Emergency hard drive help needed

V

vietkangta

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 18, 2005
Messages
316
I was running a "check now" on one of my secondary drive and it was on stage 4 of 5. I thought it was taking too long and i needed to use the computer so i restarted my computer.

After i restarted my computer my hard drive looked liked it was wiped clean!

I partitioned it into 3 parts and none of those parts show up anymore. When i went to disk management it shows the drive as having empty space and that i needed to "initialize" it.

Please someone help. I had a lot of important files on the hard drive that i need to recover somehow.
 
I don't have any advice, but whatever you do DON'T initialize it (unless you come to the conclusion from others' advice the data is truly gone).
 
You'll need to find a recovery tool and hope you can recover data. I don't have any suggestions for said tool, but if you search this forum you'll find lots of suggestions.

I have to ask though, what made you think that would be a good idea?!
 
Well the problem fixed itself. I powered off the computer for a few minutes and now the drive is recognized again.
 
I hope you are busily copying your data to another drive and contemplating your new backup strategy.

Hard drives are still the highest fail item in computers. At any time, for no good reason, your hard drive can quit working.

Any important data must be backed up to at least 1, preferably 2 separate destinations that are stored away from the main computer.

The most common strategy for home users is to use usb external hard drives.

Now, for your situation, go to the manufacturers web site for your drive. Look for the support section. Then find the download section. Then find the DOS version of their diagnostic program. Download the CD version. Burn your CD and boot up with just the suspected drive connected to the computer. Run the Full/Complete scan.

If you find any errors, get rid of the drive as it is making a run SOUTH.

Hope this helps.

Don
 
What exact brand of HD you have? If it's a Seagate/Maxtor HD, you can use the seatools program to check for problems and see if it'll help resolve it. Or maybe your wiring was loose?

Like what DonDon said, might be a good idea to back up your stuff in case the hd really is failing on you.
 
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