Hard disk crash please help

Hi:

Something sent a power surge through our house today and the main circuit
breaker flipped, cutting off power to my computer.

Catastrophe. The drive won't boot. Windows just doesn't see it. Even the
"dir" command DOS (which I accessed through the repair recovery console)
gives me an error that says the "directory cannot be enumerated."

Running the Windows XP CD, I'm told that there's no system there and the
drive needs to be reformatted to install it anew.

I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called "getdataback"
and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The preview
function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine. All I have to do
is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in usable
form.

But it's a holiday weekend, and if I cannot ressurect the system itself, I
will lose days reconfiguring a new system. I cannot afford this. The preview
system won't read the "identity" files from Outlook Express, so I cannot
access critical emails.

I'm in pretty deep trouble.

Please please ... is there anyway to revive this drive? How bad can the
damage be?

Need a miracle wrote:

(snip multipost)

Asked and answered in the other newsgroup to which you posted. Please don't
multipost; it makes more work for everyone and will get you *less* help,
not more. See this for why:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossposting
http://www.blakjak.demon.co.uk/mul_crss.htm - multiposting

If you have forgotten where you posted or can't find your post, use Google
Groups Advanced Search and search for your name.

Malke
--
MS-MVP
Elephant Boy Computers - Don't Panic!
FAQ - http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/#FAQ

bw wrote:
> "Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in
> message news:60DC297C-B243-4754-BBE9-ADB6F1A352F3@microsoft.com...
>> I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called
>> "getdataback"
>> and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The
>> preview function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine.
>> All I have to do
>> is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in
>> usable
>> form.
>
> Yeah I hate programs that shake you down for money before they
> actually do anything at all.

Would you prefer a program not do anything, THEN shake you down for money?

Here, you can get a high assurance that the product will meet your needs
before you lay out any cash. This is far superior to most commercial
programs, including, some hold, various Microsoft products.

First , get yourself a copy of Knoppix or Ubuntu Live, and try mounting the
disk in that. (use ntfs-3g for ntfs)

I've known that to work when Windows won't look at it.

--------------------------
"This is a wonderful computer. It''s 20yrs old and absolutely reliable.
And, in all that time it''s only had four mobos, six processors, two cases,
seven OS''s ...."


"Malke" wrote:

> Need a miracle wrote:
>
> (snip multipost)
>
> Asked and answered in the other newsgroup to which you posted. Please don't
> multipost; it makes more work for everyone and will get you *less* help,
> not more. See this for why:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossposting
> http://www.blakjak.demon.co.uk/mul_crss.htm - multiposting
>
> If you have forgotten where you posted or can't find your post, use Google
> Groups Advanced Search and search for your name.
>
> Malke
> --
> MS-MVP
> Elephant Boy Computers - Don't Panic!
> FAQ - http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/#FAQ
>
>

"Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:60DC297C-B243-4754-BBE9-ADB6F1A352F3@microsoft.com...
> I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called
> "getdataback"
> and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The preview
> function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine. All I have to
> do
> is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in
> usable
> form.

Yeah I hate programs that shake you down for money before they actually do
anything at all. If it's a bad partition table you can probably recover it
with TestDisk by Christophe Grenier, a small freeware utility. Windows
might be hosed anyway, but this utility should let you get to your data
files, without taking a chance on $79 in extortion money.

I like Ultimate Boot CD, it has testdisk and some other decent utils, good
luck.

"Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:60DC297C-B243-4754-BBE9-ADB6F1A352F3@microsoft.com...
> Catastrophe. The drive won't boot. Windows just doesn't see it. Even the
> "dir" command DOS (which I accessed through the repair recovery console)
> gives me an error that says the "directory cannot be enumerated."

p.s. take it easy, the worst thing you can do is panic. Read all the
documentation FIRST for any recovery stuff you try.

I've had the "no system installed" message a number of times and most of
them have managed to logon without much of a problem... Some times I had to
try repeatedly for 10-15 minutes but finally managed to boot the system. The
message is most times incorrect; on one or another occasion I had to reset
the BIOS to default settings, and haven't had to restore or edit the
boot.ini file.

How to access the BIOS
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/bios_manufacturer.htm

Other times I've used a boot disk to replace the files in the boot sector.
Or had to repair the boot sector with the foxboot command from the Recovery
Console, but I've never had to reinstall the system.

