Recovering video files

8 Nov 2022 10:46:50

Richard I

My super-dooper Panasonic HD hard disc recorder failed and cannot be fixed without reformatting the hard disc, loosing all the TV recordings that I wanted to keep.

I have extracted the hard disc and via various means I have determined that the files are all there but are buried in a Panasonic specific file system. Needless to say the disc will not mount on Apple or Windows machines.

The video file types are M2TS for HD recordings and VOB and MP4 for standard definition.

Can anyone recommend some data recovery software that I can use on a mac to retrieve my precious recordings?
Thanks
Richard

Re: Recovering video files

9 Nov 2022 09:19:53

Euan Williams

If you can't recover these files yourself, this company is highly recommended and not exotically expensive. Contact them, they aren't greedy :)

Re: Recovering video files

9 Nov 2022 23:27:40

Stuart Affleck

Panasonic specific file system? What a pain in the proverbial. My Humax HDR-FOX T2 uses EXT3- a Linux filesystem, but Paragon do a Mac package to read/write it. If you can somehow get the HD recordings off, they will be unplayable, sadly, due to encryption- all HD channels in the UK are encrypted, so recordings are locked to the individual device that made them. If your box dies, tough- they won't work even if you transfer a working HD to an identical model. Only devices that can get around this with additional software are my Humax model, and the immediate replacements. SD recordings have no encryption so if you can get them off safely, no problems there.

Re: Recovering video files

10 Nov 2022 09:05:13

Richard I

Thanks for all the replies.
Stuart: you have confirmed my fears that the HD recordings could well be lost for good. Unfortunately they represent most of the recordings. Still, it stops me throwing good money after bad. (Regarding the file system, it could be that Panasonic uses EXT3. ‘ Panasonic file system‘ are just my words describing the non-Windows non-Mac file system)

Re: Recovering video files

10 Nov 2022 14:58:20

Rick Churchill

Although you require to save your recordings and I don't think that is possible, it may be worth a look at this site that I came across. I downloaded a procedure from the AVForum.com some time ago when I thought my Panasonic drive was failing. It does give some information on reading the disc which was done using a Linux programme.

The procedure was posted to allow installation of a new HDD in the recorder and the difficulty in getting the Panasonic to recognise the new disc. Put “Panny720HDD.bin” in your search engine.

Here is a quote from the forum:
Start Quote>Windows will not recognise the HDD, but TrueImage "should" be ok if you do a bit copy.
But using DD on Liinux is "guaranteed".
I have used the free HxD - Freeware Hex Editor and Disk Editor | mh-nexus under windows and that works fine. <End Quote

Re: Recovering video files

11 Nov 2022 20:41:44

Lionel Ogden

Should you be unfortunate to lose your recordings could you not access them again through iPlayer, ITV Hub or similar? and re record them on a new hard disk?

Re: Recovering video files

12 Nov 2022 17:18:15

Richard I

Yes indeed I could. With films that’s likely to happen gradually overtime. Unfortunately some of the stuff lost is compilations of snippets of music performances from Jules Holland and Glastonbury for example. However I have not yet given up I am going to try to resuscitate the recorder without risking wiping the disc. The trouble is electronics nowadays is very difficult to fix and hard to see what you are doing!

Re: Recovering video files

12 Nov 2022 17:30:07

Andrew Kemp

If the README for this recovery software is to be believed, Panasonic DVRs do not use the EXT3 filesystem.

Apparently, while older devices use Universal Disk Format, newer ones use a proprietary format named MEIHDFS-V2.0, which may stand for 'Matsushita Electric Industrial Hard Disk File System'

(That software is not for macOS, and would not solve the encrypted HD video problem even if it was.)

Re: Recovering video files

13 Nov 2022 12:31:01

Richard I

Thanks Andrew, it is fascinating reading but scary! Since my own research confirms that be high definition recordings are encrypted I have abandoned the data recovery route