Comments on: Howto access ext3 partition from Windows

By: Albert

Albert — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 23:13:12 +0000

WOW! thanks!!!
this is in my opinion one of the best solutions to acces/convert EXT3 files to NTFS using the SAMBA interface in combination with this nice tutorial, which does great job. All other solutions like Ext2 IFS, ext2explore always cause DATA LOSS, only your solution is the most clean one!

By: eagle275

eagle275 — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 22:37:27 +0000

i wanted to follow your guide - only that I dont have the raid volume before installing ubuntu.

Therefore I created a single primary partition in windows - then added the drives to virtualbox ..

only problem is : after installing ubunto to one of the vbox-drives (during installation it shows me all 5 vbox-drives) and booting up - i dont see any other drives aside /dev/sda which is no other than the primary vbox-drive where I installed ubuntu. I tried fdisk -l but it also only shows
/dev/sda with partition /dev/sda1 and lshw -C shows me /dev/sda and my cdrom . So .. Where are the other drives that are “there” according to virtualbox (they are present in the virtual machine devices… ) and how can i make them usable for mdadm and so on ?

By: finally

finally — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 04:08:33 +0000

Thanks for this awesome guide. It is the only way I could use a nice file backup filesystem like ext4 (I know there may be better ones for backup but I am not that into it) and still access it from Windows 7 64 bit.

By: Scott

Scott — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 20:02:48 +0000

I’m glad I ran across this article since there were problems (sometimes severe) in the way Ext3 access worked in all the other solutions on my Windows 7 x64 installation.

Problem #1: about half of the “easier” solutions presented are read-only, so you cannot write to the Ext3 file system. Writing to the file system was a requirement for my use.

Problem #2: If you have a new installation of Ubuntu and used default settings for Ext3 then you cannot use ext2ifs since “Inodes that are larger than 128 bytes are not supported.” The default for new Ubuntu installs is 256 bytes.

Problem #3: As far as I can tell, that only leaves ext2fsd. It seems some people have gotten it working, but on my install it would only show the directories at the root level of my volume and showed no files inside any of them. This is after following all the alternate things people said to try like running it in compatibility mode for Windows Vista.

This left me no simpler solutions than using VirtualBox and it worked perfectly.

While it might be like using a hammer to crack a nut, at least it worked. Better for my situation than using a defective plastic spork that breaks every time you use it. It worked, which is more than I can say for all the other “easier” solutions.

By: anonymous

anonymous — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 09:57:45 +0000

Great article, really promissing !
Easy, simple and probably the most secure process.
Thanks for the Author and Martin Bajer comment.

+ Promissing alternative:
- [2010/06] http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2read/files/

+ Otherwise:
- [2009/07] http://www.ext2fsd.com
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2fsd/files/

+ Alternatives :
- http://www.fs-driver.org
- http://www.chrysocome.net/explore2fs
- http://www.diskinternals.com/linux-reader/
However, please read carefully Feature, FAQ, LIMITATION, RISK, of each method.
Great article, Thanks

By: reg

reg — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 03:45:17 +0000

for ext4 and LVM you can also use http://ext2read.sf.net

By: Gavin C

Gavin C — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 19:23:05 +0000

My first reaction was “there’s a driver for this” then I realised, “wait, you were looking specifically for a way to let a windows install see a 4TB linux software raid5 array. There’s no driver for *that*.”

This is a cunning workaround - thank you!

By: Martin Bajer

Martin Bajer — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 12:32:39 +0000

Hi,
first of all thanks for interesting articke. It makes me to think about sharing seriously - Now I see Ubuntu files from Windows VirtualBox guest.

BTW, who is this tutorial for? Is it meant for people with dual boot? Why to have dual boot anyway, or why to install Windows directly to your hardware if you have Ubuntu installed already? It is far better to install Windows inside VirtualBox. VirtualBox supports “Shared Folders” - from manual: “allow you to access files of your host system (Ubuntu) from within the guest system (Windows)”.

In my case I am running Ubuntu 9.10 as main system, and Windows XP in VirtualBox just for must have windows only apps like CorelDraw (We are using Inscape as much as possible, but our customers are hooked).

This is my tutorial how to access Ubuntu user files (located on Ext4 partition) from Windows running in Virtual box on top of Ubuntu.

1) Install “VirtualBox Guest Additions” into Windows guest
2) Create dir called for example “Shared” in Nautilus
3) Right click on that folder and select “Sharing options”, check all options
4) Start Virtual Box manager, open settings for Windows virtual host (which has be powered off), go to Shared Folders and create one for your “Shared” dir.
5) Start Windows machine. Go do Explorer and add network drive.

Hope it helps somebody. Cheers

By: Buzz

Buzz — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 18:29:39 +0000

All:

You can mount ext4 ext3 and ext2 drives in windows with ifsdrive. It is THAT easy.

http://www.fs-driver.org/

By: ATOzTOA

ATOzTOA — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 08:10:51 +0000

What about ext4?

By: friend of satam

friend of satam — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 09:37:44 +0000

heei, guys, any software suitable for windauz7?

By: Chris Demwell

Chris Demwell — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 20:01:03 +0000

I would like to point out that this method may be long and difficult, but has the advantage that one can also mount filesystems that are stored in LVM, mdraid or dmraid, or through compression or encryption layers like encfs or cryptoloop. This is very helpful for people who dual-boot their systems, but does have the disadvantage of being more brittle. Here’s where a link to articles about the importance and facility of reasonable backup procedures would come in handy - but you already do backups from any platform you use, right? Me too!

By: aw

aw — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:36:40 +0000

If you are running VirtualBox and have 64 bit capable CPU then you can run a 64 bit client on a 32 bit OS like Windows.

By: Gerriet

Gerriet — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 19:37:03 +0000

Hi ,)

How I can access from Windows to a ext4 partion ? Or must are have the partion ext3 ?

By: Alessandro

Alessandro — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 10:12:18 +0000

To me, not the smarter way to access my data from an ext* partition.
Actually, since the amount of free space on the hard drive is no longer an issue, I’d rather prefer to sync everything on a NTFS partition, with native r/w support in win.

By: mamelouk

mamelouk — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:58:12 +0000

I think this is a good idea. I am sick and tired of loosing data with ext2fs, and having to reboot to linux to checkdisk each time the system crash.

By: Buzz

Buzz — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:27:38 +0000

@Arkadi, not sure which software/method you are referring to, but ext[3,4] are backwards compatible with ext2, so they should work fine. I have had no problems with ext3 and ext4 using ifsdrives in XP.

By: Arkadi

Arkadi — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:04:49 +0000

If it only could support ex4….

By: ackondro

ackondro — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 05:41:17 +0000

I agree also, the above method is long, dangerous and not aligned with what a user wants, try below for a better option
http://www.ext2fsd.com/

By: joeYao

joeYao — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 03:19:39 +0000

I agree with Buzz.

http://www.chrysocome.net/explore2fs