1. try starting your system using a live linux distro like partedmagic
google, download and burn the ISO on CD-R, boot from it, set your language to get proper kb layout.
2. check whether linux can access the data, when not use testdisk and try to find lost partitions selecting the affected drive. (testdisk saved me at least 5 times)
3. dont use windows for recovery as thats a big waste of time.

all my problems with unrecognized partitions have been caused by shitdows.

get used to partedmagic and testdisk. make mbr and partitiontable backups from time to time if you work with windows on frequent basis.

if your disk really died try to get a used identical drive off ebay and replace the controller, the green/blue power circuit board. the PCB has to be identical revision.

notes for the future:
never store critical data on internal drives (using windows)!
data backup of course.

 

Power Data Recovery ; R-Studio Network Edition ; Spin.6 ; Wondershare Data Recovery . Any of these programs might well be able to recover your data. The best ones work as a boot disc and can read your dead drive even when your OS can not recognize it.

 

I agree with Catalyst. Use any Linux Live CD or bootable Live USB. I've done this to backup data from unbootable Windows disk/partitions for years.

Final word of advice, start making backups, and backup your backups. Good luck!

 

His drives controller is OK..his BIOS recognizes the disk. There are only a few bad sectors in the MBR, FAT or TOC. There are a few really good recovery tools for windows. Normally there is no need to use a linux distr. to recover sucessfully.

 

Most recovery software is utter crap, I've tried them all....

Acronis Recovery got me 90% of my data back when mine stopped functioning, all depends whats wrong with the drive. (it takes a LOOOONG time)

Take it to a recovery expert if that doesn't work for ya.

Worst Case... ya download again... if you cant find some of what you lost.. it's just how it is.

Those are ur options.

Backup next time. Hard drives are cheap now.

 

this is a great tip *yes*
now I do not need a backup


if your disk really died try to get a used identical drive off ebay and replace the controller, the green/blue power circuit board. the PCB has to be identical revision.

this is a good idea,if you have the skills

If the read head has hit the platter you may have
bigger problems

look up How to Swap Hard Disk Drive Platters
on internet lots of tutorials

 

Buy a new one (...and start to pray)

P.S.
Next time you have to duplicate all using DVD...

 

It really is difficult to have backups of everything in this day and age of packed multi terabyte hard drives. It ends up being that you have to buy 2 hard drives, one for the original files and one for the backup. Not everyone has money for endeavors such as this particularly when they might have a ton of externals. For the future if you have the money and have a little patience in getting it configured I would look into running a RAID array. Post your experience so far and we'll see if there is anything else we can do for you. Good luck!

 

Take your hard drive out and put it in usb sata plus ide enclosure.will be able to access your data. Or place your hard drive back in pc and use your windows disk to repair drive.

 

On windows 7 and have windows 7 disk you only need to run that at start up and it will give you option to repair windows. That should sort it.I repaired a friends comp that way last week so know that it does work that way.

 

I am on XP SP3 and I'm trying to avoid a repair because I have so many applications and settings set up that it would take me a long time to fix everything up. This is what happened: at first it would boot to the desktop but the status bar would not load and it would freeze so that even a CTRL+ALT+DELETE wouldn't work. Then this soon escalated and I started getting a Stop 0X0000007 error when booting normally. I got around this for a while by booting into Safe Mode and performing a System Restore but this would have to be done on every boot in order to work and soon even all restore points disappeared. Then after that even Safe Mode wouldn't work even though there is still hard disk activity. I tried to go to Recovery Console but for some stupid reason it can't see my hard drive anymore. I know it's still working though because I was able to boot into Safe Mode once after this. I actually have a registry backup but I can't get to it and I'm not sure that would solve the problem. I also would love to run chkdsk but I can't get to that either.

 

Find a similar hard drive . (Doesn't have to be the same size. But made by the same company and similar in exact design). Switch green circuit boards of the drives...placing the new circuit board drive on the one that died.
If this doesn't work, then you have a mechanical problem. Most data recovery places can fix this as well.

