Software recovery method for flash media with defective formatting

• US 20060242460A1
• Filed: 06/23/2006
• Published: 10/26/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 08/16/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: MCM Portfolio LLC
• Original Assignee: Sreenath Mambakkam
• Inventors: Mambakkam, Sreenath, Thiagaraian, Shanmugavelu, Govindaraju, Jothikumar
• Granted Patent: US 7,526,675 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 714/15
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1435 using file system or storage system metadata
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 2029/0407 on power on
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/765 in solid state disks

Abstract

A method and software program for recovering data from corrupted flash media. In one aspect, the method employs a low-level access scheme that enables data to be recovered when high-level interfaces, such as file systems, are damaged. The type of flash media is determined, and a corresponding access scheme is employed. Depending on the type of damage to the media, a physical-to-logical table may be built and employed to sequentially access the flash media in search of indicia from which selectable file-types can be identified, or the media may be accessed using normal operating system commands. Once the file indicia are found, the location of corresponding file data is identified, whereupon the file data are read and stored. The software program employs an application program interface (API) comprising one or more sets of pass-through commands to enable low-level access to the flash media and to build the physical-to-logical table

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a computing device;

a flash storage media;

a flash adapter to interface the computing device with the flash storage system; and

a firmware to perform operations to recover data from corrupted flash storage media comprising;

accessing raw flash data stored on the flash media using a low-level access mechanism;

searching the raw flash data for file indicia corresponding to a selected file type; and

reading data from the raw flash data based on information in the file indicia, said data comprising a recovered file.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the flash adapter is a standalone device.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the flash adapter is removable from the computing device.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the flash adapter is integrated to the computing device.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing device is a cellular telephone.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing device is a personal digital assistant (PDA).

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing device is a digital camera.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing device further comprises a Universal Serial Bus (USB) port.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the flash storage media comprises a SmartMedia compatible device.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the flash storage media comprises a Sony Memory Stick-compatible device.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the firmware resides at the flash storage media.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the firmware resides at the computing device.

13. A system comprising:

a computing device;

a flash storage media;

a flash adapter to interface the computing device with the flash storage system; and

a firmware to perform operations to recover data from corrupted flash storage media comprising;

determining a media type of the flash storage media;

building a physical-to-logical table mapping physical storage locations to physical storage locations based on the type of flash storage media;

searching the flash media for a file header corresponding to a selected file type using the physical-to-logical table; and

reading data from the raw flash data based on information in the file header.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the flash adapter is a standalone device.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the flash adapter is removable from the computing device.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the flash adapter is integrated to the computing device.

17. The system of claim 13, wherein the computing device is a cellular telephone.

18. The system of claim 13, wherein the computing device is a personal digital assistant (PDA).

19. The system of claim 13, wherein the computing device further comprises a Universal Serial Bus (USB) port.

20. The system of claim 13, wherein the flash storage media comprises a SmartMedia compatible device.

21. The system of claim 13, wherein the flash storage media comprises a Sony Memory Stick-compatible device.

22. The system of claim 13, wherein the operations further comprising:

defining an application program interface (API) comprising a plurality of respective sets of pass-through commands, each respective set to enable the firmware to low-level access a particular type of flash media corresponding to that set of pass-through commands; and

building the physical-to-logical table with the firmware using the set of pass-through commands corresponding to the media type of the flash media.