HELP !!! Drive disappear !!!

[AhV]

Any computer whiz out there ? My computer prompted me to 'SCANDISK' on my slave harddisk this afternoon. So, I did ..followed the instructions and "fixed" the Harddisk.

After fixing, my computer failed to recognise the drive..kept telling me that my HD was not formatted....General failure error reading Drive d : and data cyclicancy check etc. What has happened ? Pls advise as my images are in the HD :cry:

Any chance of recovery ???

 

[meepokman]

it think its time u call in the professionals.

never encounter such an issue for the past 4 yrs whenever i fix/repair comps.

The chances of recovery is there. If all you did was scandisk, then chances are high (abt 85%). But you will have to pay a professional & qualified person to do it.

I know there are people who can do it but not sure where to find.

good luck.

*don't zero-out your harddisk or else ur pics will be gone forever.

 

[Wai]

actually i have encountered this a few times, so far i manage to recover my data by rebuilding the File allocation table, you need plenty of luck too

The error msg you have seen indicated that the first track (track 0), where the master boot record located, is corrupted, that's why your scan disk prompt you to repair it, but you shouldn't have let scan disk fixed it, because it may actually corrupt your File allocation table further (from my experience)

good that your PC still can recognise the drive (physically) means the drive still can work (rather than completely dead), if you have another working PC, bring this hard disk to another PC for recovery.

If only MBR is corrupted, you can try rebuild it using the command fdisk /mbr, if the FAT is corrupted as well, you will need tools that can rebuild FAT for you (but they are not free).

After you have the FAT rebuilt, you can then access all your data and transfer to another hard disk. After which you may want to reformat the drive, or better still get a new one.

If all these failed, may be you can keep your drive aside for a few days, and try plug in the hard disk again see if its works, miracles do happen. The recovery process is too time consuming, so I dun help pple do that anymore.

 

[Spyer2]

I encountered such case too, coz my mobo going to die soon. I detected my IDE slot are the main fault. ;(

 

[Wai]

I encountered such case too, coz my mobo going to die soon. I detected my IDE slot are the main fault. ;(

yes, that's why i ask him to transfer the drive to another PC

it can be due to wrong BIOS setting too, esp for old hard disk <10GB, this kind of compatiblility problem was quite common last time.

 

[AhV]

Thanks guys for the advice.....

According to Wai, I should not have allowed SCANDISK to 'fix' my HD in the first place.

Now my options are :

1. Get a pro to 'save' it but need to find them - Any1 has any idea where I can find one ?

2. Unplug my HD and plug it into another working PC. Attempt to repair the MBR and FAT from there. Did I understand correctly ?

3. After Wai's advice, I stayed up last night and found a DOS program on the net - DISKPATCH, which supposedly repairs MBR and FAT - sounded impressive but I cant understand the steps ... TOO TECHNICAL

Has any1 use this programme before ? As it is my old PC, I am still using WIN98 ;p I am not sure if there are certain steps to take note of/ follow. I will still get home and try again tonight.

4. This is the last option. WAIT FOR MIRACLE TO HAPPEN ?

 

[CYRN]

Thanks guys for the advice.....

According to Wai, I should not have allowed SCANDISK to 'fix' my HD in the first place.

Now my options are :

1. Get a pro to 'save' it but need to find them - Any1 has any idea where I can find one ?

2. Unplug my HD and plug it into another working PC. Attempt to repair the MBR and FAT from there. Did I understand correctly ?

3. After Wai's advice, I stayed up last night and found a DOS program on the net - DISKPATCH, which supposedly repairs MBR and FAT - sounded impressive but I cant understand the steps ... TOO TECHNICAL

Has any1 use this programme before ? As it is my old PC, I am still using WIN98 ;p I am not sure if there are certain steps to take note of/ follow. I will still get home and try again tonight.

4. This is the last option. WAIT FOR MIRACLE TO HAPPEN ?

If you've got valuable data on that drive... options 3 and 4 are definately not recommended.

For option 2 maybe you can plug it to a PC running a later version of OS.. maybe it can help as the later OS have (but limited) self recovery routine.

For option 1... find classified from ST.... or bring the HDD down to SLS and ask ard? :dunno:

hope it help.

 

[ST1100]

i've encountered missing drives too, that refuse to reappear. i used R-Studio from R-Tools Technology - managed to recover most of my data with another PC. Cost about US$50.

It works by scanning the entire drive and recovering whatever intact data it finds, file by file.

 

[AhV]

i've encountered missing drives too, that refuse to reappear. i used R-Studio from R-Tools Technology - managed to recover most of my data with another PC. Cost about US$50.

It works by scanning the entire drive and recovering whatever intact data it finds, file by file.

My HD cannot be recognised at the moment by WIN 98 but can be seen as a drive by WIN2000 but kept prompting me to format the drive

Will your program worked ? Where can I get hold of a copy ?

 

[StreetShooter]

Thanks guys for the advice.....

According to Wai, I should not have allowed SCANDISK to 'fix' my HD in the first place.

Now my options are :

1. Get a pro to 'save' it but need to find them - Any1 has any idea where I can find one ?

2. Unplug my HD and plug it into another working PC. Attempt to repair the MBR and FAT from there. Did I understand correctly ?

3. After Wai's advice, I stayed up last night and found a DOS program on the net - DISKPATCH, which supposedly repairs MBR and FAT - sounded impressive but I cant understand the steps ... TOO TECHNICAL

Has any1 use this programme before ? As it is my old PC, I am still using WIN98 ;p I am not sure if there are certain steps to take note of/ follow. I will still get home and try again tonight.

4. This is the last option. WAIT FOR MIRACLE TO HAPPEN ?

This is your slave drive, right? Does it get transferred between a Win 98 and Win XP PC? If so, XP may have written some partitions onto it, which prevent your Win 98 PC from reading the hard disk.

You may want to try this DOS utility to remove the XP partitions:

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/delpart.zip

It successfully saved one of my slave drives, which experienced a similar problem before. Can't remember whether I managed to recover the data, though, so USE AT YOUR OWN RISK.

 

[ST1100]

My HD cannot be recognised at the moment by WIN 98 but can be seen as a drive by WIN2000 but kept prompting me to format the drive

Will your program worked ? Where can I get hold of a copy ?

i downloaded the trial from download.com, then went to the home site to pay.

 

[AhV]

*sigh* As per your advices when I last posted this thread, I have sent my drive to 'data recovery experts' at SLS. I was hopeful when they told me that they were able to identify the drive and could attempt to copy the whole harddisk bit by bit to another Harddisk...estimated cost was only $150. At that point, it sounded good to me.

I have just received a call yesterday and they told me my drive has 'failed' ..computer was not able to identity it so that makes copying impossible. They explained that there was one last hope ... use the INDUSTRIAL method - whatever that may be but it will cost me $1500 !!!! :cry:
wakao ... :bigeyes: as costly as a new desktop PC

Is there any cheaper alternative ? or is there any "IT whiz" CSer out there who can help ? I really cant afford that kind of money but will be grateful if my images could be retrieved/ saved. Any advice for me, people ? Any clear D-I-Y instructions for me to follow ?

I am still hopeful....15GB of images... its a pain to lose ALL of them I SWEAR I will NEVER run SCANDISK again !

 

[Newman]

....15GB of images...

Ouch! I once lost 800MB of memories. Now I always backup my photos!
If your hdd has mechanically failed then the only choice is to use industrial recovery service and yes it's expensive. This is just one of them. http://www.ibas.com.sg/ You can do a search from sg.yahoo.com to look for more.

Good luck!