[rkhames]

I recently attempted to move some files from a storage hard drive (not system drive) to a usb drive.  The file transfer never really got going, it just hung up right away.  After waiting about 30 minutes to see if anything was going to happen, I tried killing the transfer.  Nothing worked.  In my frustration, I just rebooted the PC.  Had to hold down the power button for 10 seconds to finally kill it.  Now, the PC is having trouble with the hard drive in question.  It can't read it or chkdsk it.  However, it does show up in disk management.  I'm thinking that the drive isn't dead but, something is preventing windows from properly accessing it.  I spent hours online searching for answers but, I just don't know enough about this stuff to get to the bottom of it.

During a subsequent reboot, Windows said something about "Repairing L:" and showed a progress percentage.  This went very slowly.  After 4 DAYS, it finished.  I wasn't around when it completed; I just saw the login screen when I got back to the computer.  The computer is running extremely sluggishly.  I'm guessing windows is spending a lot of time trying to access this drive and getting time outs.

 

I ran a chkdsk to see what is up.  ​When I run chkdsk, it says "Cannot open volume for direct access."

 

Help!  Thanks.

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It takes about 45 minutes for it to finally come out and say, "The type of the file system is RAW. Chkdsk is not available for RAW devices."  This is a new one for me.  Never heard of this before.

[rkhames]

It takes about 45 minutes for it to finally come out and say, "The type of the file system is RAW. Chkdsk is not available for RAW devices."  This is a new one for me.  Never heard of this before.

[terry1966]

if the drive shows up in disk management but it shows as raw, then that usually means the partition table has been corrupted,

 

personally i use testdisk to fix such issues without loss of any data usually, :- http://www.cgsecurit...g/wiki/TestDisk

 

but you might find it easier to use easeus partition master instead :- http://www.partition...t-partition.htm

 

either program i believe should help you get the drive and data seen again as normal in windows.

 

[rkhames]

Testdisk runs veeery slowly but, eventually it showed me all of my drives.

 

It asked me to select the partition table type and had "None - non partitioned media" already highlighted.  The instructions indicated that the already highlighted option is usually the correct one.  However, I'm not sure.  Shouldn't it be "Intel/PC partition"?

 

I selected the Intel option and then selected 'analyse'.  The next screen was basically blank and said "partition: read error".

Edited by rkhames, 25 August 2017 - 05:11 AM.

[rkhames]

On this screen, "Current partition structure" where I am getting the Partition: Read error, my only option is to "quick search" and it says "Try to locate partition" below that.  There is a blinking cursor.  I can't select any options or go back a screen, etc.  It's just hanging there.  Maybe it needs some time?

[terry1966]

are you having any problems with the pc if the drive is not plugged in? if so then first i'd suggest going to the malware part of the forum and making sure the pc is clean. when testdisk is analysing/searching it can take hours but it should never freeze or hang, you should always be able to just quit and go back etc. and why i'm wondering if your pc has other issues.

 

what is the size of the hard drive? i ask this because in my experience usually drives less than 2TB in size have been formatted with mbr(but not always) partition table so you'd choose intel partition type but drives over that would be gpt so you'd choose the efi gpt partition type.. teskdisk does usually select the correct partition type to use but not always. if it selects efi gpt then that is what i'd stick with, i'd be very very surprised if none was the correct choice though so either choose intel or efi gpt and see what you get.

 

usually in windows the partition type used is the ntfs file system type.

 

if you're unsure what options to use in testdisk, then maybe see if easeus partition master is easier to use.

 

Edited by terry1966, 25 August 2017 - 05:55 AM.

[rkhames]

I left it for a few hours and when I came back, the screen had changed to the analysis screen.  It said Drive L: 1000GB and some other info.  Then, it read Analyse cylinder 1/121500: 00% Read error at 0/241/1 (lba=15183)  Below all that, "Stop" is an option.  I can't tell if it's still analyzing or if it is done and I need to hit stop.

 

I have not tried running the pc with that drive unplugged.  I can do that after I make sure test disk is safely finished.

 

Thoughts?

[rkhames]

It just updated to give me the choice to add partition, load backup.  I'm guessing add partition is what I want?

[rkhames]

Will adding a partition affect the data on the drive?  I cannot afford to lose what is on here and would do some other data recovery method if this would somehow cause a loss of data.

 

Also, thanks a ton for you help.  I have fairly decent kung-fu but, yours is superior. 

[terry1966]

testdisk won't write or change anything on the drive until you tell it to, adding a partition is one of the things that would write something to the drive and at the moment no that is not something you want to do.

 

was the drive encrypted? i've never used encrypted drives so don't know what may be different using testdisk on one than a normal unencrypted drive.

 

ideally you want testdisk to find a partition that was on the drive originally and then look at the files on that partition to make sure they are there and it is what you expect to see, then and only then would you want to write that found partition back to the drive.

 

personally if the data isn't backed up anywhere then i'd first recommend you to use some other software like photorec or EaseUS Data Recovery to scan the drive and copy any and all data it finds to another drive, only after that would i want to make any changes to the drive.

photorec :- http://www.cgsecurit...g/wiki/PhotoRec

EaseUS Data Recovery :- https://www.easeus.c...-lost-files.htm

 

here is a step by step guide to using testdisk. http://www.cgsecurit...sk_Step_By_Step

so first you'd want to say no log, then intel partition (maybe efi gpt.), then analyse, then quick search, if it finds a partition press P to look at the files on that partition, if everything looks correct then you'd write the partition table to the drive if things don't look correct or you're not sure do a deeper search and see what it finds.

 

Edited by terry1966, 25 August 2017 - 11:23 AM.

[rkhames]

Thanks.  No encryption.  It was just a 1 gig drive used to store photos and music.

After hitting enter, it said "no partition found or selected for recovery." searching deeper was an option so, that's what I'm doing.  If it finds nothing, I'll use the EaseUs Data Recovery to try to copy the drive.  I have a larger, empty drive on board that I could transfer it all over to.  

 

Thanks for the step by step.  I'd been reading the on-board documentation and it was a little hard to follow...  I'll update as soon as the deeper search gives me some results.

[terry1966]

to be honest even after a quick search i'd have thought it should have at least found 1 partition, am beginning to think when windows took 4 days to do whatever it did when "repairing", it actually zero'd out the drive erasing all data on the drive, partition table, filesystem, files.

 

fingers crossed that i'm wrong and just being pessimistic and the deep search will find the partition and data.

 

you doing the analysis after selecting intel for partition table type?

 

Edited by terry1966, 25 August 2017 - 02:41 PM.

[rkhames]

Its still doing the deep search.  I sure hope you're wrong about the delete.  That would not be good.  Should I do the analysis after the deep search is over?

[rkhames]

Deep search came up empty.  Went back to screen saying "Analyse cylinder 1/121599 00%  read error at 0/254/63 (lba=16064)"  Cursor is flashing after the 00% indicating that it might be trying to make progress past the first cylinder....?

[terry1966]

ok for now i'd leave testdisk alone.

 

i'd use photorec :- http://www.cgsecurit...g/wiki/PhotoRec or recuva :- https://www.piriform.com/recuva to search the drive for lost files and save them to your other drive, if neither can find any files then that will confirm my pessimism and the drive is wiped and empty with nothing you can do to save the data that was on it..

 

with luck though they willl find everything on the drive and copy the files to your other drive. once that is done it's then up to you if you want to continue trying to fix things with test disk, or simply just format the drive again and run some tests on it to see if it's failing and not worth risking your data on it again, or if it passes as ok then copy the files back to it.

 

Edited by terry1966, 25 August 2017 - 05:14 PM.