Recovering damaged boot sectors from Hard Drive

[Guest]

[Saurav_3FR]

Well my motherboard had a circuit problem causing the whole PC to shutdown all of a sudden never to start again.... well i upgraded both my mobo n processor after that... on booting i kept getting BSODs n had to repair the xp installation... upon successful bootup chkdsk started up, corrected errors but ended up with a 2nd NTFS boot sector is unwriteable error i find about 5GB data on the E: partition of my hard drive is 'non existent' as in present in explorer but still contains no data.. whenever i tried to store something on th3 E: partition all i kept getting were some delayed write errors n that windows couldn't find the sector specified and that the data i was trying to save might have been lost.... i tried several failed format attempts from 'My Computer' as well as by goin to administrative tools in control panel... this ofcourse i was trying to format in ntfs... it would go up2 the end when windows would flash a 'format wasnt completed successfully'... i formatted using FAT32 n well it worked but i got back only 8.04GB of my 13.8GB E: partition.... quick formatting again i can get back the 'lost' space but anything thats being written onto those sectors is being thrown to the wind.... and converting from FAT32 to NTFS after the FAT32 formatting is pointless... i'll start experiencing what was happening in the beginning... So is there any possible way using anything to repair those damaged sectors at all or am i stuck with what i have n my 5GB is gone for good???

Help would be much appreciated!!

Thanks in advance....

[Data]

Did you try admin tools/disk management and delete/recreate the partition?
Otherwise, the HDD tools on the manufacturers website is a good place to start.
I prefer good old fdisk myself.

[Saurav_3FR]

well if i delete the logical drive from disk management will i be able to access the partition again... n could u please elaborate a little more on recreating a partition and using fdisk....

and i was wondering if repartitioning the E: partition into 2, one containing the bad sectors, would do any good?

currently using FAT32 for E: and coz of the bad sectors im not able to convert to ntfs

[gibran]

Do you have an ati card per chance?

8 common causes for 'delayed write failed' errors

[Saurav_3FR]

no... i have

Petium dual core [ at ]2.00 GHz
1 GB DDR2 RAM
Asus mobo with intel 945GC express chipset(onboard graphics)

the delayed write fail error if say originated due to a driver problem or cable problem is it possible that it would affect only one section of the hard drive as in my case??? shouldnt something like that cause errors all over???

[gibran]

You can confirm an hd error using a Smart diagnostic software

cristaldiskinfo
SpeedFan

In such cases is better to be prepared for data loss.
IIRC in fact HDs usually prevent a certain amount of bad sectors using some spare sectors to copy data before it is damaged.

Most smart diagnostic softwares give two scores representing performance degradation and health/lifespan of an hd.

[Data]

well if i delete the logical drive from disk management will i be able to access the partition again... n could u please elaborate a little more on recreating a partition and using fdisk....

and i was wondering if repartitioning the E: partition into 2, one containing the bad sectors, would do any good?

Fdisk can be a very destructive tool. If you wish, I can find some resources for you though.

Yes, partitioning the "error zone" out will work. Done it myself, but it only delays the inevitable.

IIRC in fact HDs usually prevent a certain amount of bad sectors using some spare sectors to copy data before it is damaged.

Yes, but if the mft zone, or pagefile area is weak, the amount of errored sectors will exceed the allocation.

[Saurav_3FR]

ok i used crystaldiskinfo...

"caution[C6] uncorrectable sector count : 2" this is what i get when i hover the mouse over the 'caution' caption...

what else can i deduce from the report???

[gibran]

ok i used crystaldiskinfo...

"caution[C6] uncorrectable sector count : 2" this is what i get when i hover the mouse over the 'caution' caption...

what else can i deduce from the report???

You could consider installing Speedfan you HD temp is on the upper end of your sv0411n Operative Temperature range

If your HD temp increase over 131F you'll have an increased chance for HD failures.
Other values are well above the warning threshold.
Anyway it is strange as it looks like there was no change in Reallocation Event Count, but I'm no expert.

After few HD dropped dead in my case I replace my hd as soon as I get a low score (below 40 %) with those SMART diag utils.

Maybe this will not work but you could try to quickfromat that partition to NTFS and then do a surface scan to find damaged sectors.
You should backup important files as a safekeeping precaution and place only less important files in that partition.

[Saurav_3FR]

I was considering to partition off the error zone.... that way i can atlleast use the remaining 8GB of undamaged sectors in NTFS format... i've had it with FAT32... slow defragging n s***... i primarily use my E: partition for storing stuff i download via torrents or use it for games n i cant see either of em to be less important.... id go for a new HD ASAP but im kinda broke after my recent upgrade plus with my college admissions n stuff i dont see a new HD around the corner...

anyways... installing speed fan....

[Data]

36 deg sounds fine to me.
The error sector count may be maxed. I believe you can zero it. Not sure how ATM.
Unrecoverable probably means physical damage to the platter surface. IOW, worn.
Don't use that area is the only solution in the short term.

[3xist]

http://www.filehippo.com/software/benchmark/

[gibran]

36 deg sounds fine to me.

You are correct. I mistakenly interpreted the temperature value 130 in that pic as 130F.
I blatantly missed the big 36C in the summary above

Sorry saurav sen the Temp operative range of your HD is 5-55C

[Saurav_3FR]

http://www.filehippo.com/software/benchmark/

cant open filehippo anymore these days ... my ISP's been blacklisted or something... i keep getting a "You are not authorized to view this page" message...

so should i go ahead and repartition E: n isolate the bad sector region....

[Saurav_3FR]

so could anyone be kind enough to tell me how to separate the clean 8.04Gb of my 13.8GB on E: from the rest of the crap?... as in repartitioning E: into 2 - 8.04GB n  5.76GB

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