The following English, Japanese, Chinese and Korean software updates are released:

• PC-3000 Express/UDMA-E/Portable Ver. 6.5.14
• Data Extractor Ver. 5.8.5
• Data Extractor RAID Edition Ver. 5.8.5
• PC-3000 SSD Ver. 2.6.5

SHORT LIST OF THE MAIN ENHANCEMENTS:

PC-3000 HDD (Express, UDMA, Portable)

WD Marvell

• Support for the new Marvell 88i10XX and LSI TT67XX controllers has been added to the Boot-ROM mode;
• The data transfer speed has been increased in the Boot-ROM mode.

Seagate F3

• The Hex Editor plugins have been added to work with some versions of MCMT:
  • Parser: parsing of extents chain, search for the blocks which are not saved in the User Area, analysis of the descriptors for data stored in Media Cache, search for possible extents chains, map generation for the extents chains in Data Extractor;
  • Editor: editing the number of extents, the pointer of the first extent in a chain and table end block (TimeStamp/Data Version).

PC-3000 Kernel

• PC-3000 Express now works with the PC-3000 SAS ports in Data Extractor.

Data Extractor

• The new mode of parallel view of several resources has been added (available for RAID members, in a map mode for selected chains and in PC-3000 Flash).

RAW recovery

• The visual mode has been changed (list transfer uses low RAM value for a large number of files, changes of a working window design);
• More than 300 new GREP expressions of various file types have been added to the reference;
• The new algorithm to recover MOV files from the photo and video recorders has been added.

File systems

• The initial support for the DVR DHFS4.1 file system has been added.

RAID Edition

• The support for the Apple Fusion Drive has been added;
• The method for determining the type of service blocks (XOR, RS, HS) and their parameters (for RS) has been added to the matrix on the form of creating a new RAID.

PC-3000 SSD

Silicon Motion

SM2246XT controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • Silicon Power Slim S55
  • Silicon Power Slim S60
  • CFast Lexar Professional 3400x

SM2258 (G, H) controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • ADATA SU800
  • Plextor S2C

SM2246EN controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • RevuAhn 850X
  • RevuAhn 880K
  • RevuAhn 900T PRO
  • Corsair Force LX

Phison

PS3111 controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • Smartbuy Revival 2
  • Patriot Spark
  • Kingston A400
  • GOODRAM CX300
  • Silicon Power Slim S55 (PS3111)
  • Lite-On MU3
  • Silicon Power Slim S60
  • GOODRAM S400U
  • Smartbuy S11

DETAILED LIST OF ENHANCEMENTS

PC-3000 HDD (Express, UDMA, Portable)

WD Marvell

• Support for the new Marvell 88i10XX and LSI TT67XX controllers has been added to the Boot-ROM mode;
• The data transfer speed has been increased in the Boot-ROM mode;
• The functionality of S.M.A.R.T. clearing has been enhanced;
• The “Edit HDD ID” mode has been improved.

Seagate F3

• The Hex Editor plugins have been added to work with some versions of MCMT:
  • Parser: parsing of extents chain, search for the blocks which are not saved in the User Area, analysis of the descriptors for data stored in Media Cache, search for possible extents chains, map generation for the extents chains in Data Extractor;
  • Editor: editing the number of extents, the pointer of the first extent in a chain and table end block (TimeStamp/Data Version);
  • Import: load the extents list from an external MCMT file;
  • The Sys Files read and write procedures have been optimized;
  • The function to lower control of the loader uploading has been added in the Work with Flash ROM image file (changing in the drive RAM via the terminal according to the uploaded DiskFW code);
  • The function of adding a “Fake” sign has been added to the LOD editor (works in conjunction with the function to lower control of the loader uploading);
  • The button for a log of the ROM report has been added in the Work with Flash ROM image file;
  • The sorting of columns in the SA object bookmarks has been added;
  • The Sys LBA tab in the SA objects view with the functionality of subtracting an arbitrary SA region with the ability to select a readout strategy and receive data from the drive even in case of a read error (in the state the HDD could read);
  • The “read by one sector” reading has been fixed for the Indirect mode.

