Disk undetectable after chkdsk

[Clive Backham]

I have an IDE disk (Segate P-ATA, 80GB) formatted as a single NTFS
partition. It has a great number of errors on it. In an attempt to
recover as much as possible, I ran chkdsk /r (in Windows 2000). After
some time during which it was recovering various files, chkdsk
reported that there was not enough space on the disk to write the data
it needed to. After this, the disk had disappeared from Windows (not
present in either Explorer or Disk Management). When I rebooted the
machine, the BIOS IDE detection hung when trying to detect the devices
on the secondary IDE controller (the one with the this disk). No
matter what I do, this disk basically cannot be detected in the BIOS.

Now I realise that perhaps chkdsk /r could conceivably scribble all
over any random parts of the file system if the disk was in a
particularly bad way, but I fail to understand how it can possibly
cause the disk itself to become undetectable in the BIOS.

Can anyone shed any light on this, and suggest if there is any hope of
getting this disk online again?

 

[Rod Speed]

I have an IDE disk (Segate P-ATA, 80GB) formatted as a
single NTFS partition. It has a great number of errors on it.

Most likely because the drive was dying
or the drive subsystem was failing.

In an attempt to recover as much as
possible, I ran chkdsk /r (in Windows 2000).

Not a good idea with a dying drive etc.

After some time during which it was recovering various files, chkdsk
reported that there was not enough space on the disk to write the data
it needed to. After this, the disk had disappeared from Windows (not
present in either Explorer or Disk Management). When I rebooted the
machine, the BIOS IDE detection hung when trying to detect the
devices on the secondary IDE controller (the one with the this disk).
No matter what I do, this disk basically cannot be detected in the BIOS.

The drive has died or whatever was failing has now died.

Now I realise that perhaps chkdsk /r could conceivably scribble
all over any random parts of the file system if the disk was in a
particularly bad way, but I fail to understand how it can possibly
cause the disk itself to become undetectable in the BIOS.

It cant, something must have failed in the drive subsystem.

Can anyone shed any light on this,

First check to see if the drive is actually spinning up. If it isnt,
try one of the power connectors off one of the optical drives.
The metal tunnels that the pins go into in the power connector
can open up over time and not make good contact anymore.

If it does spin up, try another ribbon cable and see if that
allows the drive to be seen by the bios at boot time.

If that doesnt help either, try just the drive in another system,
on the secondary IDE with whatever is currently on the
secondary IDE ribbon cable removed for the test if you can.

If it doesnt show up in another system, your only real
option is pro recovery if the data on it isnt backed up.

It might just be the power supply going
bad if the drive is fine in another system.

and suggest if there is any hope of getting this disk online again?

Work out why its not coming online currently and fix that.

 

[Clive Backham]

Thanks very much for your response:

Not a good idea with a dying drive etc.

As I am now only too well aware! Live and learn, as they say.

If that doesnt help either, try just the drive in another system,
on the secondary IDE with whatever is currently on the
secondary IDE ribbon cable removed for the test if you can.

I have now tried it in a different PC. It wasn't detected in that one,
either. So it looks like the drive is very dead.

If it doesnt show up in another system, your only real
option is pro recovery if the data on it isnt backed up.

This was an unfortunate incident. The data was backed up, but the
server onto which it was backed up was destroyed by the same event
which caused the errors on this disk (oil depot explosion in December
at Hemel Hempstead in the UK, if you heard about it in other countries
- we only recently found the PC under 2 feet of rubble).

 

[mscotgrove]

You can get this problem when the boot sector fails, or has been
corrupted.

You can try my recovery program www.cnwrecovery.com , it is still in
beta, and hence free.

If the drive has some life, it should be detected as Physical Drive xx,
even though it may not be seen as a logical drive.

There is a partition recovery mode feature, that will work even if the
boot sector has failed completely. As well, it has the ability to
recover files in various different ways.

Michael

 

[Clive Backham]

You can get this problem when the boot sector fails, or has been
corrupted.

You can try my recovery program www.cnwrecovery.com , it is still in
beta, and hence free.

If the drive has some life, it should be detected as Physical Drive xx,
even though it may not be seen as a logical drive.

Thanks, but the problem is that the disk isn't even detected by the
motherboard BIOS. It's as if there were no physical disk present.

 

[Rod Speed]

Thanks very much for your response:

No problem, thats what these technical groups are for.

As I am now only too well aware! Live and learn, as they say.

I have now tried it in a different PC. It wasn't detected
in that one, either. So it looks like the drive is very dead.

Yeah, does it even spin up in the different PC ?

It can sometimes be relatively easy to fix if you just have
a bad solder joint with the power connector for example,
but its much more often much harder to fix than that.

This was an unfortunate incident. The data was backed up, but the
server onto which it was backed up was destroyed by the same event
which caused the errors on this disk (oil depot explosion in December
at Hemel Hempstead in the UK, if you heard about it in other countries
- we only recently found the PC under 2 feet of rubble).

Tad hard on the poor thing.

Professional recovery may be able to get at least something useful
off the drive, tho its certainly been made harder by the use of chkdsk.

It may be possible to get the data off the server if it wasnt blown to bits
etc.

 

[sas]

Disk undetectable after chkds
neither motherboard bios can't see driv

I had similar problem, I solved it by next procedur
remove all drives from computer except CD's
Write values on drive on paper. CH
put back drive, which is destroyed during your work session
change slave drive to master drive by changing shortcut piece t
differen
position on drive.
Put drive back to computer secundary or primary wire
Boot computer
Hit del button to go bios definition
If you have your drive installed in secundary wire of motherboard
the drive you must fix, is secundary master drive
it probably have auto recognition o
change it to CHS type recognition
but the right value
eg
[Don't write these values in you mother board bios but use you ow
drive specification (written on top of the drive)
CHS values are next on 4311Mbytes driv
cylinder 891
heads 1
sectors 6
landing zone 891
correct size value appear on motherboard bios drive specification o
no
save and exi
you had to do check, that the values really changes by doin
procedur
agai
I had to do it four times until values was righ
Now you shoud see drive in our boot up sequenc
Allthough my combuter did't show, that there was secundary maste
available.
After starting windows 2000 it was found
format your new drive and use it
Also older linux may find your driv

I get this proplem while I used peertopeer program an
preview movie and deleted it after seeing it, So dont delet
while program is still writing on drive, pause it, stop program an
delete it using w2k explorer. check and delete cache files and
start it again

W2k can do similar happening without you presenc
it try to read drive and execute silent chkdsk an
remove you drive as it is usb drive and all info on drive is gon
It probably writes drive values bigger than they really are an
this way destroy all