# [SOLVED] External HD not formatted all of a sudden



## grendel824

Hi - I have a 500GB external Western Digital "My Book" that has all of a sudden started telling me that "drive G: (the drive in question) is not formatted." I of course do not want to format it, as I'd like to keep the 250gb of stuff on there. I'm running Windows XP, and it DOES show up in Disk Management. I tried a couple of shareware rescue programs and they do see files on there, and running one even started rescuing a bunch of photos and mp3s, but with that much stuff on there I wouldn't have anywhere to rescue most of it to.

Running TestDisk from the "stickied" instructions gets me to step G, but there is no selectable partition to "fix." What, if anything, can I do to make the drive useable again without having to format over it and start all over?

Thanks!


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Hi,

What does TestDisk "say" at step E and G? Please post screenshots.

What does Disk management say - raw, healthy, free space etc?


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## grendel824

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Thanks for your reply! Here are the screenshots of the steps and Disk Management:


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

The boot sector is damaged. 

Run TestDisk again, but follow these steps:

*A.* At the first window, select “*No Log*” and press the <*Enter*> key. 
*B.* Select which drive to analyse, choose “*Proceed*” and <*Enter*>.
*C.* Select partition type – Intel if it’s a PC then <*Enter*>.
*D.* Choose *Advanced* > press <*Enter*>.
*E.* Choose *Boot* > press <*Enter*>.
*F.* Choose *Repair FAT* > press <*Enter*>.


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## grendel824

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Edit: "Repair FAT" doesn't come up - do you mean "Rebuild BS"? (PIC Attached)

I'll try that now, thank you!


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

No, I meant "Repair FAT" - but in your case it seems that "Rebuild BS" would be the correct choice. :smile:


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## grendel824

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Okay - that finished and it gives me this screen. Am I good? Screwed? Anyway, thanks for even getting me this far - it was more than I was qualified to do already!


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

It doesn't look like I expect it to.
If the drive isn't mounted inside the case already - please do that. 
A common mistake when hooking another drive up is to get the jumper settings wrong. You can avoid that by temporarily using the CD drives IDE channel > "borrow" the data cable from the CD drive.

1. Is/was the file system FAT32 - no NTFS or other file systems?
2. Is/was there only one partition on the drive?

If the answer to *both* of those questions are *yes* - go back to this screen:









Select *Backup BS* > press <*Enter*>.


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## grendel824

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

The drive was in an external case - it was working for the past six months or so, if that's what you're asking. Or are you saying I should open the plastic casing it came in and try to install it somewhere inside my computer's case? I guess that would be possible, but I don't think there's much room for it and I can't afford to be taking my PC apart at the moment (finals, job search, need the computer working for all of it).

I'm not sure how to tell what the file system was - I thought I remember seeing something online about these WD MyBook drives being NTFS when I started looking stuff up to try to figure out my problem, but I'm not 100%.

There was only one partition, though - I originally just took it out of the box it came in, plugged it in, and stored stuff on it. My PC would occasionally "lose" the drive, in which case I had to sometimes unplug the USB cable and shut down the PC, then plug it in again before turning it on, which would get it recognized again.


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

OK. If you don't have the time to move the drive, we'll let it stay in the enclosure.

TestDisk sees 1 FAT32 partition, nothing else - so that's what we are trying to save.

It looks like the backup boot sector is OK - load that as described in post #8.


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## grendel824

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Hmm.. that didn't seem to work, but now it's giving me the "Repair FAT" option that was missing before, so I'll try that! 

UPDATE: It tells me "FAT seems okay, nothing else to do"

UPDATE 2: Huzzah! It seems to be back. As soon as finals are over, I'm going to get busy backing all this junk up on DVD just in case. Thanks so much for your help! If I wasn't deeply in debt for student loans, I'd want to cut you a check! Make yourself track-downable so if I ever strike it rich I can find you! :grin:


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## Deleted090308

*Re: External HD "not formatted" all of a sudden*

Great news! 
I'm glad you got it fixed. :smile:


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## smeaf25

Just wanted to thank both u guys for solving the same problem I had. I was able to recover 450GB worth of data! You guys rule. ray:


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## shanes

I purchased a WD My Book Premium edition 500G as my internal drive was getting full and I bought into WD's marketing about how great their product was for safely preserving your valuable images.

Except for filling up and slowing down, my internal worked hastle free for 4+ years. I transfered all my images to the My Book and after 11 days it is all gone!

You guys do ROCK, thanx for helping me get my pics back as well (I do back up to CD and DVD but I have been getting behind in that pocess and was looking at losing a few months of images).

My question now is what happened? 

Can I avoid it in the future?

Should I return the My Book and get a second internal?

(I did not originally go for an internal to minimize internal temperature and power drain on my power supply)

Thanx

Shane


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## smeaf25

shanes,
I'm in the same boat as you are except my 'My Book' is older than yours, 2yrs. I would return it and find a more reliable one or just get an internal. As for my current one, I will just use it sparringly and for non important stuff. As far as I'm concerned, Western Digital externals are a no-no for me.


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## shanes

Yes I think I will return it.

I am going to replace it with an external drive case complete with its own power supply and fan and put in something like a Seagate.


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## americanidiot

I had this exact problem and you guys just saved me so many unbelievably important documents ('papers, business papers' as The Dude would say). I can't thank you enough. I just had one of those "i love that we can all communicate and help each other" moments. Thanks especially to grendel824 and eneles. To anyone else who has this problem, particularly with the WD 500GB drive, PM me or just follow the instructions above!


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## Rossiroo

I have the same problem but when I run the "rebuild BS" I only get some list of media files, not the "root sector", I keep pressing "N" and about 5 hours later it finishes without finding the root sector (root directory?).

Can anyone help?


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## Deleted090308

@Rossiroo: Please create a thread of your own where you describe what you have tried and what the problem is.


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## TheJanitor

Add another to the list of those whose data was saved by your help! Eneles, thanks for being there!


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## jam_rich

And another happy customer! Just got that lovely feeling of relief as I've managed to rescue all my music and photos. Thanks very much for all the above advice - it worked a treat.


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## turpdog

Hello eneles,

I was following your steps that you posted to solve the needing to format the hard drive again, and everything was falling into place. I got to the point where I ran TestDisk and figured out that the boot sector was damaged. I then started to run TestDisk again so I could choose "Boot" so I could repair FAT but now my computer can not find the external harddrive. I have switched cables, shut down and started up again, totally powered down computer unplugged and started up again, nothing helps to find the drive. Diskmanagement tells me there is a drive but it is not named with a letter.

I tried to plug the drive into another laptop and it does not recogize it and disk management does not show it as well. No weird noises coming from the hard drive. In your experience is there anything that can be done now or is all lost?


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## Deleted090308

@turpdog: Please start a thread of your own where you tell us what computer and external HDD you have.


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