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Question

External Hard Drive Requires Formatting after Clean Install

Apr 30, 2012 5:00AM PDT

Hi there,

to take care of the formalities, I have a home-built PC which is running Windows 7 Premium x64 via an AMD Phenom II Quad Core Black Edition on an Asus M4A89GTD USB 3.0 motherboard. My external hard drive is an iPro (Samsung HDD) 1.5TB.

I wiped Windows 7 clean last night and installed a fresh copy of Professional x64, as I thought it easier than sifting through the mess of programs to remove them one by one. The first issues I encountered were with drivers for the mobo and graphics card. As the LAN is integrated into the mobo, I was unable to access the net to download the driver that would allow me to enable the LAN. Catch twenty-two, huh?

Anyways, after getting all of the appropriate drivers squared away, I figured on connecting my external drive to restore my documents and programs back to the clean install. Prior to the clean install, my external hard drive was labelled as "i:" and usually popped up within 5 seconds of connecting it via a rear USB 3.0 port.

Now, once connected to the same port, post clean install, it hangs for about 20-30 seconds before appearing as "e:." Upon being detected, Windows 7 insists that it must be formatted.

After calming down from a near heart attack at the tender, young age of twenty-three, I grabbed my Linux laptop and connected the external hard drive with success.

So, my question is this. If my external hard drive was recognized on Windows 7, why would it suddenly not be recognized after reinstalling? Also, if Linux can still access the contents, as it always has, why can't Windows 7?

Okay, here's the kicker. (Laugh at will)

- This is my only copy of all of my important data, such as home studio recordings, vacation pictures, business records, etc.

- I currently do not have the capacity on my laptop to temporarily store 1200gigs+ from the external drive in order to format it.

I really appreciate any help given! If anybody needs more details on my hardware, please let me know!


*Also, under the "Disk Management" tab in Computer Management, External Disk (EHappy shows as "Healthy (Active, Primary Partition)" in the status column.

Discussion is locked

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Answer
Let's try the usual recovery first.
Apr 30, 2012 5:05AM PDT
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Will this enable me to access it via W7 again?
Apr 30, 2012 6:34AM PDT

Bob, hey. Thanks for your response. I'm not very proficient in linux, so I don't understand much of the context in that tutorial. One thing I'm not sure of -and can hopefully be cleared up- is whether this will allow me to access the drive in Windows 7. It mentioned partway through, something about forcing the drive to mount in a directory that you create, allowing it to me accessed from "Computer." Does this mean it will be accessible from Windows 7 as a result?

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No.
Apr 30, 2012 6:40AM PDT

It only allows you to copy the content out.

Folk have never had to learn Linux to do this. So I bet you won't have to either.

--> Remember that I will not intentionally do anything to put the files are risk such as note the recovery software at the top of the CNET Storage Forum. Recovery software is used after we get our files safely out.
Bob

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Answer
In addition to Bob's post
Apr 30, 2012 5:12AM PDT

I see form http://www.imation.com.hk/index.php?Itemid=107&category_id=6&flypage=flypage_new.tpl&lang=en&option=com_virtuemart&page=shop.product_details&product_id=117,

that this drive is "preformatted as a single FAT 32 partition for compatibility with all updated Windows and Macintosh operation systems. The FAT 32 file system has a maximum individual file size of 4 GB "

So if this drive is formatted to FAT32 then a simple convert via Disk Management to NTFS should work without losing any data.

This is how Microsoft told us to convert our FAT32 XP drives to NTFS; http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307881

That said, I wouldn't risk that without backing up the data first.

Mark

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Already NTFS
Apr 30, 2012 6:17AM PDT

Mark, thanks for your reply. Sad to say that it's already in the NTFS format. I formatted it shortly after purchasing it. Thanks just the same! Happy