Solved Lost the recovery key for BitLocker but..

I lost my recovery key completely but I still have the password. Is there any way I can reach the recovery key without changing the password? (since I'm facing problems accessing it anyway and the solution requires a recovery key not a password)

Thanks in advance for any help.

Hello Margla, and welcome to Eight Forums.

You should still be able to unlock or recover a BitLocker drive with the BitLocker password.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/21433-bitlocker-recovery-unlock-drive-windows-8-a.html

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/21714-bitlocker-repair-tool-recover-drive-windows-7-8-a.html

BitLocker Drive Encryption - Unlock a Locked Data or Removable Drive - Windows 7 Help Forums

Yeah but it freezes once I enter in the right password so I was going to use the bcd-repair command but I'm using Windows 7. I read that bcd-repair+password only works in Windows 8. So I need the recovery key to use another bcd-repair method that's applicable to win7.

If you're wondering why, my computer crashed during the encryption process and now I can't access the drive (external hdd that has an os).

Since it crashed during the encryption process, you'll most likely need to format the hard drive instead.

How about installing Windows 8 and using bcd-repair and the password (of the encrypted drive) to repair it/move files to another partition?

You could try, but I don't think it's going to work since it was interrupted and didn't complete the encryption process.

Bro please tell me if you know ANY other solution in case this fails. That's 500gb of data, it's literally my life and it happened to do this on the same day my backup was moved. Am I SOL or is there a solution with even a very slight chance of luck? ANY?

I'm not aware of anything that may work since BitLocker was interrupted by a crash. When this happens, it's never good.

Thanks anyway man.

Also time to do some suings lel.

Yep, but I never trust anything to work as it should when it comes to a sudden power loss.

("suings" from my previous reply was jokingly directed at Microsoft, who apparently (according to that broken image) said that sudden interruption of the encryption process wouldn't wholly damage the data on the driver and that you can turn the encryption back on again later, by the way.)

But guess what. I've installed Windows 8 this morning aaaaaand the repair tool (from an old post of yours - THANKS!) did in fact work, and it goes as follows for the people who might encounter the same problem in the future:

cmd > Run as Administrator > repair-bde F: D: -pw -F

F (first one; leave the second as it is) = letter of the partially encrypted/damaged drive.

D = parallel empty partition/drive (same size or bigger).

It will then ask you for the password (which will be invisible as you type it in) and will start decrypting once you hit enter (at least in my case and as shown in the link below).

You can use the recovery key instead (works in different OS systems as well) if you have it but it has a different syntax, so check it all out here:

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/21433-bitlocker-recovery-unlock-drive-windows-8-a.html

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/21714-bitlocker-repair-tool-recover-drive-windows-7-8-a.html

(Please correct me if I got anything incorrect here. As I said, I'm a total newbie who I think got lucky, ha!)

Imp. notes:

- For those who are trying to recover from a partial encryption induced damage, the decryption/repair process will be 'stuck' at 1% for a good while prior to kicking in (could remain considerably slow depending on your setup, but will be progressing) - so be patient! I was panicking (yet not surprised) initially and even found some old forum threads from people facing the same (nonexistent) issue that received little to no help and gave up on their data just like that. I don't blame anyone, this can be a really misleading 'issue' (especially that a hanging error in this case will mostly likely seem familiar). It took me about an hour or more to see progress.

I'm still at 68% myself, but I'll keep you updated. It's progressing as I write this.

- I unintentionally alt+F4'd the Command Prompt earlier but there wasn't anything different from the first time when I turned it back on (same for the error below), so don't panic if it happens to you. However, be careful, because as made clear; it takes a good deal of time to see progress.

- I got an error (seven duplicates with different numbers) when I reached 7% reading: "LOG ERROR: 0xc0000037

Failed to read sector at offset 37571010560 (different number for each) <0x0000017>"

but it continued normally after that (again took a while, but it did proceed on from 8% as it should - no cutoffs).

I'm going to guess these are only a few irrecoverable files (will probably be partially decrypted to the empty partition/drive) that only took part in between 7-8% so it shouldn't be a biggie (will update you on this too) or make you close the Command Prompt just yet. Patience is key - I've been sitting here for hours but it's gradually getting faster as I write this. It's sure worth it and I still wouldn't believe my eyes to see it reach 100%.

- See you soon.

EDIT: I'm writing this from phone so I didn't post any pictures, but will sure do in the next post.

Alright, IT HAPPENED.





(Make sure to apply the second picture's content too. Some of the files I thought were irrecoverable were repaired as well. All is good now.)

Brb celebrating.

Oh, two lessons:

1) Have backups 24/7. During each and every second. Literally.

2) Never lose hope even when your chances are too slim. This IS fixable (whether my case is special and I got extremely lucky or not, which I'm unsure about) - it IS worth a try.

:thumb:

Great news Margla. I thought that you had already tried that, and it didn't work.