External Hard Drive Problem

[CAS]

I just bought a Dell Inspirion 531 with Vista since my old computer (XP)
would no longer function. In order to access the files from the old HD, I
installed it in a Metal Gear Box 3506 UC 3.5" enclosure and connected it to
the USB connection of the new computer. Initially I could see the files, but
after rebooting my computer I received an error message stating that the
drive is not accessible and the disk structure is corrupted and unreadable.

All I want to do is move the files from my old computer HD to the new
computer HD.

Any suggestions would be gratefully appreciated.

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, CAS.

We can't help much unless you tell us more about your old hard drive. And
Vista has kind of the same sort of problem. :>(

What does Disk Management tell you about that drive? Run DM (diskmgmt.msc)
and check out its Help file. You probably need to "initialize" that
"foreign" hard drive.

If you need to post back, please tell us the make and model of that hard
drive, and its interface (IDE/ATA/PATA, SATA, SCSI - or what?).

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)

 

[CAS]

RC:

Thanks for the reply. The hard drive is a Western Digital enhanced IDE.
The model is WD1200JB-75CRA0 and it is 120 GB. Since I could not find the
"run" function on Vista I went to 'control panel', 'computer management' and
then to 'disk management'. It lists this hard drive as "111.76 GB
RAW/Healthy(Primary Partition).

Also, when I go to 'error checking' in 'properties' I get the following
error message: "The disk check could not be performed because Windows cannot
access the disk"

Hope this helps.

My goal is to save the data that is on this old hard drive and move it over
to the hard drive in my new dell computer.

Rgds,

CAS

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, CAS.

Whoops! I meant to get back to you a couple of days ago. :^{

Since I could not find the
"run" function on Vista I went to 'control panel', 'computer management'
and
then to 'disk management'.

There are several ways to "Run" in Vista, but you don't really need any of
them. Just click the Start orb (or press the Windows logo key) and start
typing. Your keystrokes go into the Search box, so type "diskmgmt.msc"
(without the quotes), then press Enter. You'll still need to furnish
Administrator credentials, because this is a very powerful utility that can
do harm as well as good.

I prefer this direct method of starting Disk Management for several reasons,
mostly because it does not carry along the screen real estate "overhead" of
the many-mouse-clicks path through Control Panel | Computer Management. It
irritates me that I can't make DM remember that I want to see it in a
Maximized window and with wider columns, but this view is still better than
the "keyhole" view that I get the other way.

In Vista (as in WinXP), you also can Run any command by pressing <Win>+R.
And you can put the Run command back on Vista's Start menu by right-clicking
on the Start orb, then click Properties, then the Customize button for Start
menu on the Start Menu tab. On this screen, you can customize the Start
menu in several ways, including checking the box for Run command.

Anyhow...Once in Disk Management, click Help | Help Topics. This should
bring up the home page for Microsoft Management Console 3.0, since Disk
Management is a "snap-in" under the MMC. Click the Search tab on the left,
then type in "foreign" and click List Topics (or just press Enter). You
should see 3 topics, all in the DM "Location". All 3 are interesting, but
the second one, "Move Disks to Another Computer", is most on point for your
problem. This version of the Help file puts a lot of emphasis on a couple
of features that most of us don't use at all, so we have to kind of "read
around" all the info about "GUID partition table disks" and dynamic disks.
But there is plenty of info here that applies to us one-man-one-computer
guys like me (and you?).

The key paragraph on that Help page says:
<paste>
Detect new disks
On the new computer, open Disk Management. Click Action and then click
Rescan Disks. Right-click any disk marked Foreign, click Import Foreign
Disks, and then follow the instructions on your screen.
</paste>

DM doesn't know much about what to do with a "RAW" disk but to format it,
since that usually means that it hasn't been formatted. :>(

This should get you going, but if it doesn't, please post back and I'll try
to be more prompt next time.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)

 

[CAS]

RC:

Thanks for the detailed reply. By the way, what is a 'raw file'?

I followed your instructions, but nothing happened when I clicked on 'rescan
disks'. The curser changed to the circle for a few seconds and then
stopped/changed back to the curser. Nothing regarding 'foreign' came up on
the screen.

Would a recovery program be useful at this point?

Also, what about the fact that when I go to 'error checking' in 'properties'
I get the following error message: "The disk check could not be performed
because Windows cannot access the disk" ?

Your patience with this problem is appreciated.

Rgds,

CAS

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, CAS.

Well, so much for my "try to be more prompt next time". :>( I'm still
hoping someone else will jump in and point out whatever it is that I must
have overlooked.

"Raw" means different things in different contexts. When Disk Management
says "RAW", it's not talking about a file, but about a whole volume
(partition or logical drive). It means that it thinks that volume has not
been formatted. Usually this means that we need to format it, NTFS or FAT.
But we don't want to do that, of course, unless we are sure that there's
nothing on that volume that we want to keep! Sometimes there is a glitch in
the partition table or other key location that says a drive is RAW when it
really does have data on it. The critical code is probably only a single
byte. The partition table is only 64 bytes long, up to 4 entries of 16
bytes each, and each byte has a very specific purpose. For example, at byte
01C2h is the System ID for the first partition; 07h here indicates that this
partition holds an "Installable File System (NTFS partition or logical
drive)", according to the WinXP Resource Kit. A 08h here would mean a FAT32
partition or logical drive. If some celestial accident caused this one byte
to become 00h, then DM might think that the disk is unformatted - RAW - even
if all the rest of the drive is undamaged. That - or some similar error -
might trigger the disk check error message you are seeing.

Would a recovery program be useful at this point?

Possibly, although your narrative leaves me thinking that "this should work"
without the necessity of such a program. Maybe there was a problem in
installing and connecting your USB enclosure. I've never worked with one of
those at all.

Maybe it's time to call Microsoft Tech Support. Please let us know the
final resolution so that we will know how to advise the next user with a
similar problem.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64)