Yesterday I disconnected my external drive to do something, and when I reconnected later on I heard the drive power up and saw the light come on, but the prompt asking me how I wanted to open it did not start. When I checked My Computer the drive was not named the usual "Hitachi" but "Local Disk (E
" and when I opened it, none of my folders were there, it appeared blank. I clicked on Properties, and it showed that I still had 268GB of used space on it, so presumably the data is still there?
I am no computer whiz, but per what was suggested in some other threads, I went to Control Panel, Appearance and Themes, Folder Options, View, and made sure "Show hidden files and folders" was checked. I then opened Command Prompt and tried to check the external drive's directory, and saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>dir
Volume in drive E has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Directory of E:\
12/21/2013 12:41 AM <DIR> System Volume Information
The parameter is incorrect.
12/21/2013 12:41 AM 0 'Çσ
1 File(s) 0 bytes
1 Dir(s) 1,711,221,506,048 bytes free
E:\>
I also tried another suggestion in Command Prompt and saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>attrib -h -r -s /s /d e:\*.*
Unable to change attribute - E:\'Çσ
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>
I also tried the following Command Prompt:
Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>dir /ah
Volume in drive E has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Directory of E:\
File Not Found
E:\>
I tried chkdsk in Command Prompt saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>chkdsk
The type of the file system is FAT32.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Windows is verifying files and folders...
Windows found errors on the disk, but will not fix them
because disk checking was run without the /F (fix) parameter.
\'Çσ first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
Removing trailing folder entries from \
File and folder verification is complete.
I'm at a loss here! Does anyone have any suggestions or ideas on what I can do? Or even what went wrong? Thank you to whomever can help me!

I am no computer whiz, but per what was suggested in some other threads, I went to Control Panel, Appearance and Themes, Folder Options, View, and made sure "Show hidden files and folders" was checked. I then opened Command Prompt and tried to check the external drive's directory, and saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>dir
Volume in drive E has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Directory of E:\
12/21/2013 12:41 AM <DIR> System Volume Information
The parameter is incorrect.
12/21/2013 12:41 AM 0 'Çσ
1 File(s) 0 bytes
1 Dir(s) 1,711,221,506,048 bytes free
E:\>
I also tried another suggestion in Command Prompt and saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>attrib -h -r -s /s /d e:\*.*
Unable to change attribute - E:\'Çσ
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>
I also tried the following Command Prompt:
Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>dir /ah
Volume in drive E has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Directory of E:\
File Not Found
E:\>
I tried chkdsk in Command Prompt saw the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\Chuaz>e:
E:\>chkdsk
The type of the file system is FAT32.
Volume Serial Number is 1AFC-2847
Windows is verifying files and folders...
Windows found errors on the disk, but will not fix them
because disk checking was run without the /F (fix) parameter.
\'Çσ first allocation unit is not valid. The entry will be truncated.
Removing trailing folder entries from \
File and folder verification is complete.
I'm at a loss here! Does anyone have any suggestions or ideas on what I can do? Or even what went wrong? Thank you to whomever can help me!