Hard Drive Not Formatted?

[gabhanjacisa]

Windows XP Professional w/2 hard drives: C and F. C is older than F,
F is the only hard drive used on this computer, C is rarely if ever
used. System running very, very slow the past 2 days. Did virus scan
w/AVG and it says Drive C is not recognized, or something to that
effect. I tried to access Drive C through My Computer, I get the
message that Drive C is not formatted and do I want to format it now.

1. What caused this?
2. Should I format?

Thanks,
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Eric Gisin]

The slow down indicates bad sectors. The error message indicates the boot
sector or FAT/MFT are unreadable.

Don't format, run smart tool or manufacturer's diagnostics.

 

[Rod Speed]

Windows XP Professional w/2 hard drives: C and F. C is older than
F, F is the only hard drive used on this computer, C is rarely if ever
used. System running very, very slow the past 2 days. Did virus scan
w/AVG and it says Drive C is not recognized, or something to that
effect. I tried to access Drive C through My Computer, I get the
message that Drive C is not formatted and do I want to format it now.

1. What caused this?

Looks like the C drive is dying and that retrying on errors
may well be what has slowed things so dramatically.

2. Should I format?

Do you care about the data on the drive ?

It would likely be better to just unplug the data and power
cables from that drive and see how the system works like that.

If you dont care about the data on the drive and
that fixes the problem, just leave it disconnected.

Its possible that the drive is fine and its just a cable gone bad tho.

 

[eric.oo]

Windows XP Professional w/2 hard drives: C and F. C is older than F,
F is the only hard drive used on this computer, C is rarely if ever
used. System running very, very slow the past 2 days. Did virus scan
w/AVG and it says Drive C is not recognized, or something to that
effect. I tried to access Drive C through My Computer, I get the
message that Drive C is not formatted and do I want to format it now.

1. What caused this?
2. Should I format?

Thanks,
(e-mail address removed)

I am having the same exact problem. My c: drive is a WD2500SD This is
Western digital 250 gig Sata drive and is only about a month old.
The data on it is important to me and if i do reformat who knows when
she will decide to die on me again?

 

[wemaole]

May be the boot sector or FAT/ MFT are corrupt. Don't format, use some
tool to fix it.
I suggest you use Partition Table Doctor to fix boot sector.

First thing I recommend you download the demo version of
Partition Table Doctor.( http://www.ptdd.com/download.htm )

Run the program and right click the partition and choose fixboot.

For more detail:
http://www.ptdd.com/fixboot.htm
http://www.ptdd.com/mbr.htm