Hard Disk Hell! help!

Recently i have had a problem with my secondary HDD in my PC.

I was getting pop-ups saying i had a problem and i needed to visit a certain site to fix it, yada-yada, so I ran Spybot to see if it could find anything.

I ran Spybot, which said it needed to reboot to fully remove the ad/spyware, so I did, and when i rebooted Windows could not see any files on my F: drive, and kept asking me if i wanted to format it.

This freaked me out so I got a program to scan the drive and make sure my disk was empty before i formatted it and the files are actually still there.

I used two progs to scan and cover the files over to another disc, but they rename all the file names to new names, which isnt ok for me. I want all my files back, with their original names. Im not just trying to recover specific files. There are thousands of em.

Can anyone give me any solutions or advice on this? Id really prefer not to have to spend much, if any, money on getting this fixed.

Is there some index files missing that are causing this prob?

Thanks for any help u may be able to give.

Is this an entire HD, just one partition on the drive, or otherwise? Is the drive formatted FAT or NTFS? Is it on your primary or secondary (slave) drive?

A few more details please!

The FIRST thing you MIGHT try is to go to a command prompt, and type:

"FDISK F: /MBR" without the quotes. This will force FDISK to refresh the Master Boot Record (MBR) of just that partition. Then reboot and try it again. If this doesn't do the trick, please post back more details and I'll dig a little deeper. ;)

Hi!

Its an NTFS drive, one partition, and its a secondary drive, on XP Home...

I tried using Fdisk as instructed, but it doesnt seem to be installed on my system. I could download it and install it but i dont know where to install or extract it to?

Or is there any other advice u could give on the information ive just given?

Thanks Shiva!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hal909

Hi!

Its an NTFS drive, one partition, and its a secondary drive, on XP Home...

I tried using Fdisk as instructed, but it doesnt seem to be installed on my system. I could download it and install it but i dont know where to install or extract it to?

Or is there any other advice u could give on the information ive just given?

Thanks Shiva!

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Well shoot! I'm just being ignorant...FDISK doesn't exist in XP, it's an obsolete utility. All disk management is done through Administrative Services. I don't know if there is an equivalent to FDISK /MBR, which was a NON-destructive process in prior versions, or not. I'll do a little more research, and if nobody beats me back here, I'll post back later when I know better what I'm driving at! Sorry! :o

Can you post a screen shot of what your ADMINISTRATIVE TOOLS/COMPUTER MANAGEMENT/DISK MANAGEMENT screen actually looks like? This will show what XP THINKS the status of that partition actually is.

Get to this via Control Panel BTW!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shiva_42

I don't know if there is an equivalent to FDISK /MBR

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The Win2000/WinXP equivalent is "Fixmbr" from the command prompt in the Recovery Console. There is also "Fixboot" for repairing the boot sector.

Description of the Windows 2000 Recovery Console

Description of the Windows XP Recovery Console

If i go into the command prompt of the recovery console will i be able to apply the FIXMBR to my F: drive? My OS is installed on my C: drive? I presume the prompt will start at C: or C:/Windows... Can i get to my F: drive with usual DOS commands?

Here is a screen shot as requested by Shiva...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hal909

If i go into the command prompt of the recovery console will i be able to apply the FIXMBR to my F: drive? My OS is installed on my C: drive? I presume the prompt will start at C: or C:/Windows... Can i get to my F: drive with usual DOS commands?

Here is a screen shot as requested by Shiva...

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Mods:

I can't display this attached pic. The system tells me I don't have sufficient privileges for some reason. Would this be due to my recent change after passing 2000 posts, or has something inadvertently been turned off on me?

Shiva, I suspect that the group you are now in has an incorrect setting, I'll pass it on to an Admin.

Shiva, try again please.

Can anyone help me with this?

Take the cd out of the tray.

7:45 EST, 5 Jan...it's doing the same for me...just a VDr message that I have insufficient privileges to view the image. Is the screen shot of his Administrative Tools window just too sexy? :rolleyes: :D

That could be it Bistro!

Is there any way I can embed it into my posts?

I really need help with this!

The image viewing problem is internal to VDr (not your fault); that should be cleared up soon. Another way to display an image that might work would be to post a link to the screenshot where it is stored on a photo storage site such as Photobucket or Boomspeed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bistro

The image viewing problem is internal to VDr (not your fault); that should be cleared up soon. Another way to display an image that might work would be to post a link to the screenshot where it is stored on a photo storage site such as Photobucket or Boomspeed.

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Ah good to see it's being looked into.

I brought it up in another thread and only those with 2000+ posts can't view.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Nix

I brought it up in another thread and only those with 2000+ posts can't view.

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:confused: Hmmmmm....maybe if one makes it to 10,000 posts, then they can see images again. :eek:

:D

The problem should be fixed now Bistro......


Liam

Thanks, liam...mucho bedder....can see the screenshot now.

Hal909, Windows is reading that drive (F: ) as completely empty and unformatted. Not sure why that program (name of program?) would show files existing on the drive (it might be reading some kind of cache rather than the drive itself :confused: or the files are still there, just on an unformatted drive and Windows isn't recognizing them).
It might be problematic, if not impossible to recover any existing files off of it if it is not formatted correctly. Perhaps someone here has some better insight. Meanwhile, I'll do some checking around.

EDIT: You may have to get a data recovery utility such as Get Data Back in order to recover those files off an unformatted drive, but it will cost you.

Ya all the files are still there. Its looking like im gonna have to pay 50 dollars to get Restorer2000pro to do it for me, just thought there might of been another way around.

If u come up with anything let me know.

Well, there might be another way around...i just do not know of any offhand to be honest. Hang in there for awhile...don't mess with the drive at all and wait to see if someone will come along here who may have more insight than little ol' me. Might save you some bucks and a headache.

You might be able to rescue the data with one of these free file recovery programs, many members have had great succuss with them in the past:

PC Inspector

Restoration

Exactly WHAT program are you using that DOES show files on the drive? I've never seen a drive with the status your screenshot indicates that ANY other program, short of a specialized data recovery program, would see filenames on. If it is any sort of a "standard" application, clue us in. Otherwise, even when a drive is damaged, formatted, or otherwise "unavailable", many of the specialized data recovery apps will be able to divine the contents. But, you'll be stuck using that "data recovery" program to recover the files... Windows won't be able to provide a silver bullet under those circumstances.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Train

Take the cd out of the tray.

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My image viewing is fine now. BTW, what does the line above pertain to???

http://home.comcast.net/~copn/web/screenshot2.jpg

The only time my cd devices show up like that is if I have a disk in there.
That is what I was refering to.

I uploaded hal909's picture and linked it in for a couple days.

Now I see!

hal909:

Still waiting to hear what application you refer to when you describe it finding files on this drive...