I have a problem with my usb flash disk. It's a Kingston Datatraveler. I use it intensely, and since yesterday it has become corrupted. I can't remember that I took it out before dismounting (or safely removing, since I mostly use it on a Win7 - VM Ubuntu machine), but that seems to be the most likely cause.

I searched and searched, but it seems everyone gives up eventually on trying to rescue data in this situation. However, I'm stubborn and I need your help.

These are the diagnostics that I did so far:

walle@earth:~$ sudo fdisk -l /dev/sdb 

walle@earth:~$ sudo fdisk -l



Disk /dev/sda: 21.5 GB, 21474836480 bytes

255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2610 cylinders, total 41943040 sectors

Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes

Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Disk identifier: 0x0009a95f



   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System

/dev/sda1   *        2046    41943039    20970497    5  Extended

/dev/sda5            2048     6000639     2999296   82  Linux swap / Solaris

/dev/sda6         6002688    41943039    17970176   83  Linux

walle@earth:~$ lsusb

Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub

Bus 002 Device 002: ID 80ee:0021 VirtualBox USB Tablet

Bus 001 Device 006: ID 0c76:0005 JMTek, LLC. Transcend Flash disk

walle@earth:~$ ls -laR /dev/disk

/dev/disk:

total 0

drwxr-xr-x  5 root root  100 Sep 21 12:22 .

drwxr-xr-x 16 root root 4180 Sep 21 12:22 ..

drwxr-xr-x  2 root root  240 Sep 21 12:22 by-id

drwxr-xr-x  2 root root  160 Sep 21 12:22 by-path

drwxr-xr-x  2 root root   80 Sep 21 12:22 by-uuid



/dev/disk/by-id:

total 0

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 240 Sep 21 12:22 .

drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 100 Sep 21 12:22 ..

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 11:08 ata-VBOX_CD-ROM_VB0-01f003f6 -> ../../sr0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 11:29 ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f -> ../../sda

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:28 ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part1 -> ../../sda1

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part5 -> ../../sda5

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part6 -> ../../sda6

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 11:29 scsi-SATA_VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f -> ../../sda

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:28 scsi-SATA_VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part1 -> ../../sda1

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 scsi-SATA_VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part5 -> ../../sda5

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 scsi-SATA_VBOX_HARDDISK_VB0f06d815-0d4e855f-part6 -> ../../sda6

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 12:07 usb-GENERIC_USB_Mass_Storage-0:0 -> ../../sdb



/dev/disk/by-path:

total 0

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 160 Sep 21 12:22 .

drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 100 Sep 21 12:22 ..

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 11:08 pci-0000:00:01.1-scsi-0:0:0:0 -> ../../sr0

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 12:07 pci-0000:00:0b.0-usb-0:1:1.0-scsi-0:0:0:0 -> ../../sdb

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root   9 Sep 21 11:29 pci-0000:00:0d.0-scsi-1:0:0:0 -> ../../sda

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:28 pci-0000:00:0d.0-scsi-1:0:0:0-part1 -> ../../sda1

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 pci-0000:00:0d.0-scsi-1:0:0:0-part5 -> ../../sda5

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 pci-0000:00:0d.0-scsi-1:0:0:0-part6 -> ../../sda6



/dev/disk/by-uuid:

total 0

drwxr-xr-x 2 root root  80 Sep 21 12:22 .

drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 100 Sep 21 12:22 ..

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 1587b411-663d-4b75-93e0-06ed4f76f55c -> ../../sda5

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root  10 Sep 21 11:08 28c80af8-f546-46ec-9b63-38cbd7c0b9f2 -> ../../sda6

GParted doesn't detect the device, gnome-disk-utility does, but under "Capacity" it says "No media detected".

testdisk doesn't detect it either.

Additionally, the symptoms on Win 7 are that the drive is visible, but not accessible in explorer ("Please insert a disk into Removable disk F:" when trying to browse it, and "Cannot open volume for direct access." when trying to run chkdsk).

My hopes sprang up when I plugged it into a Vista computer: it detects it and can dismount it. I still cannot access anything on there, but when I search for some files by name they show up in results, although I still can't open them.

Please help if you have any idea on how I can recover my data.

Any help would be much appreciated.