Make a boot disk with the files downloaded from
http://www.bootdisk.com/bootdisk.htm download the xpquick file, zip version
to make the bootdisk manually or the .exe version which makes it for you.
Look for the download link in line: "XP Quick Boot Diskette xpquick.zip |
xpquick.exe | Read.1st". Once you logon copy the file to C:\ to replace the
damaged file/s.

And after that rebuild the boot sector from the Recovery Console, with
commands; "fixboot", "bootcfg /rebuild" or "fixmbr" in that order... fixmbr
is risky and should only be used as last resort.

The Recovery Console.
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/win_xp_rec.htm

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/r_c_cmds.htm


----------------------------------------------------
"Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> escribió en el
mensaje news:60DC297C-B243-4754-BBE9-ADB6F1A352F3@microsoft.com...
> Hi:
>
> Something sent a power surge through our house today and the main circuit
> breaker flipped, cutting off power to my computer.
>
> Catastrophe. The drive won't boot. Windows just doesn't see it. Even the
> "dir" command DOS (which I accessed through the repair recovery console)
> gives me an error that says the "directory cannot be enumerated."
>
> Running the Windows XP CD, I'm told that there's no system there and the
> drive needs to be reformatted to install it anew.
>
> I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called
> "getdataback"
> and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The preview
> function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine. All I have to
> do
> is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in
> usable
> form.
>
> But it's a holiday weekend, and if I cannot ressurect the system itself, I
> will lose days reconfiguring a new system. I cannot afford this. The
> preview
> system won't read the "identity" files from Outlook Express, so I cannot
> access critical emails.
>
> I'm in pretty deep trouble.
>
> Please please ... is there anyway to revive this drive? How bad can the
> damage be?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

Oh My God!!!

*YOU* are God.

Testdisk is copying over all my data as we speak. It also says it found a
backup boot partition, and is asking me whether I want to use this or rebuild
the partition.

Which option should I choose?

At least I have my data. What a cool program. And FREE.



"bw" wrote:

>
> "Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:60DC297C-B243-4754-BBE9-ADB6F1A352F3@microsoft.com...
> > I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called
> > "getdataback"
> > and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The preview
> > function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine. All I have to
> > do
> > is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in
> > usable
> > form.
>
> Yeah I hate programs that shake you down for money before they actually do
> anything at all. If it's a bad partition table you can probably recover it
> with TestDisk by Christophe Grenier, a small freeware utility. Windows
> might be hosed anyway, but this utility should let you get to your data
> files, without taking a chance on $79 in extortion money.
>
> I like Ultimate Boot CD, it has testdisk and some other decent utils, good
> luck.
>
>
>
>
>

Thanks to TESTDISK, my hard drive appears to be completely restored.

It boots. All the data is there. I've backed it up entirely.


Got to love this forum. And what a kick-*** program, absolutely free.

Thanks again to all.




"Need a miracle" wrote:

> Hi:
>
> Something sent a power surge through our house today and the main circuit
> breaker flipped, cutting off power to my computer.
>
> Catastrophe. The drive won't boot. Windows just doesn't see it. Even the
> "dir" command DOS (which I accessed through the repair recovery console)
> gives me an error that says the "directory cannot be enumerated."
>
> Running the Windows XP CD, I'm told that there's no system there and the
> drive needs to be reformatted to install it anew.
>
> I know the data is still there. I downloaded a program called "getdataback"
> and as far as I can tell, I did not lose a single user file. The preview
> function works and every file I looked at seems to be fine. All I have to do
> is send in $79 and the program will copy the data over, hopefully in usable
> form.
>
> But it's a holiday weekend, and if I cannot ressurect the system itself, I
> will lose days reconfiguring a new system. I cannot afford this. The preview
> system won't read the "identity" files from Outlook Express, so I cannot
> access critical emails.
>
> I'm in pretty deep trouble.
>
> Please please ... is there anyway to revive this drive? How bad can the
> damage be?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

"Need a miracle" <Needamiracle@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:84136267-3B9B-4BAB-8B55-FC2BA4EC8C87@microsoft.com...
> Thanks to TESTDISK, my hard drive appears to be completely restored.
>
> It boots. All the data is there. I've backed it up entirely.
>
>
> Got to love this forum. And what a kick-*** program, absolutely free.
>
> Thanks again to all.

Now is the time to think about your backup policy, unless
you prefer to let the next disaster catch you unprepared.