missing partition ,help make it visible!

Discussion in 'Acronis Disk Director Suite' started by yst, Apr 17, 2008.

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  1. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    yesterday after installed the farstone restoreit,the process as below,
    it checked the available space in my first drive(c: & F:),then display available space for the hidden protected partition for restoreit .therefore I selected F: drive and allocated 3333mb for the hidden partition usage.(actually my drive .F: is 43 gb but only have 1gb space available!)but I enter 3333mb that equal to 3gb isn't it,anyway ,the installation process just not checked it and just allowed me to allocate 3333mb that is out of the expected free space capacity,then it asked me are you sure to creat that hidden partition,I enter yes,at that time I am not knowledged that my F: drive actually only had 1gb left space avalable.


    after reboot ,restoreit success installation ,create a new restore point at boot automatically.but I open window explorer ,because I am afraid something wrong,double check that the whole drive F: have disappeared ,in the window explorer only have c: and skip to d:,all my valuable information in the F: now dissapear,therefore anxiously I uninstall restoreit in hope that it will recover my F:,uninstalled and after rebooted farstonerestoreit tell me it cannot retrieve the hidden partition (created in F: drive) anymore,could you agree to left it to free space,
    I not know what to do and enter yes,then after restart window,I still cannnot access my missing F: .

    I use acronis partition suite to search for lost partition in this hard disk,but find nothing,and is trying active parition recovery ,but it only showed an unallocated partition,after surface tested the lost files and structure still not shown .


    now my last resort is ,Can I just use the diskmgmt.msc command,and go to the unallocated drive,it is black in color, right click it and create new partition,then "not format it ",can this trick help the hidden and missing partition reappear with all the data in it not destroyed?(I found an article tuturial on that),but not sure is it will destroy all my data?Or should I first use recovery software to save them first,what method can do to save my data,since the drive have 44.8 gb of data,I think it is impossible to recover and save them to other disk,as I do not have this large disk space either.therefore I want is there method to make hidden partition become visible again,without losing data ?can the last known good configuration help,but this drive is not system drive ,it is extended partition's logical part of the primary boot partition.

    Thanks in advance!
     
  2. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    yst,

    This will be a challenge. The F: partition has been deleted and it can't be recovered with Acronis Recovery Expert. Is that correct?

    Was your F: drive 43 GB in size and contained 42 GB of data?

    Don't do anything to the Unallocated Space until you get good advice.
     
  3. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    Was your F: drive 43 GB in size and contained 42 GB of data?

    yes .in my memory it only have 1.2 gb empty space,remaining space is datas.

    thanks you!

    anyway,the trouble will make me more experienced!
     
  4. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    yst:

    Please take a look at this recent post from someone with a similar predicament.
     
  5. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    thanks ,

    I had previously been in this state about three times,and had learned recovery software can help,but I really hesitate to do so because of not that perfect!

    at one time I brought the computer to technical shop ,I don't know what he did,but after awhile my missing partition appeared as usual!therefore I think I can do it myself by research,therefore asking this in wilders forums .

    but if I have to recover using software,i will consider bought it to the techincal computer repair shop,may be that will much more perfect!just wonder what he did ,why I don't know the tricks?!
     
  6. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    i remembered I have make a backup partition table of the 1 harddisk with partition table doctor previously,but the problems is although my drive F: is the same ,but my c: has been reinstalled a new window xp,therefore the content is total different,but I have told the technician who install xp for me just not to change the size of drive c,therefore I think I have the same size as previously state.

    then now can I just restore the partition backup ,will this screw thing up?
    my drive F: which become unallocated is extended or logical partition of the c drive,therefore I am afraid is I restore it will afect booting up window,and afraid it will overwrite all my data in driveF: if thing wrong I cannot recover again!

    I also have an image backup of partition c:(not the whole disk),so,my question is ,if I restore the partition c: image ,then will this image restore also restore the F:drive make it recognised again by xp?so many puzzle ,need some one experienced help ,thanks again!
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2008
  7. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    Can you examine the partition table in your backup and compare it with the partition table currently on your disk? If so, maybe you can determine if the C: partition is still the same size and in the same location.

    If the C: partition has moved then yes, this will really screw things up. If it has not moved or changed then you can do this without affecting the Windows partition, but read on...

    If the C: partition has not changed since you backed up the partition table then this may work. The changes to the logical F: partition in the partition table will not affect the C: partition, but the effect on the F: partition is unknown. You may be able to see your data or you may make things worse. Can you make another backup of the partition table in its current state before proceeding? If restoring the old partition table does not work then will you be able to restore the current table to get back to where you are now? (I'm not familiar with how Partition Table Doctor works).

    No; restoring an image of the C: partition will not affect the other partitions, so it will not help you to recover your F: drive.

    There are too many opportunities to lose everything on your disk if you mess around with the partition table, so I would recommend that you consult your friend at the computer repair shop.
     
  8. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    thanks for your help,really thanks,


    hard disk 1 partition tables as below,note that the second line (my drive F:)
    have zero entry now:(I has just learned reading partition table today,not sure would it be wrong!)

