Unreadable Hard drive

[MarcusAurelius]

Hello,
I have recently lost the ablility to read one of my harddrives. It is a slave hard drive, so my computer still is running. I have tried the connection and power (even unplugging and plugging it back in), as well as letting my whole computer cool down for several hours.
The drive shows up on "My Computer" as "local drive" and after trying to read it for a minute or two my computer asks if I want to format the disc (I don't, as I don't want to lose the data on the drive).
I do not know what cause this, though it happened about the same time I had a computer crash (due to a computer game running entirely off another drive).
Thank you for your time.

[street1 (RIP)]

Welcome to computerhope-MarcusAurelius

Sometimes your hard drive will change to raw.

Do you have a way to check it as slave in another computer?

See if you could boot to something like Knoppix and check if the data is still there on the HD

http://www.knoppix.org/

Edit:Makes me darn proud to see I have started having an answer like
GX1_Man.

Hummm,Maybe I'm learning.

[GX1_Man]

Look under properties and see if the drive format is listed as "RAW". Was this previously an NTFS partition?

[MarcusAurelius]

I tried the drive in another computer, it was listed as "local drive" and when I tried to open it, it tried to format again.
As for the properties (which took a long time to load), it is listed as RAW now.   And yes it was NTFS prior.

Does this mean that the 220 gigs I had on the drive, and had been putting off backing up, are lost?

Concerning Koppix: I couldn't quite figure out what it is or how to use it. Plus none of the downloads worked, though that is probably the fault of my bad internet.

[Shockwave]

Knoppix is a version of the Linux OS... It is a possibility that those data could be lost...

[street1 (RIP)]

First, DO NOT WRITE TO THE DRIVE! Next, hopefully you have another drive to copy the information onto. If so, this utility will probably help you. It runs inside windows, so NTFS partitions are not an issue. It's freeware and can read HDDs which have nonmechanical problems(such as yours), which windows cannot read.

http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/uk/welcome.htm

I have had good luck with this utility and wish you the same.

_______________________________________ _____________
I found this  above at a online website.Seems like it may work.
Also freeware rules!!

[MarcusAurelius]

Thank you for all the help...
I have tried the manufactuers website faq and emailed them... no help there.

I currently have only 10 gigs free on my master drive (110 total) and can't use pc inspector currently. I had been thinking about getting another HDD, which I could transfer into (hopefully). Though before I spend a bunch of money, is this a good idea: get a new drive and try to recover data into it? As well as the question: Can I hook up 2 slave drives to my computer? (no cords)

Thanks again for your help.

[GX1_Man]

Windows needs 15% hard drive space free to operate correctly. Keep that in mind.

Have a read here:

http://www.computerhope.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?num=1152393515


Are you other viewers keeping track of the RAW problem yet?

[clos915]

I have the exact same problem except I have tried formatting the drive because well its an external drive so most of the originals are on my computers hdd. Anyword on that RAW problem?? Mine shows that too. Please help!  

BTW Marcus, don't try and format it... it won't work. I've tried it many ways and had no luck. The progress won't move at all and if it does will give you an error that windows can't format it.



------------------------------------------Not wanting to post another but later----------------------------
i found this website. hope this helps!

http://www.easeus.com/resource/raw-file-recovery.htm

I'm still trying it myself.

[MarcusAurelius]

Still no good... still 'RAW'.

I am currently running a test by the manufactuer (Western Digital). It will take 18 more hours to finish, and I don't know if it will prove to be worth anything. The simple test said there was an error, but the only thing it listed as an error was that it read as 'RAW', to me this is more of a symptom than the cause...

As for reformating: On the Western Digital website they said that in order to reformat, you have to use the diagnostics progam to "set to zero" the drive then attempt reformating. I do not know what type of drive you've got, clos915, but from what I've foundout there are a bunch of complex steps.

Unfortunately, I don't want to give up on all that data yet. Maybe get another HDD to transfer the data to (using some program: PC Inspector? [Edit: clos915's posted link is another option?]), then reformat, and transfer back...  :-?

[MarcusAurelius]

May be my last question...
I finished the 21 hour test of the HDD, it says that there are bad sectors that may be repaired, though the data in those areas will be deleted. Should I do this, or try some kind of restoring data (keeping in mind I currently have nowhere to dump the data)? I fear that 1: the majority of the drive will be deleted, or 2: it will delete parts of the drive and remain RAW. Should I do this or buy an expensive drive and attempt to recover data first?

[GX1_Man]

Windows needs 15% hard drive space free to operate correctly. Keep that in mind.

Have a read here:

http://www.computerhope.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?num=1152393515

Did you even try this?

[MarcusAurelius]

I am sorry, I hadn't. I guess at first it confused me. I have reread it now and am trying it. I tried Knoppix (two people metioned it) and I am confused.

EDIT: Is it that Linix can read a "raw" drive and windows can't?

[MarcusAurelius]

I would like to report my problem solved!  

I was trying to exit the Western Digital test (21 hour test), in order to reboot my computer with a Slax CD. As I exited, I accidentally accepted it repairing the damaged sectors.  I lost data, but I can now read what is left on my drive.  It still reads as RAW though.  I am going to attempt to backup onto DVD+R what I want saved, then restart my computer. Thankyou to everyone who helped!  I wish I could have tried something that might have saved the damaged data though...  :-/

Thanks again!

[GX1_Man]

You probably could have if you had taken the Slax advice before trying the Western Digital repair. Live and learn.