Laptop drive - Nearly all folders empty?

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texuspete00

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So I'm trying to fix a computer for a friend. It's an Asus G75V laptop with a 1TB hard drive inside (not an ssd). The computer goes to an Asus setup page when you turn it on all of a sudden, like the HDD is empty. I took it out and hooked it up to my desktop. It's really weird. There is a file or two in the root, and a ton of EMPTY folders. There may be empty subfolders, but nearly no folders have actual files inside, including folders like "system32." The primary goal is to recover the last couple of months of school work first, getting the computer up and running again is secondary.

I tried recuva freeware thinking I should proceed like I am trying to recover deleted files. It like instantly came back with no results for files to be recovered. I guess an empty drive scans quick! I am curently running a "deep scan." It looks like it will take 4 or 5 hours. I also did some googling, and I do see some malware discussions on hard drives having all empty folders, I will continue to research, but thought I should open a thread in case someone can help me out with some advice.
 
Seems like your friend has got a nasty virus. I'm sure your files and folders are there there just not accesible or visible do to whaever worm you got.

I would suggest clean format and install would be the best bet.
 
If I can get the school work off the drive (I am looking for cad drawings mostly), I'll format and reinstall windows. There is a recovery partition on this drive, which seems to be intact. I don't know how to use it, but I'll figure it out.
 
do you have view hidden files enabled? Try accessing it from a live disk like knoppix or ubuntu.
 
Restoring from a factory partition will still erase any files that you have on there. You can try recovery options that might work. Really seems like you got a virus if somehow you can get a virus scanner to find it you may be able to look up instructions on how to get rid of it.

Have you tried seeing what happens in safe mode? Maybe the stuff may show up?
 
I would check the SMART data on the drive to see if the problem is physical
 
Check the permissions, if those aren't right you will not see anything from the second machine.
 
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