Member Avatar for vegeoku

I messed up my harddrive suing partiton magic just recently, I went in and put in a new harddrive as my master and installed windows xp home on it. Now i have it running, but it doesnt see my harddrive that was messed up, and it also takes about 10 minutes to boot up. If I disconnect the drive it only takes a few seconds to boot. Now I'm trying to get my information back. Are there any programs to use to get my data back? or is it even possible to get it back now =/

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Quick recovery plan and cautions for based on the replies from and : their suggestions point in the right direction, but the safest next step is to stop using the damaged disk and make a full, sector-by-sector image of it before attempting any file recovery or repairs. Working on the original drive risks overwriting data or accelerating failure.

Create an image from the problem disk using a Linux live environment (so the disk is not mounted) and a tool built for failing drives such as GNU ddrescue. An example sequence (replace /dev/sdX and target paths) is:

sudo ddrescue -f -n /dev/sdX /mnt/recovery/drive-image.img /mnt/recovery/drive-image.log

sudo ddrescue -d -r3 /dev/sdX /mnt/recovery/drive-image.img /mnt/recovery/drive-image.log

ddrescue is resilient and lets you resume operations; read its documentation before running: GNU ddrescue. A ready-to-boot toolset like SystemRescue can simplify the imaging step: SystemRescue.

Once an image is secured, run recovery tools against the image (not the original). For partition-table and filesystem recovery try TestDisk first; if that cannot restore files, use signature-based recovery (PhotoRec) to carve files from the image. Both are documented here: TestDisk / PhotoRec.

If the problem drive causes long boot delays, that often means the BIOS/OS is waiting on timeouts or the drive is failing. Check whether the BIOS detects the drive and query SMART if possible (tools: smartmontools or CrystalDiskInfo). If the disk makes unusual noises (clicking/spinning up/down), stop and consult a professional data-recovery service — continued power cycles can destroy recoverable data. If the data is critical, imaging by a professional is preferable to home attempts.

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Member Avatar for nanosani

Also make sure that the jumpers are set appropriately ... so that one drive can be recognized as master and the other as slave.... and also make sure that your master is on primary ide channel ... if the problem is with the harddisk .. then please post in our hardware section to get appropriate response.

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