HP_RECOVERY partition "Invisible" after PC System Recovery

Hi everyone, greetings from Brazil

I bought my DV5000t in July 2006 and I really never had problems with it till last week when the system started crashing for no reason.
I then decided to use HP's PC System Recovery which I believe is "ran" from the local HP_Recovery partition ( well, for many times I tried creating the Recovery Discs but after getting an error while creating the second disc, I finally gave up...I've read many posts about ppl having the same problem...but anyways, that's not the case now...let's stick to the original issue...)

Well, the system was successfully recovered, everything is running smoothly now. No crashes or annoying error messages...HOWEVER, my HP_Recovery partition is no longer "visible" in Windows Explorer....

I am 101% sure I did not delete it and funny thing is, I can see it ( and all of its details ) in Disk Management....it even says it's "Healthy".....technically, that means I still DO HAVE the partition, right ????

Though I have no plans of using that space for personal data/files and wheter I can "see" it or not makes no difference at all, I wonder if it's still "working" properly. The only thing is I'm afraid I won't be able to use PC Recovery again from HD as I do not have the discs.

All I got from HP's tech support was "I am sorry to inform you that there might have been data loss"... I really can't buy that cheap excuse.

They said I could try running a System Recovery ( from HD ) again...I just can't be bothered doing it and re-installing everything again. And I really don't want to take the risk of losing everything for good.

Any comments/suggestions/help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks a lot !

A. Lima

 

Well, if it helps any...
Dell Media Direct Partitions, HP Quickplay Partitions, and some other similar stuff is never visible. There is a way to "hide" stuff the way you are seeing right now. But I cannot think of an easy way to test if your partition is still okay without risking screwing up the PC.

Best advice I can give, is to set up ALL your programs, settings, everything...get rid of the bloatware, tune the machine up. Then go out and purchase a copy of Norton Ghost or Acronis True Image (Acronis True Image is Vista compatible, Ghost is not) and make an image of your drive with all your stuff installed. If anything goes wrong, then you will not need that partition at all.

Also, call HP Tech Support and tell them you cannot make the discs because of some stupid error that cannot be fixed, and ask them to ship out recovery discs to you for little or no charge (they might ask for about $20). Get Acronis, and you're doubly set.

 

If you see the partition in Disk Management than the data is probably all still there it is just not assigned a drive letter which is why you wouldnt see it in Explorer. You should be able to quickly assign a drive letter to it and see if everything is there. If it is, just remove the drive letter as you shouldnt need to access it anyway. On my vista install on dv6500t, it came with that partition visible.

 

yes
it worked!
THANK U SOOOOOOOO MUCH !
I wonder why those dumb technicians couldn't help me out !
they should be fired for that! lol

thanks a bunch !!!