HD dying?

[py343]

I received a blue screen once and when I restarted, I saw that the system file was corrupt or missing in the windows directory. I followed the instructions to replace it using the windows disk. Then, NTFS.sys was corrupt or missing. This time, the recovery console froze after I selected the system drive I wanted to work on, and did this every time. I booted up using an old drive with Windows XP. It can detect the drive I wanted to work on as a different letter and can even access it and read the initial C:/ directory structure. Then, for some reason, windows started locking up and I couldn't go any farther.

Any suggestions? Is there a way to diagnose/check the drive integrity?

[goofy]

Not sure if there is a free solution but if you need to recover or repair your drive and see if you have real problems then you can use Sprinrite to detect harddrive errors, http://www.grc.com/sr/spinrite.htm which is made by Steve Gibson from GRC.com who also has a podcast called Security Now with Leo Laporte if you want to check out his credentials.

[py343]

Not sure if there is a free solution but if you need to recover or repair your drive and see if you have real problems then you can use Sprinrite to detect harddrive errors, http://www.grc.com/sr/spinrite.htm which is made by Steve Gibson from GRC.com who also has a podcast called Security Now with Leo Laporte if you want to check out his credentials.

I have SpinRite, just have never been successful with using it to repair a drive. Then again, those drives were totally dead. At least this drive managed to have Windows Checkdisk run on 100% of it. I guess I'll try that.

[py343]

I tried it. It is stuck on "Discovering system's mass storage devices..." Been there for about 30 minutes now.

[SpacePhoenix]

It sounds possible, can the command prompt access the drive in question? Is it making any odd noises? If you able to access the data, copy it to another (physical) disk right away.

[py343]

It sounds possible, can the command prompt access the drive in question? Is it making any odd noises? If you able to access the data, copy it to another (physical) disk right away.

It finally finished scanning, but had a lot of "red" drive sections that could not be selected at all, much less worked on.

I could access the drive using an OS on a different drive, but only up to the C:\ (different drive letter when accessing with other drive, obviously) directory set. I could see program files folder, etc... However, the computer then pretty much started crashing. Seems as though whenever anything tries to access this drive, problems occur. When activated, the computer also shows a solid red (indicating drive activity) ALL the time, not blinking, just solid red always. I disconnected the drive and now at least my computer works, sort of. I'll see if I can take it out and connect it using my external SATA port once I get my system running on the remaining drive. Unfortunately, that drive's OS was screwed up (hence the reason I moved to another installation) and unstable.

Thankfully, most of my big data is stored on external and internal large, system-less drives. The drive that broke was VERY old, very small and not very good quality. Then again, the drive that is still working is even older (PATA). Last time I buy Maxtor crap.

[HeathMan]

It sounds like you saved all your data already, but it is a good idea to always make a backup before you run any diagnostic/repair tools. Often these tools will cause a lot of hard drive activity, so if it is about to fail, these tools can speed it up. I have only had one really messy hard drive failure and it was not fun at all...

[py343]

It sounds like you saved all your data already, but it is a good idea to always make a backup before you run any diagnostic/repair tools. Often these tools will cause a lot of hard drive activity, so if it is about to fail, these tools can speed it up. I have only had one really messy hard drive failure and it was not fun at all...

I already disconnected the HD that failed. It was practically inaccessible (caused crashes). It's not that I backed things up, it's that there was no large data since it was a system disk used for day-to-day work. Storage was taken care of by other disks, but some data was lost, obviously. When I get Windows up and running on another disk, I will reconnect the broken one and see if I can copy the data.

[py343]

Okay, I hotplugged the drive and it is working. However, I can't see my name's directory in Documents and Settings.

So, let's say my account name was py343 that had all of my settings and files. Well, it's completely missing from the drive's Documents and Settings folder!

[py343]

After messing around with the system files, I managed to boot up and shut down the system on the drive. Once I accessed it through my primary OS, I could again see the Admin folder. Unfortunately, it is empty! Nonetheless, the disk usage is as it was before the files disappeared, or close to it. So, where are the files? Is there any way to recover them?

Then again, maybe the directory was deleted. Any way to undelete it?