This is what Disk Management shows:
Since I didn't want to risk erasing data or making it harder to recover data, I've turned to Recuva. Please guide me on what to do.
This is what Disk Management shows:
Since I didn't want to risk erasing data or making it harder to recover data, I've turned to Recuva. Please guide me on what to do.
Looks like HD 0 is broken or something. Doesn't seem that the drive is functional. If you bring up the device manager and go to view->"devices by connection" and find your 2-3 hard drives what does it look like?
Also for some unknown reason you have Disk 1 with an (empty) extended partition taking up most of the space. Extended partition is only necessary on MBR drives where you need MORE than 4 partitions.
Right-click on disc 0 and select initialize.
Right-click on disc 0 and select initialize.
I don't think he wants to erase or write to the disk, I think he wants his data back from the disk. Besides the drive is showing up with no media / zero size, something is way wrong.
Try initializing the disk so that it can be seen, then see if you can get the info off it.
Try initializing the disk so that it can be seen, then see if you can get the info off it.
Initialize disk overwrites the MBR (and partition table) or GPT. I don't see how erasing the list of partitions on the disk is going to help with data recovery.
If the MBR (and partition table) or GPT is corrupt windows will want to make a new one and assume the disk is blank so you can use it. That's not what he wants.
Have a read here, it may help
https://superuser.com/questions/283930/will-initializing-disk-make-data-unrecoverable
Have a read here, it may help
https://superuser.com/questions/283930/will-initializing-disk-make-data-unrecoverable
"Short answer, 'No, initialization shouldn't make the data unrecoverable' but probably won't make it any easier to recover either."
Note that in this user's case the drive is showing up as 0 bytes. Maybe a controller failure, disk surface/head failure, or the firmware couldn't be read off of the platters.
I got this when initializing an MBR:
And this initializing GPT:
In Device Manager, I have Unknown device under Disk Drives. My options are Update driver, Disable device, or Uninstall device.
Have a read here, it may help
https://superuser.com/questions/283930/will-initializing-disk-make-data-unrecoverable
There may be a options here using "the free version of 'Partition Find and Mount' which let me mount the drive read only."
I got this when initializing an MBR:
And this initializing GPT:
In Device Manager, I have Unknown device under Disk Drives. My options are Update driver, Disable device, or Uninstall device.
There may be a options here using "the free version of 'Partition Find and Mount' which let me mount the drive read only."
It seems to be exactly what I though, your drive's controller card is not reading from the disk and is indicating zero size. That's why when you tried to erase some of the data from drive (which you did in my above quote of you) it was unable to do so because your drive is zero sectors in size. Post a screen shot from your device manager, it should confirm that the controller card on the hard drive is as good as detached from the drive assembly.
Post a screen shot from your device manager, it should confirm that the controller card on the hard drive is as good as detached from the drive assembly.
It seems your hard drive, the port it is plugged into or the power that it is getting, or the disk surface/heads, or the controller card on the drive (pick one or more) are/is totally messed up. You need professional level data recovery services if you want your data back. The messing around you've done with the drive since your first found that it wasn't working may have eliminated any chance that even the pros can get your data back (then again it doesn't look too good to begin with).
Common prices for professional data recovery services could be $500 - $5000 USD. Some may offer a "no data recovered no cost" guarantee, other may not. Some professional data recovery services may be more skilled than others and that skill may not necessarily correspond with price (just don't expect one of them to undertake a serious data recovery attempt for $50 involving transferring the "adaptives" calibration data from the chip to another board, replacing all the read/write heads and the preamp and recover all your data guarantee success and no cost for replacement parts)
- Choice A: give up on your data (or restore from your backup copy)
- Choice B: use professional data recovery services
- Choice C: mess around with the drive more (this includes simply leaving it in your computer with power), have virtually no chance of getting any of your data back yourself, and drastically reduce the chances that Choice B will work.