My hard drive got deleted after a CCleaner scan

[pop1207]

After the CCleaner Health Check, my hard drive were fine after i shutdown my computer and turning it on again. All of my hard-drives were gone except for drive C D and E, the only thing i do differnt this Health Che k is closing my browser for it to scan, normally i would left the browser open when im doing the scan.

[nukecad]

Did you only run Health Check? (Not Registry Cleaner or the new Driver Updater).

I doubt that Health Check did anything, especially if the drives were still showing until you shutdown.

Drives do occasionally go 'missing' from Windows for various reasons, and when they do you usually notice it on reboot.
A Windows update (especially if it was updating in the background when you shut down), a faulty connection, the CMOS battery needing replacement, a fault on the drive itself, a failing power supply, a failing motherboard, all those and and more could all cause a drive(s) to go 'missing'.

Would I be right in thinking that the now unrecognised drives were external, maybe connected by USB?
If so try unplugging and replugging them and then Restart (not shutdown) the computer.

You can also try going into Disk Management, click “Action” on the toolbar and then select “Rescan disks” to tell the system to perform a re-identification for all connected disks.

PS. How many drives were there? and which OS version are you running?

[pop1207]

On 26/06/2021 at 15:13, nukecad said:

PS. How many drives were there?

Dirve C D anmd E did not go missing, but all of my other drives did, there were 4 in total

[pop1207]

On 26/06/2021 at 15:13, nukecad said:

You can also try going into Disk Management, click “Action” on the toolbar and then select “Rescan disks” to tell the system to perform a re-identification for all connected disks

i did do that but nothing happened

 

[Andavari]

Were they external USB drives, and if they were what brand and model were they?

Recently some external Western Digital USB drives have been maliciously erased via the Internet:
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=western+digital+drives+being+erased

[pop1207]

1 hour ago, Andavari said:

Were they external USB drives, and if they were what brand and model were they?

 

Internal

 

[nukecad]

Just to be double sure here - Did you run the new Driver Updater in CCleaner?
(That may have changed the driver for those discs).

If not then:

Have you Restarted the computer? Not shutdown/boot but Restart.
(With Win 10 Restart resets the computer more thoroughly than a Shutdown/Boot does).

As it's four drives that went missing, and not just one, that would seem to rule out a faulty drive or drive connection and point to the computer software or hardware.

Open Device Manager right-click on 'Disk Drives' and Scan for Hardware Changes to see if that will pick up the 'missing' discs.

Does Disc Management see the drives or are they also missing there? If DM can see them but Windows can't then try changing the drive letters.

I'd also run a couple of different Virus/Malware scans just to be sure that it isn't that.

Then I'm afraid it's down to checking the computer software and hardware for possible faults.

Just to be sure that it's not one faulty drive messing up recognition of the others you could try physically disconnecting them and adding them back one at a time.
(You could also try each one on another computer or in an external caddy).

As said there can be many reasons for discs becoming unrecognised, here's an idea of what to try:
Carry out any virus checks to see if its computer virus, spyware etc issue,
Check your system log events for any possible update that may have incorrectly been applied or got stuck trying to be applied,
Replace the CMOS battery, (you should do that every 3 to 6 years),
Carry out basic checks to make sure you have good power supply and the cables are firmly connected,
Carry out checks of ram, cables and connections inside the computer.

[pop1207]

1 hour ago, nukecad said:

Just to be double sure here - Did you run the new Driver Updater in CCleaner?
(That may have changed the driver for those discs).

If not then:

Have you Restarted the computer? Not shutdown/boot but Restart.
(With Win 10 Restart resets the computer more thoroughly than a Shutdown/Boot does).

As it's four drives that went missing, and not just one, that would seem to rule out a faulty drive or drive connection and point to the computer software or hardware.

Open Device Manager right-click on 'Disk Drives' and Scan for Hardware Changes to see if that will pick up the 'missing' discs.

Does Disc Management see the drives or are they also missing there? If DM can see them but Windows can't then try changing the drive letters.

I'd also run a couple of different Virus/Malware scans just to be sure that it isn't that.

Then I'm afraid it's down to checking the computer software and hardware for possible faults.

Just to be sure that it's not one faulty drive messing up recognition of the others you could try physically disconnecting them and adding them back one at a time.
(You could also try each one on another computer or in an external caddy).

