Re: [bug-ddrescue] Improvement: Avoid rescuing empty space

[Robert Heel]

Hi Antonio,

thanks for the hint!

My current project is an 500 GB USB HDD with an NTFS partition with a read rate of 20kb/s - and of course the MFT is 
destroyed :-(

Happy new year!

Robert


Am 26.12.24 um 19:38 schrieb Antonio Diaz Diaz:
> Hi Robert,
>
> Robert Heel wrote:
> > Thanks for the great project, it saved many bytes :-)
>
> You are welcome! :-)
>
> > Huge HDDs are often not completely used, and the unused space is often
> > filled with zeros.
> > What about a config option to skip sectors filled with zeros (in the
> > same way skipping bad sectors) to avoid wasting time rescuing empty space?
>
> As Robert Trevellyan points out, ddrescue already provides the option '--domain-mapfile'. All you need to do is to 
> create a domain mapfile with a tool like partclone[1], and pass it to ddrescue using --domain-mapfile.
>
> Of course, for this to work, the file system must not be (too) corrupt, or partclone won't be able to create the domain 
> mapfile.
>
> [1] https://partclone.org/features/
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> Merry Christmas,
> Antonio.