Hitachi-IBM-ARM

• The PBA filed view in the P-list sheet has been fixed.

Samsung

• Fixed the issue of “defects list edited” checkbox appearing from a simple view of the statistic;
• The Backup process algorithm has been improved.

PC-3000 Kernel

• PC-3000 Express now works with the PC-3000 SAS ports in Data Extractor;
• HDD/SSD Profiles. The storage of profiles has been completely redone, now there is no limit to the volume of the list;
• Profiles searching procedure has been changed, now you can see the list of what is found.

Data Extractor

• The new interactive mode has been added which allows to edit/form the drive created on the basis of the map (available from the context menu);
• The new mode of parallel view of several resources has been added (available for RAID members, in a map mode for selected chains and in PC-3000 Flash);
• The Firebird ver. 3.x is supported now. The tasks created in previous versions use ver. 2.x and are supported in the new version without conversion. This will increase the speed of data processing during the analysis and give access to the new features;
• The new option for storing the info about heads has been added due to the advent of the drives with more than 15 heads. Now attributes and the info about heads are stored in different files. An old option for storing the attributes is supported for previously created tasks. The number of buttons to control heads has been increased to 16;
• PC-3000 Express now works with the PC-3000 SAS ports in Data Extractor;
• The input file size in bytes, kilobytes, etc. has been added to the filter and file search;
• The ability to search for files with a size of 0 bytes has been added;
• The location of the database of tasks created in NAS has been changed (now it is not stored in the temporary Windows directory);
• The Calculator in the Sector field of the Sector editor has been added;
• The *.deff storage format has been optimized for memory and speed usage;
• The saving of the descriptor with the current sort for the map has been added;
• It is now possible to add encrypted drives to the menu of encrypted partition;
• The priority rules of saving files and folders have been changed. Now the subdirectory is being saved until the content is saved.

RAW recovery

• The visual mode has been changed (list transfer uses low RAM value for a large number of files, changes of a working window design);
• More than 300 new GREP expressions of various file types have been added to the reference;
• The new algorithm to recover MOV files from the photo and video recorders has been added;
• The search for Apple CoreStorage structures has been added (used for Fusion Drive and File Vault);
• New methods for Apple CoreStorage VolumeHeader structure have been implemented:
  • metadata map creation
  • physical volume map creation
  • logical volume map creation
• New methods for Apple CoreStorage have been added:
  • metadata map creation
  • physical volume map creation
  • logical volume map creation
  • virtual disk mapping (based on the logical volume map)
• View and edit of structures:
  • The support of the groups of parameters has been implemented - sets of named parameters transferred during the navigation, saved for shifts and used in scripts;
  • The support for the items based on the secondary data sources (including the sources located in the RAM) has been added;
  • The NTFS file navigation has been enhanced (using the groups of parameters);
  • The capability to customize an interface (the number of bytes in a row/column, font) and select the encoding (ANSI, Dos, ASCII, etc.) in the HEX Editor;
  • It is now possible to set the number of rows displayed before the current offset has been added to the HEX Editor window;
  • It is now possible to set the byte order for the data (little endian, big endian) which by default has higher priority over the byte order;
  • Now HEX edits are shown in the structure viewer;
  • The recalculation of the GPT checksums while saving changes have been added;
  • Drag'n'Drop + Ctrl copying has been added;
  • New API scripts have been added;
  • Hex-editor window now has bookmarks (accessible from the context menu and via hotkeys);
  • Hex-editor window now supports clipboard operations (copy/paste);
  • The ability to select the structure template that will be used to interpret the data has been added to the view mode;
  • It is now possible to turn off the autodetection of the structure template by data. In this case, the structure template that is active at the moment of turning off the autodetection will be used to interpret the data.

Reference books integration

• The ability to integrate user RAW and Grep lists of expressions with the new reference book from the 6.5.9x software has been added. Right after the installation, you will have two options: to integrate them or to replace the previous version with the newest one by default.

