Question for krell or Shawners re: harddisks

[Dark Messenger]

First off apologies for this lazy post.

I had a maxtor 50 gig hdd installed running windows xp professional (Dell branded) on a P-4 1,8 gigahertz, 512mb pc set up on a fat32 as drive C: with an 80gigabyte Western Digital NTFS formatted drive as D:\.

Somehow the D:\ drive got corrupted and the data can't be read. What would cause this and can it be fixed? I've heard Shawners recommend something before I think it was called 'getdataback'.

I tried that and it didn't recover everything. I heard you can use the pro version of Spinrite and that might fix it too.

Only thing I can think of that might have corrupted the data was to change my environmental variables temp directory settings from C:\whatever to D:\whatever...possibly rebooting before programs closed or from system hangs with write behind caching enabled or powering off resetting with write behind caching enabled.

As far as corrupting data tables that's all I can think of that might have caused this and this is simple everyday shit like pushing the reset button or powering off before all programs have exited properly.

It seems odd this should happen but then again this is my first experience with drives larger than 3.2 to 13.2 gigabytes so it may be more common than I know.

Anybody else have any thoughts or similiar experiences you want to share please feel free to do so...did not mean to exclude anyone in addressing a request for comments to these two folks...just really wanted their input as they seem familiar with this problem.

thanks guys and dolls (for the very few female posters we have here)

[Krell]

Start > Run > Cmd > chkdsk d: /f

Make sure this is ok, then reboot.

If you still can not access the data, it may be that the MFT is corrupt, and you need a recovery software for NTFS, theres plenty to chose from. You should use a diff drive to recover the data TO.



.

[thepuzzler]

I've always good things to say about File Scavenger. (http://www.quetek.com/prod02.htm) I've managed to recover a whole drive worth of stuff with it. Good program.

[shawners]

Some programs can fix disc errors and mark them so data cant be or wont be stored on them.. check the hard disc to make sure there arent errors and then try to recover portion of your hard drive at a time. Unless you got 80 gigs or more external drive. You have to try systemworks 2006, it may help get data back. And i have lost data before a couple years back, no big loss since at the time it was 128kbs of songs. Let us know what you achieved so far in recovery.

[Dark Messenger]

Let us know what you achieved so far in recovery.

will do that later..still in lazy mode right now. ;)

Update: December 18, 2008 - THURSDAY

Finally got around to updating this thread as I finally found the time and means for doing so.

Here's how I did it. I googled site:www.zeropaid.com krell harddrive and read everything I could find by krell.

I then obtained the following software:

A) GetDataBack for NTFS version 3.50

Installed it and ran it registering it.

B) I then took out my secondary or slave drive and replaced it with what I thought to be the failing Maxtor one.

CRUCIAL:
**** A VERY IMPORTANT TIP FOR YOU IF FIND YOURSELF IN THE SAME MESS AS I WAS IN. STOP WHATEVER YOU ARE DOING WITH THE BAD DRIVE. STOP USING IT. LEAVE IT ALONE. DON'T DO ANYTHING THAT COULD WRITE DATA TO IT*******

I hope I made myself clear on the above.

C) Now I freed up as much space as I could on my PRIMARY or 'Boot' drive (the one that loads the operating system or 'OS'.)

For me I had a very nice 80 gigabyte Western Digital (caviar edition I think it is that may spin at 7200rpms)

I freed up 34gigabytes of space on my F:\ partion and 17gigabytes of space on my E:\ partion and then I used Get DataBack for NTFS version 3.50 selecting the FOURTH OPTION which is:

I just want to recover files.

3) After I selected that option the program did a bit of scanning...less than a minute and presented me with a nice list of drive letters in explorer view which allowed me to pick the drive I wanted to recover files from. I of course selected the Maxtor one as it was the one I had problems with.

4) Then I clicked next and it took a helluva long time to complete its scan recovering data records for lost files that were stilll salvageable. I'd say it took about 6 hours for it to this scan on my Dell Dimension 4400 machine with 512mb ram and 1,8 gigahertz processor.

