Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

General discussion

Corrupt or Inaccessible External Hard Drive.

Feb 7, 2007 2:49PM PST

ey guys,

working off an external hard drive, 250GB, its running through a firewire interface.

Ok, so today it was all working fine. I then tried to access the Drive (which is assigned the letter I) through My computer and the next thing I know a dialog box appears saying the following

"i: drive is corrupt or inaccessible".

What the hell should I do? Does it mean the hard drive is ruined as I only got it back from a warranty replacement about 6 months ago... The drive seems to be physically working fine, its not making any strange noises (clicking etc) and it is still spinning when accessed.

Does it mean all the data is gone? I read on this forum one of the things I can do is use runtime.org to recover?

Any advice will be well rewarded!

Cheers
Rossco

Discussion is locked

- Collapse -
Actually a recurring issue.
Feb 7, 2007 2:53PM PST

I see that combo of firewire drive, Windows and corruption too often. So often that I advise owners to go back to USB 2.0 on such before the drives corrupt.

Once you get it back to USB 2.0 try recovery software like ZAR (Zero Assumption Recovery.)

Bob

- Collapse -
thanks!
Feb 7, 2007 3:25PM PST

Ok so to go back to USB 2.0 Just plug the USB 2.0 cord into the drive, and then see what happens?

What about Runtime.org is that just as good as ZAR?

If you could let me know more info that'd be great!

Thanks for your help!

Cheers
Rossco

- Collapse -
also...
Feb 7, 2007 10:13PM PST

You could also try dl'ing the Ultimate Boot CD, or Hiron's boot cd - these have utilites to rebuild file systems - which is usually what occurs when windows finds the drive/partition to be "corrupt".

Try both of the previously offered solutions, failing those - you could try to obtain a copy of Ontrack Easy Recovery - but it isn't free. That software has saved my butt quite a few times.

- Collapse -
Get Data Back has been noted by others.
Feb 7, 2007 10:56PM PST

I can't write about it since it's not something I've had to use. But some like it.

Bob