Bitlocker

• The output of the information based on metadata has been added (PC name, BitLocker key GUIDs);
• Partitions without password (with a Clear Key) are now added automatically (without a password-entry form);
• The capability to specify a map of the unencrypted Bitlocker sectors has been added for the cases with partial encryption/decryption.

File systems

• The initial support for the DVR DHFS4.1 file system has been added.

NTFS file system

• The support for EFS has been added. The automatic search for a security certificate (if there is one in the drive partitions) has been implemented;
• The methods of analysis have been significantly accelerated due to optimization of the work with the database;
• The algorithm of the found structures analysis has been changed for the case of finding a large number of boot sectors;
• The mask for the MFT records in metadata has been increased.

HFS+ file system

• The analysis has been accelerated, the support for the HardLinks for directories has been added.

EXT file system

• The methods of analysis have been significantly accelerated due to optimization of the work with the database.

FAT file system

• The algorithm for analyzing the partition and finding structures for the priority of the found file descriptors and directories was changed (dates, deletion sign). In the previous version, an incorrect accounting of these data sometimes led to an incorrect tree construction.

ExFAT file system

• Root, FAT table, bitmap, volume have been added to the metadata map.

BtrFS file system

• The work with the preallocated extents has been enhanced.

RAID Edition

• The support for the Apple Fusion Drive has been added;
• The method for determining the type of service blocks (XOR, RS, HS) and their parameters (for RS) has been added to the matrix on the form of creating a new RAID. The method works on the basis of RAW recovery results on each drive (before starting the method, we recommend to first find the "characteristic" histogram in the "RAID Participant Statistics" mode and specify the basic parameters in accordance with this histogram);
• The sorting in the Windows Explorer by the Start and Size fields has been added.

PC-3000 SSD

Silicon Motion

SM2246XT controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • Silicon Power Slim S55
  • Silicon Power Slim S60
  • CFast Lexar Professional 3400x
• The loader microprogram has been improved;
• The translator building algorithm has been improved for the cases when service data is written as user pages;

SM2258 (G, H) controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • ADATA SU800
  • Plextor S2C

SM2246EN controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • RevuAhn 850X
  • RevuAhn 880K
  • RevuAhn 900T PRO
  • Corsair Force LX

All SM22xx controllers:

• The resource backup algorithm has been improved in connection with changes to the Kernel of the PC-3000 software;
• The new "Reading of Service Blocks" test has been added;
• The view of the report on the Memory Chips has been changed;
• The short system information output has been added to the Utility starting log.

Phison

PS3110 controller:

• The translator building algorithm has been enhanced for SSD drives which are using Interleave within 4 blocks;
• The translator building algorithm has been enhanced for SSD drives which have a number of blocks for LUN higher than 0x10000;
• Repairing functions for PS3110-based SSD drives have been added.

PS3111 controller:

• The following drives have been added to the Support List:
  • Smartbuy Revival 2
  • Patriot Spark
  • Kingston A400
  • GOODRAM CX300
  • Silicon Power Slim S55 (PS3111)
  • Lite-On MU3
  • Silicon Power Slim S60
  • GOODRAM S400U
  • Smartbuy S11
• The translator building algorithm has been enhanced for SSD drives which have the number of blocks for LUN higher than 0x10000;
• The S.M.A.R.T. parameters editing feature has been added;

All PS31xx controllers:

• The resource backup algorithm has been improved in connection with changes to the Kernel of the PC-3000 software;
• The feature to view the list of bad blocks has been added to the all PS-based Utilities.

All authorized technical support users will get the latest software versions.
Please contact us to learn more on how to become an authorized technical support user and receive all of the recent PC-3000 Software Updates:

RENEW YOUR TECHNICAL 
SUPPORT CONTRACT

Interested in providing the full range of NAND recovery services? 
Take a look at our extra adapters for recovering data and digital evidence from NAND-flash drives with external chips and monoliths:

More info about the adapters for PC-3000 Flash is here.

The following English software update is released:

• PC-3000 Flash software Ver. 7.2.5.

Detailed list of enhancements:

What’s new?

