# [SOLVED] Help! I can't access my hard drive!



## shrimpman

My computer crashed and now I am unable to reboot. I transferred the hard disk (Seagate 7200.10 Barracuda 80GB) to an older backup computer where I set it up as the slave drive. Although the computer recognizes the hard drive (it shows up in Device Manager and Computer Management) , I can't access it through Windows Explorer (it doesn't appear on the list of drives in My Computer). When I view the drive in the Computer Management utility, it does not have a drive letter assigned to it. In the Disk Management utility I can see three partitions for the drive - a 39 GB FAT healthy EISA partition, a 70.96 GB NTFS Healthy Active Partition, and a 3.5 GB FAT32 Healthy Unknown Partition. I tried to assign a drive letter to the partition, but the menu choice was greyed out.

By the way, when I put my good hard drive in as the master HD in the computer the bad hard drive came out of the computer won't boot. When I put the bad HD in my backup computer as the master HD, that computer won't boot. I can only boot using my good HD in my backup computer.

Please help. I have critical data on this hard drive! 

Shrimpman


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## Deleted090308

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Hi, welcome to TSF. :wave:

See if you can retrieve the data using *Find and mount*.
Then format the drive.


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## shrimpman

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Thanks for responding to my cry for help. I downloaded Find and Mount and ran the program. It found all of my partitions. I then used the program to mount the NTFS partition where my data is located. Windows Explorer now shows the drive as Drive F:. But when I try to view the file listings in Windows Explorer I get a message saying F:\ is not accessible. The media is write-protected. I know that the files should be read only, but I think I'm supposed to be able to view them so I can copy them to another drive. I right clicked the F:\ drive icon viewed the properties. Properties shows 0 bytes used and remaining disk space and the data now appears to be written in RAW File System. 

What do I do now?

Shrimpman


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## Deleted090308

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Download the Windows version of *TestDisk*.
Unzip the downloaded file to your C: drive and open C:\testdisk-6.8\win > double click "testdisk_win" (the program doesn't have to installed).

TestDisk runs in a command window, so you use the keyboard to navigate, not the mouse.

A. Select the drive > Analyze > Press the "Enter" key.

B. When TestDisk has found the partition it will analyze it.

C. After the analyzing has finished it should say: "Structure OK".

D. Choose "Change partition" > Enter.

E. Choose "Write new partition table".

F. When that's done > Close TestDisk and restart the computer.


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## shrimpman

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Thanks, Nicholas! That worked! TESTDISK created 3 logical drives, one for each of the 3 partitions on my hard disk. I can now see and even open and work with my files. I'm thinking what I need to do now is to backup my files to DVD disks and then reformat my hard drive. Then I can reload the essential data back onto hard drive. Any comment or suggestions?

Shrimpman


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## Deleted090308

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Great!

You don't have to do that. The drive is fixed now. But, it's always a good idea to backup your data.

If you want to format the drive I suggest you use a program like Partition Magic (easy to use, but costs money) or *GParted* (not so easy, but free).


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## shrimpman

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

For now I will continue to use the repaired drive as a slave in my old computer. The original computer that it came out of won't even boot with a healthy hard drive. Since all this happened at once (unreadable hard drive and unbootable computer) I'm assuming that one caused the other. Any ideas on what would cause my computer to be unable to boot with a healthy harddrive?


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## Deleted090308

*Re: Help! I can't access my hard drive!*

Yes, I do, but I think it's better if you start a new thread concerning that problem in the "Motherboards, Bios & CPU" section. 
I will reply there. :smile: Please remember to include the computer specifications, including power supply.


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## shrimpman

OK Thanks! I was just about to spend $79 on GetBackData, a data recovery program that I understand has worked for recovering data in situations similar to mine. Thanks to you, I don't have to spend that money. Also, I got my hard drive back! I will definitely donate some of the money you saved me to TSF!

I hope to continue working with you in the Motherboards, Bios, and CPU section.

Shrimpman


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