5) After it was done it asked me did I want to see a list of filss to recover I said yes and it create a directory structure from within the GetDataBack for NTFS program its self similiar to what you might see in an explorer view window.

IMPORTANTE!

Make sure at this point you go to file and select 'save recovery record' and save it somewhere on a drive THAT YOU ARE NOT TRYING TO RECOVER DATA FROM.


6) I was so scared when I got to this point that I just left the program open and running even after I made this backup copy of the recovery record. mine had the extension .st3 or something.


7) Then it was just a simple matter of going into the options for GetDataBack for NTFS and setting the target drive and folder for where I wanted the recovered files to go.

8) I then backed up everything I wanted.

9) When finished I obtaine another software program that works conjointly with this one called 'Disk Explorer for NTFS' also by Runtime software the same people that make GetDataBack for NTFS.

I didn't do to much with it because I didn't know what to do with it so I basically just closed the program.

10) I thought to myself, "What would krell do? and I remembered he had suggested that after getting the needed SALVAGEABLE data off the old and failing drive that we should then proceed with a low-level format of the drive.


11) I had already obtained a 'MaxBlast Live' cd from the manufacturer's website for my Maxtor drive and then proceeded to pop the disk in my dvd-drive and install the software 'Maxblast' which then prompted me to remove the cd from the dvd drive and click done to launch the program which I did.

12) the Maxblast program started and gave me two options one was to view drive information which I did. After viewing information about my drive I was able to obtain the model number from this screen and used that later by hitting the 'back' button in the Maxblast program to allow me to view jumper settings for my drive.


13) When selecting 'view jumper settings' for this drive you are presented with a drop-down menu that allows you to select your harddrive from a list of what appears to be nearly every brand of Maxtor harddrives there is. I found mine and saw it had a shitload of settings I never knew about because my drive was used and didn't come with any information not even the friggin sticker with the jumper settings diagram on top.

14) The two most important pieces of information I learned from using the Maxblast software program natively installed in windows (not running from the cd its self which was bootable) was that if my drive was a single drive meaning the only drive installed in my computer the jumper pin should go to the far left in the first position at the back of my drive.

and if my drive were a SLAVE meaning there was another drive already installed on my pc that was able to boot the system I should remove the jumper completely in order for it to act as a slave drive (additional storage space).

15) So then I remembered what krell said about the importance of setting jumpers correctly. I had my jumper set incorrectly. I think it was for cable select..but I didn't want to take any chances so I opened up the pc case and removed the jumper as per the instructions from the jumper settings section for my drive in order to make it a proper slave drive.

Plugged everything back in powered on.

16) Again ran the MaxBlast software native from within windows (which means I had installed the software on my harddrive and was not running it from the bootable cd as per another krell suggestion from a post I read by him on zeropaid.)

17) Now I selected the option to set up my drive. The software automatically recognised my drive at its full capacity no less and made a recommended suggestion that I format it as NTFS with no partitions fully utilising all 60 gigs...which I did.

b) It warned me that choosing this option would overwrite any data already on the drive and that this data was still on my drive....you remember don't ya? The files that I had ALREADY RECOVERED. so there were no worries here and krell even suggested in another thread that even if I did choose to reformat the drive this way it might make it easier for the recovery program to restore my data..but in this case I already had what I needed from the drive and was ready to format it.


c) Formatting was quick and painless. All I had to do according to the MaxBlast software was to click done in the MaxBlast software program and start using my drive which I did and found to my delight a full 60 gigabytes now accessible to me with the majority of everything I already wanted to save fully recovered onto my primary drive.

18) So now after all this time. I finally finished this and edited my last post in this topic to reflect that. Now I will bump this thread to let y'all know I was sucessful and hopefully it can help others.

-DM

[Dark Messenger]

Bumping for the Lord.

[napho]

Bumping for the Lord.

Krell is with all of us; in our hearts, our thoughts, yes, even our loins. :icon_salu :icon_thum:icon_king:love