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    I messed up my external HD

    Discussion in 'Accessories' started by Mann, Dec 28, 2005.

  1. Mann

    Mann Notebook Enthusiast

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    I have an external HD with usb 2.0 that I tried to format in NTFS file system. Just when it was about to finish a message popped up saying there's a problem with the formatting so I had to abort. Now my laptop only recognizes the drive as a RAW drive and can't write any files on it nor format it. Can I still fix it? Thanks in advance for any help you can give :)
     
    Mann, Dec 28, 2005
    #1
  2. coriolis

    coriolis Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Try this:

    Go to:

    1. Control Panel
    2. Admin Tools
    3. Computer Management
    4. Disk Management(left side)
    5. Check the Disks and CD-ROMs, your main HD is DISK 0, and there SHOULD be a DISK 1 which is unpartitioned and unformatted, so do some random right clicks and after doing the above, try to see if windows recognizes it
     
    coriolis, Dec 28, 2005
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  3. Mann

    Mann Notebook Enthusiast

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    It (disk management) doesnt see the external drive though its in the "My computer". I guess that means my drive's busted, huh?
     
    Mann, Dec 29, 2005
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  4. onick

    onick Notebook Consultant

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    unfortunately i think your harddisk is busted this time :( , I faced a similar problem, after i aborted the partition making operation in my newly bought hard disk while using partition magic. after that, the whole drive was shown as an unformatted disk in partition magic where i couldn't format or write in it. in "my computer" it was shown as a single drive where i could format it by right clicking on it, but after i format it, the size of the drive changed. it was showing somethign like over 100GB, where the original size was 40GB. so, I took it back to the shop, where they exchange it. :)
     
    onick, Dec 29, 2005
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  5. ccbr01

    ccbr01 Matlab powerhouse! NBR Reviewer

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    ccbr01, Dec 30, 2005
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  6. Mann

    Mann Notebook Enthusiast

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    It doesn't work unfortunately. I guess the damage is physical. I've heard this can still be fixed....? I'm lucky though it's an old drive passed on to me.

    I appreciate the replies :)
     
    Mann, Dec 31, 2005
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  7. tempoct

    tempoct Notebook Consultant

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    What brand of the HDD? Usually the program ccbr01 would/might work only for Maxtor drive. Each manufacturer offer (similar) and free utility. I'd check the manufactuerer website for that.
    You might need low level format to get rid off this problem. The format will mark (if there's any) physically damaged sectors of the drive so the computer won't try to read/write those sectors again.
    Anyway, if there's any physically damaged sectors in your drive, don't store any valuable data without backup.
     
    tempoct, Jan 3, 2006
    #7