 

Catalyst

do you have a floppy drive on your computer

can you get a copy of SpinRite 6.0 for Windows XP (NTFS)

I used to use it when I ran XP it does a good job , but it takes a while, not good if your hard drive is near death

this might be a ram memory error , you could shut down your computer and swap memory modules around

Did it give any other information or numbers? *yes*

 

Korgrog
I checked the minidump folder but there was nothing recent in there. I also got a chance to check the Event Log real quick and I remember seeing ft corruption on recent dates so this confirmed that this was the problem for me. Unfortunately I don't have access to a floppy drive anymore so I can't run SpinRite. The full stop error was Stop 0x0000007E (0xC0000005, 0xF4762184, 0xF63E7D44, 0xF63E7A40). Thanks for trying to help man, I really appreciate it because unlike Martel80 this is my system drive which means my computer is a big paperweight at the moment.

Also unfortunately I'm not sure if I used a Corporate edition disc or a Professional disc when I upgraded my PC from Home Edition. This makes a repair problematic as I assume that I need to choose the right disk.

 

On the one hand that's true, but on the other hand only a small amount of that data is really important normally. Even if people collect hundreds of hours of HD film material from their precious honeymoon - sometimes you just have to let go and separate the important stuff from the garbage. Otherwise it's compulsive hoarding. :dancing:

But of course if people think that every shitty sample pack has to be preserved till the end of time, it's their problem.

 

IT might be your ram, you cannot run memtest because you have no floppy

your computer might have a built in ram test at boot up some hp machines have this

you would need to find out how to boot into your bios

I would try to remove the ram, I do not know how many sticks you have, and try to start the computer

with one stick and see what happens

If you reinstall XP you will loose all your programs in the registry and need to reinstall them anyway

did you install or update the drivers to anything , or auto update before this started?

found this somewhere else

If you have a Full Operating System on CD then you can try this:

1. Configure the computer to start from the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive. For information about how to do this, see your computer documentation, or contact your computer manufacturer.
2. Insert the Windows XP CD-ROM into your CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, and then restart your computer.
3. When you receive the "Press any key to boot from CD" message, press a key to start your computer from the Windows XP CD-ROM.
4. When you receive the "Welcome to Setup" message, press R to start the Recovery Console.

I think you can run scan disk from here , it has been a while for me using XP
I do not think it matters which disk you use , to boot, just take your time,
too many I lost it all, had to reformat stories on line , I used to have this problem
when I ran XP, was bad ram or some file error hard to recover from,when I did get it
to work computer ran like crap, backed up everything, reformatted started from scratch
run windows 7 now on all machines, runs pretty good, still have the odd screw up
that you cannot find any real answers for online

 

Try looking for the latest Hirens boot cd its packed with loads of tools and might help you get back some of your data.
My advice for the future is to run error checks and repair on all your drives regally, like once a month.
I don't know if turning off indexing will prolong a hard drives life?.

 

Thanks again korgrog, Lukie and anyone else I may have forgotten for the help and for the record I am actually very conservative in what I download and am certainly no collector. I'll do a RAM check later today and I think I have a Hiren Boot CD floating around somewhere. I already tried recovery console but it only worked once and the second time couldn't find my drive which is funny because I was able to boot into Safe Mode one last time after this. No new hardware and not even any changes in software recently including driver updates. Concerning which disk to use I was referring to if I ran a repair would it matter if I used a Corporate Edition or a Professional Edition since I have no idea which one was initially used for the original installation. Thanks again for your time man, I'm really good at this stuff but sometimes someone may come up with something you might have forgotten about which is useful.

 

Hi,

i have also similar question so i wont make a new thread.
Well my problem is a bit difrent. My haddrive is not recozgnized anymore in BIOS, so i though circuit board is dead but few days ago my friend bring me same harddrive with working circuit board. so i took that circuit board off and place put it on my harddrive, but it was same my haddrive still wasnt recognized in BIOS. Any ideas?


Thanks

 

That's me. I have a complete collection of Vengeance samples, I guess because everyone says "You have to have them", so I have them, but I never use them, dont know why...