Dead hard drive

[Guest]

I have a 2- or 3-year-old 3.5" hard drive, capacity 123.5 GB, which has
stopped working completely. Using the Windows Recovery Console, I have
managed to access the outermost level of the disk -- namely, something
appears to have corrupted in the files which run the system and it is
evidently incapable of booting up anymore. I would greatly appreciate any
ideas on how to fix the drive; or at the very least, how to recover my data.

One side note which may or may not concern this decidedly delicate
operation: in an attempt to rename the system driver 'ntfs.sys' to 'ntfs.old'
(a procedure I undertook once before to repair a damaged ntfs.sys file, as it
was wreaking havoc on another computer), I received a message telling me that
the rename operation failed. From this, I come to one of two conclusions: 1)
either the file is missing or corrupted beyond repair or recognition by the
operating system, which might prevent the operation of the disk; or 2) the
disk is unusable.

An update: I just attempted to re-install Windows XP onto the disk, but to
no avail. I was informed that the selected partition (the damaged disk) is
either "too full, damaged, or using an unknown file format," and that in
order to continue the installation I would have to format the disk. This
seems decidedly out of accord with my primary object in this little ballet,
which is to recover the disk's data.

Also, when I removed all other means of booting the system from such, I
received a simple message: "Error loading operating system." I'm unsure
whether this coincides with my previous theory that the cause of all this
chaos is the ntfs.sys file, and again would greatly appreciate any advice.
Thank you.

 

[Mistoffolees]

I have a 2- or 3-year-old 3.5" hard drive, capacity 123.5 GB, which has
stopped working completely. Using the Windows Recovery Console, I have
managed to access the outermost level of the disk -- namely, something
appears to have corrupted in the files which run the system and it is
evidently incapable of booting up anymore. I would greatly appreciate any
ideas on how to fix the drive; or at the very least, how to recover my data.

One side note which may or may not concern this decidedly delicate
operation: in an attempt to rename the system driver 'ntfs.sys' to 'ntfs.old'
(a procedure I undertook once before to repair a damaged ntfs.sys file, as it
was wreaking havoc on another computer), I received a message telling me that
the rename operation failed. From this, I come to one of two conclusions: 1)
either the file is missing or corrupted beyond repair or recognition by the
operating system, which might prevent the operation of the disk; or 2) the
disk is unusable.

An update: I just attempted to re-install Windows XP onto the disk, but to
no avail. I was informed that the selected partition (the damaged disk) is
either "too full, damaged, or using an unknown file format," and that in
order to continue the installation I would have to format the disk. This
seems decidedly out of accord with my primary object in this little ballet,
which is to recover the disk's data.

Also, when I removed all other means of booting the system from such, I
received a simple message: "Error loading operating system." I'm unsure
whether this coincides with my previous theory that the cause of all this
chaos is the ntfs.sys file, and again would greatly appreciate any advice.
Thank you.

It really does not matter as it would appear that the hard
drive has physically failed. If the data is very important,
then one should have a professional data recovery outfit do
the job. Any attempts at writing to the hard drive may only
make the issue worse.

 

[John]

I have a 2- or 3-year-old 3.5" hard drive, capacity 123.5 GB, which has
stopped working completely. Using the Windows Recovery Console, I have
managed to access the outermost level of the disk -- namely, something
appears to have corrupted in the files which run the system and it is
evidently incapable of booting up anymore. I would greatly appreciate any
ideas on how to fix the drive; or at the very least, how to recover my data.

One side note which may or may not concern this decidedly delicate
operation: in an attempt to rename the system driver 'ntfs.sys' to 'ntfs.old'
(a procedure I undertook once before to repair a damaged ntfs.sys file, as it
was wreaking havoc on another computer), I received a message telling me that
the rename operation failed. From this, I come to one of two conclusions: 1)
either the file is missing or corrupted beyond repair or recognition by the
operating system, which might prevent the operation of the disk; or 2) the
disk is unusable.

