However advanced the technology may be and whatever precautions we may take, data loss is almost inevitable. Though Linux operating system is often improved upon its previous versions than any of its counterparts, still there are a number of reasons, for which data can be lost in a Linux operating system based computer. In a Linux computer, the fstab (/etc/fstab) and mtab (/etc/fstab) are the two most crucial directories. Without these directories, the operating system could not be able to locate neither the existing hard drive volumes nor the mounted drives on your system. For this reason, the system fails to boot and all your data in the hard drive becomes inaccessible. In such situation of data loss, you need any Linux data recovery software to recover back the lost or inaccessible data.

Facts about 'fstab' and 'mtab' directories:

• The fstab or 'file systems table' is a system directory within the Linux operating system. This system configuration file contains information about all the available hard drives and volumes attached to the system. The file tells, the way, hard drive volumes are initialized and integrated through the file system. Moreover, it lists the details of the file systems, which are accessed by the 'fsck command.

• The mtab or 'mounted file systems table' is also part of system configuration and lists all the currently mounted file systems on your Linux system. The file retains every detail of the mounted volumes, that is whether mounted manually or automatically and is automatically updated once the mount command is triggered against any drive or volume.

Sometimes, while accessing the Linux drives or the mounted volumes you may come across error messages related to the mounted file system and all the files and directories become inaccessible. The error message that you may have encountered can be read as below:

"Cannot read table of mounted file systems"

The above error is caused due to the corruption of 'fstab' or 'mtab' directories. Thus, the file system fails to mount and the data remains inaccessible thereof.

Such situation of data loss can only be dealt by any efficient Linux data recovery utility. These applications are meant to recover the lost, deleted, formatted or inaccessible data from the Linux file system based volumes. Moreover, these helpful utilities are completely safe to use and come with detailed instructions, so that can be used without any prior knowledge.