delete partition on external hard drive

[net]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware (More info?)

I copied my data files to my external Maxtor hard disk
before I tried to reformat my internal hard drive and
reload Win XP. However during my partition, I didn't
realize I still had the external drive (160GB) plugged in
and it showed up at the top of the list and the original
internal (80GB) below it. So, I followed the instruction
mistakenly and went through the process of deleting the
partition(on the external hard drive) and tried to
partition it into two drives. Then I got an error message
as I continue to try to format the hard drive "Your
computer's startup program cannot gain access to the disk
containing the partition or free free space you choose .
Set up cannot install Window XP on this hard disk." I
stopped, reboot and tried to go through the delete
partition several times with the same error message.
After several attempts, I realized that the external hard
drive was still plugged in. So I unplugged the external
hard drive and reboot to go through the process of
reformatting and partition the internal hard drive into C
drive and E drive and loaded Win XP. Now even though I
plugged in the hard.
After I installed the external hard drive's
software,driver and restarted the computer, I connected
the external hard drive and don't see the drive in my
computer. I could find it under Control
Panel/System/Device Manager/Disk drives but it doesn't
show up as an external hard drive under "My computer" with
a drive letter. Under the disk management, I see the
drive as Disk1 but it was unallocated. Did I lose all my
data due to the delete of partition? Can I recover my
data and drive ?

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.hardware (More info?)

hi,

i took 5 brand new $100 dollar bills and burned them instead of the kindling in my fireplace.
when i went to purchase a new hard drive the store wouldn't accept my black and crispy versions.
can anyone help me recover my $500?

sound similar?
it should.

luckily you aren't completely in the same circumstance as there are software packages that can recover data given you've just de-partitioned the drive or formatted it without using it yet.

a possible solution would be partition magic. it may be possible if you used one huge partition earlier to re-partition the drive to one huge drive and recover your data easlily..... my bet is mostly not with this approach but try the net and google and look for drive recovery software and see what you may find

 

[wguru]

PC Inspector File Recovery (freewware). Relatively simple and effective. Does more than I'm able to get it to do.

 

[wguru]

Weird. Added to the string and in doing so, was prompted to sign in, did and iexplorer page went blank (indicating I'd lost internet connection, yet back spacing got me back and the reply had posted.) Weird.

 

[wguru]

This seems to be the website's 'regiment' even if you're signed in. Weird.

 

[das11289]

i suppose you can try some partition management software to rebuild your partition table on you external hard drive. it is fastest method to retrieve your partition.
1, http://www.thefreecountry.com/utilities/datarecovery.shtml (i rank it the first, because it is free!)


2, http://www.ptdd.com/
http://www.ptdd.com/recoverylostpartition.htm

3, http://www.partition-recovery.com/
http://www.partition-recovery.com/quest1.htm

or you can also use data recovery software to recover your data and then recreate your partition. because some professional data recovery software can recover your data even when the partition does not exist or cannot be accesed.