A problem with NTFS Format

Hi,
I have a hard disk with capacity of 300 GB.(Samsung).
I have formated it in NTFS and made the whole hard disk into one partition.
But yesterday when I decided to access this partition I encountered this message.

"The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable."

Now I can't go into this partition and I have lost my access to all the data I have stored on this Hard Disk.
I asked my friends for help and one of them who has a Seagate Hard Disk
claimed that he had faced such a problem and had to Format the whole Hard Disk.

That's a nightmare for me to format the hard disk.

Do you have any suggestion?

Also what do you think of this problem?
Two different hard disks but formatted in NTFS suddenly stop working and accessing the data without any logical reasons.


I have to mention that,I use NOD32 anti-virus and it's up to date.
So the threat of virus attacks is very low.

I look forward to hearing from you.
Regards,
Android.

[NoneForce]

Hi,
check the partition with a recovery tool (such R-Studio or GetDataBack) maybe they can see the data on that partition.
what's yr os? if it's win2000 you should install a patch(LargePartitionEnaber or something like that).
what's the type of hdd? SATA or IDE? heve you checked yr hdd on another mb? maybe it's a problem with yr mb

Yep , were you using the hard disk on some other PC previously or on some other OS , this may happen .
try any of these options.
1.Try connecting the hard disk via usb using and external casing
2.Try to run a CHKDSK on your windows OS over those hdisks , will restore files i hope.
3.Use Easy recovery Pro to recover files , I have a good liking over it personally and have experienced .
Wish you good luck

[Av0id]

I have formated it in NTFS and made the whole hard disk into one partition.

i think this problem teach you to create not only one partition for such big HDD

[WaSt3d_ByTes]

Hmm I had faced the problem before some time.I checked programs like R-Studio and getDataBack did not work for me. Some ppl claim that you can get your files back through a linux live cd.I have not tested.
My problem was my IDE cable. I suggest you rechecking your cables before applying the format
Unhopefully I did the format and then checked the ide cables and lost many files.I hope this does not happen with you.

[TempoMat]

I have had a similar problem like this before with two NTFS partitions on a very big hard drive, and they were not seen by WinXP. Well I was a bit fortunate as I still had a back up and thus did not loose anything.
Since then I always put a small FAT32 partition first and the REST in NTFS. I have never had the Problem again.

If you have to re-partition, you could create the first 20GB for instance as FAT32 and the rest as NTFS.

Good luck in trying out the suggested tools to retrieve your data.

[Nacho_dj]

Do anything you want but modifying your HD. If you want to recover your "loss" data don't play with the HD modifying any configuration or partition on it.

There are some tools able to read data of your HD when your system is telling you the HD is not readable. I have been recovering loss data with GetDataBack, and for this operation you will need another HD, because the tool rescues the data from the original damaged HD and copy all in the new HD. It doesn't modify the damaged HD at all.

When all the info has been restored in the new HD, you could use a developer's tool to recover the damaged HD and format it properly. If it is not a mechanical issue, your HD could be normally recovered.

You could have a look at this thread for more info about the possibilities you have:
hxxp://www.woodmann.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9653

Good luck

Nacho_dj

Thanks everybody for help.
I just have another question now.
I should reformat the whole hard disk after the recovery is done.
As experience shows,all people who had my problem were using NTFS format which Microsoft claims that it's the most secure and reliable format among the others.

It's hard to believe and I don't want to face the same failure, just because of using NTFS format on my hard Disk.

Microsoft also claims the largest portion of hard disk everybody can have by Fat32 is 32 GB.

I want to know if there is any way for me to format my hard disk by Fat32 and make one 300 GB partition .

Honestly,I don't want to use NTFS anymore.

Please recommend the best way I should choose.

Regards,
Android.

Ps:does anybody have PC3000 to share with me?

[Nacho_dj]

Try dividing the entire HD size in several partitions whose size could be compliant with FAT32 requirements...

Hi,
Thanks for the suggestion.
What do you think of using Power Quest Partition Magic for making new partitions.
I saw that it allowed splitting partitions of FAT32 in about 192 GB for the highest space I could choose.
In fact,I want to know if the partitions which are made by this software are reliable and secure.

Shall I use Fdisk instead of any other applications or not?

Regards,
Android.

[oVERfLOW]

Creating very large space FAT32 drives can extremely slow down your HDD access.

Create as many as drives more you can.

[Maximus]

No, dont use FAT32 -you will kill your data much quicker than you can imagine, believe me. But you will discover how windows badly work in FAT32 by yourself. It's not W95...
You ended up in the 'funny' problem of NTFS that plagued many, myself included. Usually you can access the NTFS unit with a live linux CD, or a linux boot.
Apart that, NTFS it is usually quite stable in windows.
Install linux in your machine, also... and make a few partitions too

Some good ideas here for sure. I don't have any trouble with NTFS myself.
My drive is 200 gig. I did need to flash my BIOS to go over 160 gig.
For two drives to both be bad at the same time sounds like a cable to me.

I had a bad memory stick one time, it must have corrupted a file in windoze. It wouldn't boot. I just booted from the cd and reloaded the file, worked fine.

I would replace the cable to be sure, if that won't work then hook up the drive as the slave in a different computer. Then you can work with it. I keep an older 20 gig drive with a bare install of winxp. If I have problems I can put it as the master and boot the system.

Fat32 ?? The fact that you can't make a partition larger than 32 gig ? shows how old it is. There are thousands of computers running NTFS.

Good luck..

[NoneForce]

Originally Posted by Android

Hi,
Thanks for the suggestion.
What do you think of using Power Quest Partition Magic for making new partitions.
I saw that it allowed splitting partitions of FAT32 in about 192 GB for the highest space I could choose.
In fact,I want to know if the partitions which are made by this software are reliable and secure.

Shall I use Fdisk instead of any other applications or not?

Regards,
Android.

Hi,
I think the best, easiest and fastest way to create and format partitions is using a partition manager offered by your hdd company. you can re-partition and format your whole hdd in few secs.

here's the Samsung HDD Manager :
http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/utilities/index.htm

and Samsung Diagnostic Tool :
http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/utilities/shdiag.htm

and forget using FDisk for large hdds,it's a time consuming process (takes about 1-1:30 hour to format large partitions)

[whyIII]

hi, how about your data? I also encountered this similar problem just two days before. When I try to access to my portable harddisk (40GB), it is complained that "The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable". The first thing I think is the partition information of the disk is corrupted. And I use Active(R) Partition Recovery to scan the disk and the whole data can be shown in the soft. However, I still can't access to the data. Finally, I use Easy Recovery Professional to recover data directly. Fortunately, all data are recovered. In your case, I am sure you don't need to worry about your data. As for the way to create and format your partition, I have no idea of it. GOOD LUCK.