An update: I just attempted to re-install Windows XP onto the disk, but to
no avail. I was informed that the selected partition (the damaged disk) is
either "too full, damaged, or using an unknown file format," and that in
order to continue the installation I would have to format the disk. This
seems decidedly out of accord with my primary object in this little ballet,
which is to recover the disk's data.

Also, when I removed all other means of booting the system from such, I
received a simple message: "Error loading operating system." I'm unsure
whether this coincides with my previous theory that the cause of all this
chaos is the ntfs.sys file, and again would greatly appreciate any advice.
Thank you.

Your options are dwindling. Have you tried removing the drive and
installing it as a slave in another computer?

If that doesn't help and a professional recovery service isn't in the
budget then possibly a repair install...

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Of course the first caveat on the above page is to back up your data and
that appears to be a non-starter in your case.


Such is life,

John

 

[HeyBub]

I have a 2- or 3-year-old 3.5" hard drive, capacity 123.5 GB, which
has stopped working completely. Using the Windows Recovery Console,
I have managed to access the outermost level of the disk -- namely,
something appears to have corrupted in the files which run the system
and it is evidently incapable of booting up anymore. I would greatly
appreciate any ideas on how to fix the drive; or at the very least,
how to recover my data.

One side note which may or may not concern this decidedly delicate
operation: in an attempt to rename the system driver 'ntfs.sys' to
'ntfs.old' (a procedure I undertook once before to repair a damaged
ntfs.sys file, as it was wreaking havoc on another computer), I
received a message telling me that the rename operation failed. From
this, I come to one of two conclusions: 1) either the file is missing
or corrupted beyond repair or recognition by the operating system,
which might prevent the operation of the disk; or 2) the disk is
unusable.

An update: I just attempted to re-install Windows XP onto the disk,
but to no avail. I was informed that the selected partition (the
damaged disk) is either "too full, damaged, or using an unknown file
format," and that in order to continue the installation I would have
to format the disk. This seems decidedly out of accord with my
primary object in this little ballet, which is to recover the disk's
data.

Also, when I removed all other means of booting the system from such,
I received a simple message: "Error loading operating system." I'm
unsure whether this coincides with my previous theory that the cause
of all this chaos is the ntfs.sys file, and again would greatly
appreciate any advice. Thank you.

EasyRecovery from OnTrack Systems

http://www.ontrack.com/software/

You can try it and the software will tell you what what can be recovered
before you buy the program.

 

[Guest]

12:44 PM 8/20/2006
Reply to: (e-mail address removed) / Win XP Gen Newsgroup


Well, chief, I've got a similar problem myself. Maybe you could recover
the data same way I'm doing now. You sound very knowledgeable, so maybe
I'm missing something here; but didn't see you mention you'd tried this.
It's quite simple. So here's the deal anyway, just in case.

I've got a 40GB HD partitioned 50-50 into C: (FAT32) ; D: (NTFS). Don't
ask me why. Not my doing. The bugger became inaccessible as a Master but,
it turns out, works perfect as a Slave in the spare XP Pro SP2 comp.

That's a single FAT 32 active partition w/ XP Pro on it and it can access
both my Slave partitions no problem. Maybe you should try it out too at a
friend's XP Pro comp. Don't forget to later re-jumper it to Master so you
can continue troubleshooting it in your original (or a different) pc - as
a Master. Believe there's some programs out there with which you could
also access NTFS partitions via DOS boot from floppy.

Note:

The following is from Pegasus, MSVP, from another thread:

Here is a quick way to find if anything is left on your disk:
- Boot the machine with a Win98 disk from www.bootdisk.com.
- Run ntfsdos.exe (www.sysinternals.com).

Can you see any files or folders on the hard disk? If not
then you may have to accept this unfortunate incident
as a harsh reminder that all important disk files must
be backed up frequently to an independent medium,
as others have already suggested in this thread.



Good Luck.

Ted...