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unreadable HD

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by ralphael

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hello again.you may be familiar with my problem.i was able to run win xp CHKDSK and recover my stoarage drive last week(actually on numerous reboots chkdsk ran on start/up and recovered)i get the same msg now>drive is inaccessible< although now when i re-boot, chkdsk wants to run on every start/up and says if i want to skip checking drive (i don't),then it gives the msg>>unreadable master file table<< and chkdsk aborts.i know that if i can get chkdsk to run i can recover the drive,its really a smart application but i cant get chkdsk to run.i also tried some of the tips in Q&A,it wont let me fragment or scandisk and i'm also trying to go over everything i did last time sincerely

6 replies

by thechas

I'm not trying to be mean. But, you had your warning.

When the drive first failed, once you recovered the files, you should have backed up what you wanted and replaced the drive.

ANYTIME a hard drive starts to act up, you can assume that the symptoms will get worse.

What you are seeing is that the head or platter failure has become worse, if not catastrophic.

"IF" you do get access to the drive, backup the files and replace the drive.

Chas

by razz2

TheChas nailed it. When a drive starts to fail it becomes unstable and if CHKDSK takes more than one time to fix it you have major issues. Last week after recovery you should have backed up and then either replaced the drive incase it is in the process of dying, or at least guessed that the partition was shot and re-formetted. I'm with Chas though. I can't risk trusting my data to a drive that has displayed problems... not worth it.

If you get acces to the drive then backup what you need and buy a new one. If you want to try to see if the old is bad or just has partition issues then install it as a secondary drive. Be warned though that if you trust it, it may still die for good.

Good Luck,

razz

by matmak

In addition to the comments of the guys, try ruuning Fdisk /MBR one of the meesgaes you receives suggest you may have a corrupt or Virus infected boot secotr thus runnning the above option should refresh your file allocation table (please note this is not a gauranteed fix and can result in the drive becoming totally inaccessible thus use as a last resort)

regards

Matmak

by glyall

use a PC or Hard drive diagnostic program.
it will tell you the state of the hard drive.
If you get a warning or failure buy a new hard drive and copy the data to the new drive.
If its is under warranty contact where you bought if and get a new drive and copy the data to the new drive

good luck

by wlbowers

The first mindset you have to get out of is you are not recovering the drive. You are only fixing things on a temporary basis.

You need to remove the drive as a master and install it on a system as a slave.

Now you can run some diagnostics on the drive. The more you attempt to access that drive, the more damage you do and the more data you are going to loose.

Good Luck Your gonna need it

Lee

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