Non-Format Drive

I have two hard disks..the C drive and the D drive..
During setup i chose to only reformat the C drive..my D drive being the biggest, held everything that made my computer..files, pictures, programs etc etc...the most important things..
I loaded up windows after succesfully reinstalling XP, finding that my D drive wasnt in "My Computer"..so i found it in Disk Management and assigned it a letter..(D).. its now in "My Computer"..but when i try to access it, it asks if i want to format the drive....i DONT want to do that, as it will wipe whatever is on it...is there anyway i can access it without doing this?..

[Moderator]

Under properties how is it formatted? Did you encrypt data on this drive either through Windows or some other programs? Is it a separate physical drive, or is your hard drive subdivided?

This may be relevant later:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421

Under properties how is it formatted? Did you encrypt data on this drive either through Windows or some other programs? Is it a separate physical drive, or is your hard drive subdivided?

This may be relevant later:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421

Thankyou for replying so soon GX1_Man, i am unsure of what you meant by "Under properties how is it formatted?", it is a physical drive, i have two hard disks fitted inside my computer..

[Moderator]

Thankyou for replying so soon GX1_Man, i am unsure of what you meant by "Under properties how is it formatted?", it is a physical drive, i have two hard disks fitted inside my computer..

Look in My Computer, Right click on each drive and choose Properties and it will show if  the drive is formatted FAT32 or NTFS.

Thankyou for replying so soon GX1_Man, i am unsure of what you meant by "Under properties how is it formatted?", it is a physical drive, i have two hard disks fitted inside my computer..

Look in My Computer, Right click on each drive and choose Properties and it will show if  the drive is formatted FAT32 or NTFS.

The drive i wish to retrieve the data from..and am unable to as it is asking to format.. says
"File System: RAW"

[Moderator]

RAW is a very ominous sign. How important is that data to you?

RAW is a very ominous sign. How important is that data to you?

3 Years of work for my studies, pictures of my family, friends and girlfriend, various stuff like that..stuff thats important to me, very much so.

I Googled "File System: RAW" and found some info that might help: How do I recover file from Raw Drive?.   Be sure to visit the link there to DataRecoveryWizard.

I Googled "File System: RAW" and found some info that might help: How do I recover file from Raw Drive?.   Be sure to visit the link there to DataRecoveryWizard.

That was very helpful Soybean, thankyou, its made me confident my files are still accessible as it has identified they are still within the Hard Disk, but unfortunately i have to pay for DataRecoveryWizard and i just dont have the money to do that right now..

[Moderator]

A hard drive is NOT a safe place to store important data, as people find out at times like these. If that software works great, if not, there are professional data recovery services but they are VERY expen$ive. That's why I asked how important it is.

A hard drive is NOT a safe place to store important data, as people find out at times like these. If that software works great, if not, there are professional data recovery services but they are VERY expen$ive. That's why I asked how important it is.

Hm, well being a university student, I can be very disorganised, so i keep most of my things in a compact space, i.e. My computer and it was logical to keep everything that was large and important, on my biggest Hard Disk...

[Moderator]

ALL hard drives die eventually, taking data with them. THat's why a regular backup strategy is important IF the data is important.

Mm..thankyou for those wise words.. :-/