1. Special analysis algorithm has been added:
   • for PS8035, SM2685, SM2703 controllers with MLC memory: fully automated image assembling and update blocks arrangement
   • for PS8210 controllers with MLC memory: fully automated image assembling for single/dual-channel modes and update blocks arrangement
   • for AlcorMicro SD Type 1 (for monolith cases based on AU controller)
2. Full screen mode for Bit Map (Bad Byte cutting mode) has been added.
3. The new data preparation method has been added: "Swap half-bytes". This method can be used when the user needs to add ECC support that’s not included in the software (only if they differ by a sequence of half-bytes).
4. The preparation method "XOR by plane" has been added. 
   The method allows to apply a personal XOR from the Resources Base for each plane.
5. The ability to select only the blocks with versions has been implemented in the editing mode of the "Synchronization Table".
6. The parameters of the "Block synchronization by marker" preparation method are now saved for each result and filled in the dialog box automatically after the second launch.
7. The preparation method "Remap page in block" to work with MLCx3 microships has been added.
8. The specialized tool "Parallel source browsing" has been added. It’s run on the Transformation Graph line and designed to synchronously view the dumps of the selected members.
9. A lot of new resources have been added to the core: NAND memory chips, XOR, ECC formats, page formats, reading rules, read retries, etc.

New resources in PC-3000 Flash 7.2.5:

All authorized technical support users will get the latest software versions.

Please note that since modern memory microchips require the dynamic change of power supply to correct errors, some of new features will work only in the latest version of PC-3000 Flash Reader (v. 4.0).

Don’t be left behind! By upgrading your previous generation PC-3000 Flash Reader to the newest one, you’ll get:

• Better quality of chip reading with built-in power control adapter
• One month of free Technical Support
• New PC-3000 software update (7.2.5.) free of charge
• Opportunity to use our revolutionary Spider Board Adapter

ACE Lab Tech Conference “Exploring the Latest Data Recovery Trends & Developments” in Las Vegas, USA, went beyond all the expectations! The event attracted a record-breaking number of attendees from both North and South America on June 8, 2018. 

It was full of valuable technical info, data recovery tips & tricks and even more smart and easy solutions to the most burning and complex issues.

The participants walked away with a detailed knowledge on how to work with the latest Seagate and Western Digital HDDs. They also got an in-depth look at the new advanced method for determining complex RAID configurations and data recovery from Apple Fusion Drive. In the third part of the conference the attendees took a deep dive into SSD and Flash data recovery. Each session ended with a Q&A period when members from the audience shown their interest and addressed their particular concerns.

Relive the ACE Lab Conference in Las Vegas by exploring the photo gallery:

  

ACE Lab conferences have emerged as the foremost world-wide gatherings of data recovery engineers, digital forensics experts and academia members who are involved in recovering data and electronic evidence. We are always glad to share our inventions with old friends and new faces, so we look forward to see you next time!

The Techno Security & Digital Forensics Conference 2018 in Myrtle Beach (SC, USA) ended on a high note after 4 days of networking, business appointments and educational sessions. ACE Lab was proud to become a part of such an important resource for corporate network security professionals, federal, state and local law enforcement digital forensic specialists, and cybersecurity industry leaders from around the world.

As a Gold Sponsor of the event, we presented the latest technologies in recovering digital evidence from the widest range of storage devices like HDD, RAID, SSD, Flash drives and Mobile devices. The turnout at our booth was overwhelming during the entire exhibition - it was a wonderful experience to share innovations with so many interested people.

ACE Lab conducted the Session dedicated to the low-level access method for extracting evidence from Solid State Drives. The presentation made by Roman Morozov, Head of Technical Support and NAND Data Recovery Tutor at ACE Lab aroused an incredible interest among the audience. All the attendees were amazed to discover the unique way for bypassing the TRIM command - the Techno Mode - to extract even deleted evidence from SSDs without the need for chip-off. And the quantity of questions after the session was a good indication of this.

Thank you all for the positive feedback and spending time with us. See you at the upcoming events!