 6402) = 0
write(4, "\23\320\"\0059\24\20\"\5#M\210I\323\320\363T\220N\321\301\207\\\327(I\204\362\371\377\32!"..., 32768) = 32768
write(4, " \6\325\33\246\324\35\240h\225B\270\312\207\211\340)\314\27\17\"pv\2232?\"0Sez\247"..., 14402) = 14402
close(3) = 0
utimensat(4, NULL, {{1420884866, 686801693}, {1420818997, 36136000}}, 0) = 0
fchown32(4, 1000, 1000) = 0
fchmod(4, 0666) = 0
close(4) = 0
rt_sigprocmask(SIG_BLOCK, [HUP INT PIPE TERM XCPU XFSZ], [], 8) = 0
unlink("home.tar.gz") = 0
rt_sigprocmask(SIG_SETMASK, [], NULL, 8) = 0
_llseek(0, 0, 0xbf8c86a0, SEEK_CUR) = -1 ESPIPE (Illegal seek)
close(0) = 0
close(1) = 0
close(2) = 0
exit_group(0) = ?
+++ exited with 0 +++
With the output above, is it possible that I can still recover it? I just don't know where to start :(