    80 01 01 00 07 FE FF FF 3F 00 00 00 D5 F6 F0 03
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
    55 AA

    compare the backup partition tables as this:

    80 01 01 00 07 FE FF FF 3F 00 00 00 D5 F6 F0 03
    00 FE FF FF 0F FE FF FF 53 F7 F0 03 99 88 99 05
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
    55 AA

    it seems that the first line(drive c:)has the same entry,
    but if manually change the second line,will the change can be update immediately?or will need to reboot to see the effect?
    is there a preview program let me see before edit ?it's a little risky!
     
  9. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    yst:

    It is good that you saved a copy of the partition table from when the disk was working correctly.

    If you are going to try an experiment, then you could try changing the second partition table entry to the old values. They describe an extended (logical) partition with values given for the starting sector and size, so maybe you will be able to then see data from the missing partition. Here is a description of what the partition table entries mean.

    You will have to do this when Windows is shut down. If Partition Doctor has its own bootable CD or floppy and can run when Windows is shut down, then you can try entering the values for partition 2 from your backup. If not, then you must use some other method. Since you have Acronis Disk Director, you can do this by booting to the recovery disk and starting DD. Right-click on the disk with the damaged partition table and choose "Edit" then, from the "View" menu, choose "As Hex". Make sure that you are viewing absolute sector 0. The partition table is in bytes 1BEh through 1FDh as shown in the illustration in this article (scroll about half-way down the page until you see disk editor view of the MBR). The partition table bytes are pink in color.

    Confirm that the first 16 bytes in the partition table (bytes 01BEh through 01CDh) match the ones in your backup and the next 16 bytes are all zeros. If they differ -- stop; you are probably looking at the wrong sector. If you are certain that you are in the right location then the 16 bytes to modify are 01CEh through 01DDh, so just click on the cells and type the hex entries in directly. Make them match the second line in the backup of your partition table (00 FE FF FF 0F FE FF FF 53 F7 F0 03 99 88 99 05).

    When done, save the sector and exit. Reboot into Windows and see if your missing partition is back. There is no guarantee that you will be able to see the data that used to be located here; this will depend on what actions were taken by Farstone Restorit when you tried to install it.

    If things get even worse, go back into DD and put all zero bytes back in the second partition table entry to return to where you are now.

    Again, there are no guarantees that this will work.
     
  10. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    hello k0lo:

    thanks you your kind response,I have not manually change the partition table,because I found that my partition can be shown by aconis disk suite , but only when used the complete scan option,it has status of undeleted,label f,44.8gb,etc,info,therefore I think I will try to boot from media boot cd,then commit the restore the next day,if I am success I post back here.because today I am not have the courage to commit it(afraid it will make thing worse or make window unbootable!)I have to take a deep breath and sleep a good night today!

    hope everyone have the knowledge of backup every harddisk mbr,partition table before something go wrong,because this accident may occur everyday!
     
  11. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    That is a very encouraging sign. If the Acronis Recovery Agent was able to find enough information to "undelete" the partition, then there is hope that you may be able to recover your data.

    Your first post indicated that the Recovery Agent was unable to find anything, so that's why none of us suggested giving it a try.

    Let us know if the recovery works.
     
  12. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    I run into difficulty ,because my computer the motherboard have been
    reinstalled a new one,therefore now the cd cannot boot normally to load the program,
    error message as below:

    hda:error waiting for DMA,
    hdb:error waiting for DMA,

    then searched the forum ,I tried pressed F11,then enter acpi=off noapic in linux command prompt,
    after a while the # prompt ,enter ,help for a list of built in command.....
    next step I am not sure what to do in order to launch the graphic interface,then I figured out to try " EXIT",and typed out this word,after that,

    surprisedly the graphic interface loaded ok,then I runned it as usual to (complete,manual scan mode),but I still timid to commit the process,because I am not sure the above linux process I done is it correct or not,if someone can confirm I am doing the correct steps ,then I will assure to complete the commit recovery.

    anyone can help me?thanks
     
  13. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    yst:

    It sounds like your new motherboard has some incompatibility with the Linux operating system used by DD in "full" mode, but the "acpi=off noapic" workaround is working. What you are doing to start DD in full mode sounds like it is working, so you should be able to proceed.

    Another alternative is to start DD in the "safe" mode, which uses DOS instead of Linux. If you do not have both "full" and "safe" mode versions on your CD then you can make another CD that includes both.
     
  14. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    not know what the problems,I select safe mode,then it start analyzing disk....
    after that only a black screen like dos and a cursor at the beginning blinking ,I wait it ,but I think it not normal to wait so long ,besides that ,graphic interface did not loaded anymore.I try alt-ctrl-del to restart computer ,but no response,I have to shut down it from the computer button and restart the computer.
     
  15. K0LO

    K0LO Registered Member

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    Can you go back and repeat what you did in post #12? Try the recovery operation if you can get the Recovery Agent to again detect your deleted F: partition.
     
  16. yst

    yst Registered Member

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    k0lo:

    really really thanks you your help,.my F: drive have restored successfully.
    thanks give me the hints,thanks your time!

    strange is in the linux command pompt,I have to remove the "quiet",then enter the post 12 command,if I leave quiet and added to the linux command,it will only give dma error!I hope this can help other also,therefore write it down here.
     
    Last edited: Apr 22, 2008
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