160GB Maxtor not avaliable in windows after format in windows...

M

mi1stormilst

[H]ard|Gawd
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Oct 6, 2001
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After reinstalling windows on my primary drive I can't see my backup drive at all )-: Now before I formatted my primary 80GB I had formatted and partitioned my 160GB from within windows disk managment utility. I dropped all my backup files for the last 6-7 years on it and could access it. Do I need to parition the drive from within windows before I can see those files again? Will partitioning it kill my files? WHERE ARE MY FILES HELP!!!
 
If you are sure that you copied your files to the other drive AND you are sure that you were viewing them from that drive, don't screw around with that drive. If they are still there, you will hose them if you partition it again. During your reinstall it is my fear that you or Windows with your permission may have formatted that drive by mistake. What OS are we dealing with here? You said that you partitioned that 160 gig drive before the reinstall. Can you still see those partitions?
 
Windows XP pro

I did not format or partition the 160 since reinstalling XP or during the installation. I could see it on my old configuration just not since reinstalling. In disk manager it says space is unallocated )-: Do I just need to convert to dynamic?
 
Unallocated is not good. I tried upgrading to a dynamic disk before and really screwed it up. I would wait for somebody with more experience dealing with this problem to tell you to do that. That drive should be online and healthy. Unallocated I thought only showed up for unformatted disk space. I'm still waitnig to upgrade to XP. I'm running W2K until all my hardware is in to do it all at once. So I haven't done a XP install, just W2K. Sorry but I'm gonna step back from this one and let the Marines take over. Hopefully somebody has the cure you're looking for. Good Luck.:(
 
Since it seems nobody else has any ideas are you still having problems or did you get lucky this afternoon and find something?
 
i'm no expert at this but did you install service pack 1 to make sure that windows sees a large drive ?

i had some troubles with a 160GB drive on an abit kr7a-raid mobo and had to run the floppy from western digital and it fixed something in the registry i think.
 
Are there even any drive letters assigned to those partitions? I'm afraid that during your reinstall they somehow got formatted. You didn't by chance change file formats between the two installations did you? NTFS to FAT or vise versa? I've heard that there are ways to recreate the info on a drive. I don't know if you and I can get those programs, or if it's like CIA type stuff. As frustrating as it is I wouldn't do anything to that drive until you know for sure that you won't be able to fix this.:(
 
I read something about slipstreaming sp1 into your XP install but its to little to late. I do have sp1 now and I did before when it worked.

Originally posted by the snake
i'm no expert at this but did you install service pack 1 to make sure that windows sees a large drive ?

i had some troubles with a 160GB drive on an abit kr7a-raid mobo and had to run the floppy from western digital and it fixed something in the registry i think.
Click to expand...
 
The drive did not get formatted or partitioned I know that for a fact. I have found numorous post on microsofts website about this very issue. No responses have solved the problems. I called Data Doctors WHAT A JOKE...$250.00 down and then quoted me an estimate of $600.00 if we are lucky )-: I am working with an application called FILE RECOVERY right now that costs $50.00 I am seeing if the demo locates the files first before I buy it. I have been running an advanced recovery for about 3 hours and it is only 16% done. The progress indicator says one deleted partition located....I will let you know as soon as I know.

Originally posted by mabegman
Are there even any drive letters assigned to those partitions? I'm afraid that during your reinstall they somehow got formatted. You didn't by chance change file formats between the two installations did you? NTFS to FAT or vise versa? I've heard that there are ways to recreate the info on a drive. I don't know if you and I can get those programs, or if it's like CIA type stuff. As frustrating as it is I wouldn't do anything to that drive until you know for sure that you won't be able to fix this.:(
Click to expand...
 
That's scary. Where at Microsoft did you find info on this. I still have to install XP and I'd really like to avoid being in your predicament.:eek:
 
that sucks if you can't get your data back :(

i always unlpug any other hard drives than the one i want to reformat just incase, i know it is too late now though.
 
Just because windows says the space is unallocated doesn't make it so, I would suggest examining the drive with a few other partition/disk managers. Linux would be a good place to start. If possible just connect the drive to a machine running linux and examine the partition table. Windows XP won't be able to use disks larger than 137GB in their entirety without SP1.

Gav
 
Also, as a last resort (try everything else first) you can create an identical partition table again. As long as you don't format or otherwise touch the contents, just the partition table, the data should be fine.

I've had to do this once. The full procedure was roughly
1) boot to something linuxish. Run gpart, get a list of what partition start headers it finds on the drive.
2) create a partition table identical to that from some partition program.
(Linux fdisk actually seemed to be off by a cylinder, so I ended up using ranish partition manager from a dos bootdisk)

You can skip 1) if you know exactly how your partition table looked.
I didn't lose any data, but then again I didn't have the 137-Gb-limit to consider either.
 
Yeah I have figured all this out after the fact. The files are on the drive...windows just can't make any sense out of the partition table )-: ACTIVE FILE RECOVERY IS MY BEST FRIEND. It has located all my files and folders. I will be saving them to another PC and then starting over with my 160GB drive partitioned into two drives 80 x 2. Shouldn't have the problem this way. Word to the wise...those of us that don't have a regular backup routine...GET ONE!

(-:

Originally posted by GavinJCD
Just because windows says the space is unallocated doesn't make it so, I would suggest examining the drive with a few other partition/disk managers. Linux would be a good place to start. If possible just connect the drive to a machine running linux and examine the partition table. Windows XP won't be able to use disks larger than 137GB in their entirety without SP1.

Gav
Click to expand...
 
Glad to see that app worked for you. I'll make sure to have the stuff out of the computer and onto disk prior to installing XP. Thanks for the links.
 
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