anyone.. ?

it was like this, my friends got Seagate HD (80G) and have two partition on it.he used it as extrenal storage (USB). suddenly, one of the partition can't be read/access at all, the other one can. so he send it to one of the IT shop (at Lowyat - Hypermarket something) to recover it since he need his project data on it.

To make it worst, after he send it to that shop... both of the partition can't be read anymore and the disk now mark as DYNAMIC Disc (Unreadble) when used Disk management.

so, question is, is there any way to recover that partition? if does.. how to do it?

thanks in advance.

i aedi ask almost same situation like u but until now no reply that i can retrieve that data except using data recovery software.
u can visit the link here.
http://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...6526&hl=dynamic

I'm kinda caught by this weird problems of drives reverting to Dynamic disks.

I suspect it could be the use of SATA hard drive. Possibly the SATA RAID driver bugs or operating system bugs which a "new drive" (if not recognized) will be converted to dynamic disk setup (this is similar to NRAID configuration).

For those who did not encounter this problem yet, I suggest not to install any SATA RAID drivers but just the normal SATA drivers instead (most manufacturers have 2 driver versions - one for RAID and the other for non-RAID setup).

Another thing to watch out for is disk spanning (used for dynamic disk setups) also... If you are not using it, then disable this.

So far I had 6 external USB HDDs (and all Seagates inside) and none of them had exhibit these kind of problems.

Anyway.. WHAT brand and model is that external HDD case?

There is a data recovery service in Low Yat though, on the 3rd floor. Its called SCS-Myung. I suggest you ask for pricing first before trying it.. it may be quite expensive.

Reference: http://www.scs-myung.com/

Anyway would like to ask a few questions here:

Which WinXP operating system are you using?
1. Home Edition
2. Pro Edition
3. Corporate Edition

What Serive Pack are you using?
1. No Service Pack installed
2. Pre-Installed SP1 (comes with the WinXP)
3. Updated to SP1
4. Updated to SP2

Did you intsall any drive utilities such as Norton Utilities?

Did you install any drive auto-defragment utilities like "Disk Keeper"?

Can you list down your detailed full PC hardware specifications?

For research.. need to know if there are similarities in these cases.

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:31 PM

Lex:

- Using WinXP Pro
- Service Pack 2
- no Norton Utilites (only norton antivirus)
- No disk keeper also
- Forgot the spec since it not in my pc.. it was my friends.. ask me to help him.. got so many project data in it.. pitty him.

Yup.. my friends already went to Data recovery shop at low yat, but its closed .. maybe next week.

now, he was very angry with the tech guy at that Hypermarket shop that make the disk morst.. (both of it can't be read at all)

thanks for the reply.. need to send it to data recovery.. ..

thanks again

From what I gather from other forum.. This issue of drives being assigned by Windows XP as dynamic disks arise when the drive letter assigned is used by another drive (usually a fixed drive) already installed. Since the drive already exists, then Windows XP doesn't know what do with it and re-assigns it as dynamic disk (because having the same drive letter).

What was the drive letter assigned to your drive before it suddenly became dynamic disk?

Try use R-Studio for NTFS for data recovery (Support Dynamic DIsk)..

problem.... solved!!! using Active@Recovery Software (for ntfs)

both partition and all data are savely recovered!! no need to send it to data recovery center at lo yat... may be i will visit that hypermarket and told them how i did it..

thanks for your support

Active@Recovery , whr r u download ? Is it free ?

i want to know where is that being downloaded too..

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:31 PM

where to download it?

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:31 PM

off BT kua.. i used ontrack datarecovery

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:32 PM

For Ontrack...

http://www.ontrack.com/easyrecoverydatarecovery/

nampak cozack punya special weapon lagi chun wor, atau mana yg bagus sekali?

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:31 PM

Get It here Active@ product....

http://www.active-undelete.com/products.htm

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:32 PM

my friend had the same prob.

i took his hard disk, put it in my pc, and suprisingly, i could read it....

i backed all the data into my ext hd and passed it back to him.

back home, my friend plugged his hd back into his drive and yet...he couldnt do anything....so he reformatted it...and retrieved his data from my hd.

but i'm curious....why can i read it when he cant?

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:32 PM

Is there any freeware data recovery for FAT and FAT32, Active@Data recovery is only support reading from ntfs and ntfs5, and Ontrack Data Recovery is not freeware..

Dynamic disks can only be used in WinXP Pro and Windows 2000. Windows XP Home, Windows 95, 98 etc cannot use dynamic disks. Search for "dynamic disk" in Google, there're alot of articles about it.

If u need to downgrade from Pro to Home (like me), you need to convert the disk's data back to basic disk.

What I did was I copied out my files from HDD 1 to HDD 2 in WinXP Pro, then used the Disk Management tool to convert HDD 1 to basic disk... then copy everything back. Very mafan. I haven't tested the programs listed earlier, but if they work, use them. It'll make life alot easier.

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:33 PM

i use stellar pheonix recovery. it can support FAT, NTFS and Linux format also, works great, can recover file in bad sector hdd too..

This post has been edited by vandetta: Jun 26 2005, 11:33 AM

Guys i think i'm having the same problem here...not too sure about it tho...

i've a 40Gb and 80GB hdd. The 40gb are my OS and prog files and the other hdd (80gb) are my datafiles,video and mp3s.

in my 80GB there are 3 partitions. strangely one of the partitions when i double click on it, a dialog box pops out saying this drive is not formatted, do you wnat to format it?

I went to the computer management and check the partition is with a FATor NTSF and its just empty there.

Any idea how can i recover the data in that partition. Before this happenned the partition's space is fully maxed out (could this be the reason?). Now i cant even browse the partition.

Cheers.

I suggest that you check the harddisk vendor. Goto their websites, normally they have tools to check for problem in your hardisk.

To recover data, try using easy recovery by Ontrack. This data recovery program is quite good. I am not sure whether you can download it from their websites. If not try to get it in LYP. I did a data recovery on my 80GB hardisk which is complaining of errors.

Happy recovery.

This post has been edited by lex: Feb 12 2006, 06:24 PM