As said there can be many reasons for discs becoming unrecognised, here's an idea of what to try:
Carry out any virus checks to see if its computer virus, spyware etc issue,
Check your system log events for any possible update that may have incorrectly been applied or got stuck trying to be applied,
Replace the CMOS battery, (you should do that every 3 to 6 years),
Carry out basic checks to make sure you have good power supply and the cables are firmly connected,
Carry out checks of ram, cables and connections inside the computer.

- i did not ran the Driver Update
- the disck did not show up in Disc Management and i also scan for Hardware Changes and notthing showed up
- I also did scan for Virus/Malware
I think i gotta do some of the thing u recommended down there

 

 

[nukecad]

Sorry to hear that it's not turning out to be simple. Always easier if you can sort it out at the keyboard rather than opening the case.

There are many hardware reason why discs can suddenly go unrecognised so it's just a question of checking things one by one, starting with the disc(s) itself(themselves) of course.

The fact that some discs are still being seen does tend to point to a hardware fault somewhere, hopefully something as easy as changing the CMOS battery or a loose connection to the unrecognised disc(s) that can just be reseated.

Which order you try/check things in is going to be a question of how easy/hard they are to get to in your particular computer.

You'll find plenty of other advice of things to try if you search online for 'disc suddenly not recognised' or similar wording.

[pop1207]

1 hour ago, nukecad said:

Sorry to hear that it's not turning out to be simple. Always easier if you can sort it out at the keyboard rather than opening the case.

There are many hardware reason why discs can suddenly go unrecognised so it's just a question of checking things one by one, starting with the disc(s) itself(themselves) of course.

The fact that some discs are still being seen does tend to point to a hardware fault somewhere, hopefully something as easy as changing the CMOS battery or a loose connection to the unrecognised disc(s) that can just be reseated.

Which order you try/check things in is going to be a question of how easy/hard they are to get to in your particular computer.

You'll find plenty of other advice of things to try if you search online for 'disc suddenly not recognised' or similar wording.

Just want to say thanks, you've been very helpful. Ill probably go change the CMOS battery and ill update you later

[Andavari]

Some other troubleshooting steps to try:
* Check in Device Manager inside Windows to see if the drives are visible to it, if they're listed in there right-click and select Uninstall Device and then reboot, upon starting up Windows will re-detect them and if successful it may or will ask you to reboot again to finish setting up the drive.

* Go into the BIOS/UEFI to make sure the drives are visible and enabled in there.

* Open the computer case, and inspect the cables connected to the drives to see if they've went bad or have a loose connection, even unplugging them and plugging them back it might be useful. Also look for melted cables to rule that out. If they're getting power from Molex to SATA power cables those are known to sometimes melt or even worse cause fires.

* If you have a USB 2.0/3.0 external enclosure (a wall powered one is required if they're 3.5 inch HDDs) you could put a drive in it to test it outside of the computer via USB which would be worth trying.

[pop1207]

On 28/06/2021 at 23:22, Andavari said:

Some other troubleshooting steps to try:
* Check in Device Manager inside Windows to see if the drives are visible to it, if they're listed in there right-click and select Uninstall Device and then reboot, upon starting up Windows will re-detect them and if successful it may or will ask you to reboot again to finish setting up the drive.

* Go into the BIOS/UEFI to make sure the drives are visible and enabled in there.

* Open the computer case, and inspect the cables connected to the drives to see if they've went bad or have a loose connection, even unplugging them and plugging them back it might be useful. Also look for melted cables to rule that out. If they're getting power from Molex to SATA power cables those are known to sometimes melt or even worse cause fires.

* If you have a USB 2.0/3.0 external enclosure (a wall powered one is required if they're 3.5 inch HDDs) you could put a drive in it to test it outside of the computer via USB which would be worth trying.

Back from a trip, the hard drive magicly came back

 

[Nergal]

1 hour ago, pop1207 said:

Back from a trip, the hard drive magicly came back

 

sounds like the drive is dying.  Back it up regularly

[pop1207]

On 08/07/2021 at 10:11, Nergal said:

sounds like the drive is dying.  Back it up regularly

i think it is, the drives keep crashing when i open it up

 

[nukecad]

I wouldn't trust it then, sound like it's new drive time.  (Or just take it out and use the others).

Is it just the one?
You had mentioned 4 drives going unrecognised, but that could be because just one of them was failing.
Take the bad one out of the equation and the others may then be fine.