Do I need a partition?

[sman123]

Hey all!

1st thanks for some great programs! been using ccleaner for over a year and it works great!

 

I have a hp dv9700 laptop that I had set up with 3 partitions. 1= xp pro, 2= vista ultimate and 3= data.

I would like to say that if I don't get the files back it is NOT the end of the world. I may lose a little bit of data but i will live. lol

It would be nice if i had it though.

What happened: I wanted to reinstall xp and vista. i was having problems with my vista install (after i installed xp of course). I read somewhere that some hp recovery disk give you options... but noooo not mine! lol it started the format process right off. so shutdown and reinstall xp.

now I have xp on 1st partition and have not created any other partitions. when i run Recuva it only scans the C: drive. Deep Scan, same thing.

 

Do I need to create a partition?

Am I out of luck?

 

Thanks!

[DennisD]

Hi sman, and welcome to Piriform.

 

Before that question can be answered, I think we need to get a clear picture of what exactly you have now in way of partitions, and which one you actually want to run Recuva on.

 

If you had 3 very distinct partitions, recognized by Windows as three seperate drives, with their own drive letters, then unless you have used some partitioning software to merge the partitions back into one, then you will still have three partitions.

 

A reinstall of XP will have installed it on only one of the three partitions. It wouldn't have touched the other two in any way.

 

So I can't get a handle on why you think you may need to create another. Am I making sense to you here, or have I misunderstood your first post?

 

You just need to look in "My Computer" to confirm how many partitions (drives) you still have.

 

Recuva can be pointed to any other drive by using the drop down menu where it says C:

[sman123]

Hi sman, and welcome to Piriform.

 

Before that question can be answered, I think we need to get a clear picture of what exactly you have now in way of partitions, and which one you actually want to run Recuva on.

 

If you had 3 very distinct partitions, recognized by Windows as three seperate drives, with their own drive letters, then unless you have used some partitioning software to merge the partitions back into one, then you will still have three partitions.

 

A reinstall of XP will have installed it on only one of the three partitions. It wouldn't have touched the other two in any way.

 

So I can't get a handle on why you think you may need to create another. Am I making sense to you here, or have I misunderstood your first post?

 

You just need to look in "My Computer" to confirm how many partitions (drives) you still have.

 

Recuva can be pointed to any other drive by using the drop down menu where it says C:

 

 

Thanks for the quick reply! hope this answers your questions.

 

I was not clear i guess. recovery cd wiped MFT even though it only ran for a second or 2. reinstalled xp pro on newly created partition 1. no other partitions are created at this time.

 

looking in My Computer shows only C:\ drive only.

In Disk Manager shows 2 enteries.

first is C: 32GB NTFS

second is 200GB unallocated

 

thanks

[DennisD]

So I'm guessing it's the 200gb unallocated drive or drive space that you want to recover data from, and as it isn't recognized as a partition, or two partitions anymore, you can't point Recuva to it.

 

If that 200gb is where your two previous partitions were, then they should still be there, as only the reference to them would have been wiped from the MFT, or probably in this case, the Partition Table.

 

That is unless your reinstall of XP actually wrote over space previously allocated to one of the other two partitions.

 

Messing about with corrupt MFT's or Partition Tables is tricky, as I'm no expert with this stuff, and I'm not sure if anyone on here is, but if you can confirm these assumptions as being the case, then we can do our best and maybe use the right software to undelete those partitions. That's a possibility.

 

It could also be possible to simply use a Rescue Package to copy files from that space. Not 100% sure about that one but it's something to bear in mind.

 

And if any other members have experienced this "recover data from unallocated space" problem, feel free to offer your two penneth.

[sman123]

So I'm guessing it's the 200gb unallocated drive or drive space that you want to recover data from, and as it isn't recognized as a partition, or two partitions anymore, you can't point Recuva to it.

 

If that 200gb is where your two previous partitions were, then they should still be there, as only the reference to them would have been wiped from the MFT, or probably in this case, the Partition Table.

 

That is unless your reinstall of XP actually wrote over space previously allocated to one of the other two partitions.

 

Messing about with corrupt MFT's or Partition Tables is tricky, as I'm no expert with this stuff, and I'm not sure if anyone on here is, but if you can confirm these assumptions as being the case, then we can do our best and maybe use the right software to undelete those partitions. That's a possibility.

 

It could also be possible to simply use a Rescue Package to copy files from that space. Not 100% sure about that one but it's something to bear in mind.

 

And if any other members have experienced this "recover data from unallocated space" problem, feel free to offer your two penneth.

 

 

DennisD, you are exactly correct. the 200GB allocated space is where the 2 other partitions were (vista partition and the data partition). as i thought the data is probably still there- although tricky to get to.

 

as stated in my original post- not that big of a deal if i cannot recover the files. i am willing to spend some time trying to recover them though.

 

2 questions here:

 

1) if i create a new partition consisting of the full 200GB without formatting - will Recuva see it and attempt to recover the files? or will this only make matters worse?

 

2) is there a free Rescue Package out there that i can try to recover the files with?

 

i guess that's 3 questions...

 

thanks again for your help here.

[DennisD]

Hi sman.

 

1: Creating a new partition using Windows would probably erase data. Using a third party software may or may not, but I would assume it would, and wouldn't take the chance of losing the stuff you want to recover.

 

2: There is a free rescue disk which will possibly undelete one or both partitions, which also has a file recovery feature. The only thing being that I've never had to use it yet, so I really don't know how efficient it is, although I would use this myself if in the same situation.

 

It appears to be exactly what you require, and it does have an "Undelete Partitions Wizard" to guide you through the process.

 

Paragon Rescue Kit 9.0 Express:

 

When you download it, you will have an exe file.

 

The simplest way to get this to disk is to extract the Image (ISO) file from the downloaded exe, and then burn that Image to a CD using something like Ashampoo (freeware) or Imgburn (Freeware), and then boot with it.

 

There's also a freeware rescue application called Test Disk, but I don't think it's the easiest program to use. It will aso try to undelete a partition and/or recover data. Might be worth a look at least.

 

Test Disk:

 

There may be other freeware programs, and I'm sure if any of the other members are aware of them they'll post the information.

 

If you have any problems doing any of the above, just post back.

[sman123]

thanks for the advise. i will give it shot. it will be a few days before i will be able to try it. but i will post back here and let you know how things turn out.

 

again, thanks for your help.

[preferess]

Infact Test Disk is good but i had also used another tool Stellar Phoenix Partition Recovery Software which i found is quite user friendly and helpful..give a try

http://www.partitionrecovery-software.com/