Winxp says disk healthy, but can't read contents
Hello,
On my Maxtor 300GB 3.5" drive, I have two partitions. The 180GB partition appears as the Q drive in Winxp Pro Disk Mgmt dialoge and is labeled as "healthy" but does not show that it has a NTFS file system. Windows Explorer does not show the size of the partition and when I try see the contents, I get an error message saying the file system is corrupt and unreadable.
I have Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro, which can pull the contents of that partition. But in the past, it made a huge mess of it, saving the files with different filenames and ignoring the folder names, etc. IT is so messy, almost not worth using.
So before going to that last resort, I am wondering if you can recommend other software that could go in there and try to repair the corruption. Is there any hope in that area?
More info: this problem occurred just now after I had to unplug the computer because it was frozen due to an unrelated problem. The disk drive was in a USB portable disk container. When I rebooted, the problem appeared. Before that, the disk was running fine and being maintained by Diskkeeper 9. So I am hoping that perhaps this is due to a minor software issue that could be corrected with the right software. Is there anything out there smart enough to go in there and iron out the corruption?
I also have the following software: BadCopyPro and DiskKeeper Pro v. 10.
On my Maxtor 300GB 3.5" drive, I have two partitions. The 180GB partition appears as the Q drive in Winxp Pro Disk Mgmt dialoge and is labeled as "healthy" but does not show that it has a NTFS file system. Windows Explorer does not show the size of the partition and when I try see the contents, I get an error message saying the file system is corrupt and unreadable.
I have Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro, which can pull the contents of that partition. But in the past, it made a huge mess of it, saving the files with different filenames and ignoring the folder names, etc. IT is so messy, almost not worth using.
So before going to that last resort, I am wondering if you can recommend other software that could go in there and try to repair the corruption. Is there any hope in that area?
More info: this problem occurred just now after I had to unplug the computer because it was frozen due to an unrelated problem. The disk drive was in a USB portable disk container. When I rebooted, the problem appeared. Before that, the disk was running fine and being maintained by Diskkeeper 9. So I am hoping that perhaps this is due to a minor software issue that could be corrected with the right software. Is there anything out there smart enough to go in there and iron out the corruption?
I also have the following software: BadCopyPro and DiskKeeper Pro v. 10.
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Whenever you are trying to get critical data off a problem drive, it is better to not try to fix it and recover the data first. Attempts to fix the drive that fail will make each successive recovery attempt more difficult. GetDataBack will not write to the drive, so have a spare drive ready to copy data to. It should preserve the filenames and will try to preserve the folder structure. It costs nothing to see the data, but you have to pay for it to save data. It is one of the best tools available for this.
ASKER
Thanks. It makes sense. It is scanning the partition now.
ASKER
Well, found all the files I want to recover and got all excited, until realized I have to pony up $79 to register in order to make the COPY data work. You are right. Seems like solid software.
Going back to Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro to see if it can find all the files too.
Going back to Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro to see if it can find all the files too.
ASKER
Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro can't find all the files, not nearly as good as GetDataBack. I even called OnTrack and they said that's the best it can do.
Just $79 price is so high for a one-time deal. Does anyone have any other suggestions, like a cheaper software or Open Software?
Just $79 price is so high for a one-time deal. Does anyone have any other suggestions, like a cheaper software or Open Software?
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PC Inspector http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm
I don't think anything will be as good as GetDataBack, though. Even for $79, it's worth it if you can get back something valuable.
I don't think anything will be as good as GetDataBack, though. Even for $79, it's worth it if you can get back something valuable.
ASKER
Callandor, I believe your opinion of gdb. I couldn't believe how much worse was the performance of Ontrack's Easy Recovery Pro. It sure is "easy" if yo don't care to lose half your data.
I am going to bite the bullet and pony up the $79. thanks for the help.
I am going to bite the bullet and pony up the $79. thanks for the help.
ASKER
Is GetDataBack any better than Easy Recovery Pro? For example, can it save the filenames and folder structure?