What the HELLl happened to my secondary drive? Please Help!! - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

samremy · 11-25-2003, 12:03 PM

My piece of shit computer was running as good as it ever had, until...

I up graded from Win98 to Win98/se.

I backed up all my drivers and system settings before the upgrade.

I'm running a 300celeron with 160mbRAM with a 3.2GB HD and a secondary 10GB HD, which I added aboout 4 months ago and Win98 recognized the secondary as 'Drive D', no problem. But after installing Win98/se on 'Drive C', my secondary is MIA. I wouldn't mind re-formating/re-installing either Win98 or Win98/se, but I'd like to retrieve the data that was stored on the secondary drive first.

BIOS recognizes the secondary drive, but even DOS won't assign it a drive letter.

Please give me some ideas.

charliex · 11-25-2003, 02:57 PM

what does fdisk say about it ?

meff · 11-25-2003, 04:04 PM

True, check fdisk. If it doesn't show up, check it on a hardware level. If it does, it may of somehow got re-tagged as open or something else, why? I don't know..

You may need to re-tag it as FAT32 and reformat it :/

samremy · 11-25-2003, 08:51 PM

FDisk had some error along the lines as 'unrecognizable partitioned hard disk' or something similar.

What a nasty thing to happen to someone when upgrading similar operating systems. I thought that I was doing myself a favor by upgrading to Win98/se. I had no idea that I would spend nearly 14 hours agonizing over it. Trying every thing that I could to make it work. I even downgraded back to Win98 in desperate hopes that it would once again recognize the hard drive that held data that should've been backed-up. I spoke to every tech person that I knew and some that I didn't. I called the tech department of the hard drive's manufacturer, Maxtor. They said it was an MS problem and that there was little chance of recovery. So the general consensus was that I was pretty much screwed. I was beginning to believe them, when ironically, my first CD-RW, which I had ordered a week ago, happily arrived. Right in the middle of my meltdown. The FedEx driver's cruel smile slapped me in the face as she delivered the storage device. I could only laugh. It was soon after that that I happened to stumble onto a free 'data recovery' program while scouring the Internet for hope. TestDisk!! from www.cgsecurity.org saved my desperate inpatient ass this afternoon. By adding their files to a ‘system boot disk’, you can access your hard drives through DOS. It acquires the hard drive from your BIOS and then searches its sectors for past partitions. It then allows you to copy them back onto the drive. It also allows you to re-write a ‘Standard Master Boot Record’ allowing windows to once again see the hard drive. JOY!!

There are versions for Linux and NTFS available, and maybe other OS-s. It’s a most useful program, but somewhat complicated and not very user friendly, but it’s FREE and it SAVED MY ASS!!!

11-25-2003, 12:03 PM	#1 (permalink)
samremy ‘Crotch Level’ Intellectual Location: Southwest, USA	What the HELLl happened to my secondary drive? Please Help!! My piece of shit computer was running as good as it ever had, until... I up graded from Win98 to Win98/se. I backed up all my drivers and system settings before the upgrade. I'm running a 300celeron with 160mbRAM with a 3.2GB HD and a secondary 10GB HD, which I added aboout 4 months ago and Win98 recognized the secondary as 'Drive D', no problem. But after installing Win98/se on 'Drive C', my secondary is MIA. I wouldn't mind re-formating/re-installing either Win98 or Win98/se, but I'd like to retrieve the data that was stored on the secondary drive first. BIOS recognizes the secondary drive, but even DOS won't assign it a drive letter. Please give me some ideas. __________________ "...to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government .. " -- The US Declaration of Independence

11-25-2003, 04:04 PM	#3 (permalink)
meff Vanishing, like I do.. Location: Austin, TX	True, check fdisk. If it doesn't show up, check it on a hardware level. If it does, it may of somehow got re-tagged as open or something else, why? I don't know.. You may need to re-tag it as FAT32 and reformat it :/ __________________ Toy-like people make me boy-like.

11-25-2003, 08:51 PM	#4 (permalink)
samremy ‘Crotch Level’ Intellectual Location: Southwest, USA	FDisk had some error along the lines as 'unrecognizable partitioned hard disk' or something similar. What a nasty thing to happen to someone when upgrading similar operating systems. I thought that I was doing myself a favor by upgrading to Win98/se. I had no idea that I would spend nearly 14 hours agonizing over it. Trying every thing that I could to make it work. I even downgraded back to Win98 in desperate hopes that it would once again recognize the hard drive that held data that should've been backed-up. I spoke to every tech person that I knew and some that I didn't. I called the tech department of the hard drive's manufacturer, Maxtor. They said it was an MS problem and that there was little chance of recovery. So the general consensus was that I was pretty much screwed. I was beginning to believe them, when ironically, my first CD-RW, which I had ordered a week ago, happily arrived. Right in the middle of my meltdown. The FedEx driver's cruel smile slapped me in the face as she delivered the storage device. I could only laugh. It was soon after that that I happened to stumble onto a free 'data recovery' program while scouring the Internet for hope. TestDisk!! from www.cgsecurity.org saved my desperate inpatient ass this afternoon. By adding their files to a ‘system boot disk’, you can access your hard drives through DOS. It acquires the hard drive from your BIOS and then searches its sectors for past partitions. It then allows you to copy them back onto the drive. It also allows you to re-write a ‘Standard Master Boot Record’ allowing windows to once again see the hard drive. JOY!! There are versions for Linux and NTFS available, and maybe other OS-s. It’s a most useful program, but somewhat complicated and not very user friendly, but it’s FREE and it SAVED MY ASS!!! __________________ "...to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government .. " -- The US Declaration of Independence Last edited by samremy; 11-25-2003 at 08:55 PM..

11-25-2003, 02:57 PM	#2 (permalink)
charliex Junkie Location: North Hollywood	what does fdisk say about it ?