Partition Table Lost on 3TB HDD? Please help

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pepelugil

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Sep 21, 2015
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Hello,

After a reboot, one of my data HDD (Western Digital Red 3TB) is now inaccessible an shown as RAW (drive E):
administrar-discos-1451049.jpg

I've run DMDE, and that's what it sees:
dmde-1451051.jpg

And now I'm running TestDisk, but after 32 hours of Quick Scan, it has only reached 66% and has found the following (I've selected EFI GPT as partition table type as this was what TestDisk recommended and what I'm think is right for a Windows 7 Ultimate x64 3TB partition):
test1-1451904.jpg

What should I do in order to recover my data, should I wait TestDisk to finish hoping that one of the partition it finds it's the correct one or should I do anything before with DMDE?

Lots of thanks for your help.
 
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Boogieman_WD

Boogieman_WD

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Jul 31, 2014
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Hey there, pepelugil.

I'm really sorry to hear about the troubles you're having with your drive. Usually I'd agree with @Reyaz123 about the HDD diagnostics tests, but not in cases like this one. Whenever there's data to be recovered, you should never run tests and scan it, as this could further damage the HDD. All of the time the drive is operating should used for data recovery.
If you have the option of cloning the drive to another one, this would be great as this way you'd be able to work on the copy and save the original for emergencies such as a data recovery company. But before you go there, you could try accessing the HDD via Ubuntu Live USB/DVD, to see if it is properly recognized and if you can get to your data. If that doesn't help, you could try with data recovery software: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-1644496/lost-data-recovery.html. You could also try the drive with a different computer or at least with a different SATA port and different cables on yours. And if worse comes to worst, I'd recommend a professional solution: WD Data Recovery Partners.

Hope that helps. Please let me know how everything goes.
Boogieman_WD
 
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pepelugil

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Sep 21, 2015
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Thanks for your answer, this HDD wasn't on a NAS it is an internal drive where I have most of my data and it was working perfectly before a Java error dind't let me run some programs and I decided to reboot my PC.

I haven't run CrystalDiskInfo, but I've run WD Data Lifeguard Diagnostic and Hard Disk Sentinel and everything seems fine.



Cloning isn't an option right now, as I don't have any other 3TB HDD with me... I was hoping that maybe with DMDE I could restore boot sector as it seems to have found boot sector copy (C), MFT as it has found MFT Mirror (f) and then undelete the Microsoft reserved partition followed by this one, is this possible or do I have to correct something else?

Edit: Sorry, I've forgotten to say that I've tested this HDD in another computer with Windows 10 and it's also seen as RAW

Thanks
 
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Boogieman_WD

Boogieman_WD

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Jul 31, 2014
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Sure thing @Reyaz123.

@pepelugil, not sure if you'd be able to fix the corrupted partition table, but it's worth the try. Otherwise you're left with the Ubuntu Live option. As you've already run diagnostics tools and based on the results, it sounds like the drive might actually be fine physically, but it could have a corrupted partition. You could try to run "chkdsk", to see if that fixes the issue. Note that there's a possibility that this might further corrupt the data and/or partition, so do that at your own risk. If you decide to give it a try, here's how to do that: open up CMD (command prompt) and type chkdsk X: /r /f (where "X" is the letter of the drive you wish to check, so please don't forget to change it).

Please keep us posted on your progress.
 
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pepelugil

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Sep 21, 2015
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I have some fear to chkdsk as my previous experience in the old MS-DOS era was not really good... When I arrive at home (now I'm at work) I will stop TestDisk (don't know if I'll be able to continue from the point I'll stop my scan or if I'll have to start all over again) and try recovering partition table with DMDE, but what should be the order of doing things?:

    1. Restore Boot from Copy
    2. Restore MFT(0) from MFTMirr(0), but I don't know how do this step
    3. Undelete Microsoft reserved partition
    4. Undelete 3TB NTFS partition
    5. Reboot PC and cross fingers

Thanks
 
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popatim

popatim

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is there data on there you want to recover? then stop.
Rule 1 - you dont recover to the same drive you are recovering from.

While you're waiting to get another drive to recover your data to, ponder why a backup is so beneficial and why you don't have one. the more copies of important files you have, stored on different devices, the safer they are!

Boogieman_WD offered solid advice and I'll stand behind it. If the drive has data on it that is important enough to possibly send out for recovery then stop using it for recovery. Image the drive and then work/recover from the image. Keep in mind rule#1 so this means you might need yet another drive...
 
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pepelugil

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Sep 21, 2015
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MFT is corrupted, and it seems it cannot be recovered from MFT Mirror, so although I have some of the most important data in this drive spread on other drives, I'll try to recover the less important files.

My first aproach has been GetDataBack for NTFS, I've left it scanning my drive (it will take more thas 6 hours) and it seems it's finding files, but without index, so they won't have their original name nor their original folder so it seems I'll have to spend lots of time looking for the files I'm interested in... Is there any other best aproach to recover the original information have lost my MFT?

Thanks
 
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