Deleted Key Files from an External HD.

[bokyabukari]

Lent my External to a friend who decided to 'clean' my empty folders. He ended up deleting ".namehere" (Dot-files) hidden folders, and a "Setup Backup" folder, apparently. Not my external is refusing to run. Is there any way I can restore these files, or at least access my data again so I can get my contents?

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Hey there, bokyabukari.

Deleting those files should not prevent the HDD from running. What do you mean by "it's refusing to run"? Do you mean that it's not recognized or that it's not powering up at all? Would you please check Disk Management and post a screenshot of what you see there about the drive (you can use imgur.com to upload the image). Here's how to do that: How to access Disk Management in Windows 8, 7, Vista, or XP to manage hard drives
Other than that, I'd recommend that you try the drive with a different cable and a different computer, to see if the same thing happens. If this doesn't work, I'd suggest that you try accessing it via Linux Live DVD/USB, or try some of the data recovery options from this thread: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-1644496/lost-data-recovery.html

Hope that helps.
Boogieman_WD

 

[bokyabukari]

Hey, thanks for replying.
By refusing to run, I mean it is Detected... Kind of.
1) When I open "My Computer", it is detected as Local Disk E: without showing it's space capacity. I can't even right click it and get details, because the computer just freezes ( http://imgur.com/4SWKrVU,oZDi5dS )
2) When I go to Task Manager, it reveals that Disk 2 (or my External) is actually named Seagate (so It's recognized, somewhat), but is running permanently on 100% as soon as I plug it in. ( http://imgur.com/4SWKrVU,oZDi5dS#1 )
3) Because my computer freezes the moment I plug it in, I cannot use Disk Management to refresh and find my drive. It ends up saying "Not Responding" until I eject my External.
4) I've tried using different cables and different computers to see if those are the problems, but the same thing happens.
5) Recuva refuses to work because of the 100% Run time. I've also tried Chkdsk but the results usually say something along the lines of 'not enough space to write'.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Well, you still have the Linux option to try, in order to find out if it can access the drive so that you can recover your files and then reformat it. Other than that, this could be due to a virus, so I'd recommend that you have an anti-virus program up and running (with an updated database) when you connect the drive. Try to see if you're able to scan it.
About the chkdsk command, this could potentially be data destructive so you should avoid it unless you have no other options left to exploit. Here's how to try and tun it in offline mode: type chkdsk E: /scan /forceofflinefix this will queu the drive for offline repair, this way it might be able to scan it.

 

[bokyabukari]

Do I have to have or install Linux to try that method? I scanned my computer and found nothing. I can't scan the E drive, though.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

No, you don't. You can create a bootable USB flash drive and this way boot to Ubuntu Linux. Follow this tutorial: http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/create-a-usb-stick-on-windows and here's a link where you can download one of Ubuntu's versions (for this case it really doesn't matter which one you'll choose): http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop. So this is basically a bootable, portable, freeware veriosn of Linux which you can try without installing it.

 

[bokyabukari]

Does that mean I'll have to install it on the External or a new USB? Because the External doesn't want to open or install anything onto it at all. Or are you saying run Linux, and try to run the external while on a linux-system computer to see if that fixes the problem?

 

[Boogieman_WD]

You'd need just a flash drive which covers the storage requirements, you won't even need a different external drive. Follow the tutorials to make the bootable flash drive. After that go into your BIOS/UEFI and make your USB flash drive your first boot device (right now it should be either the Optical Drive if you have one or your OS drive). Unfortunately I can't give precise instructions on how to change the boot order as this is different for the different motherboard models so you'd probably have to check the user's manual. After that when you restart your computer, it should boot to Ubuntu Linux instead of Windows. Then connect the problematic external drive to see if it's recognized. If it is - great, try to copy the most important data to your internal drive. If you want to boot to Windows after that, just remove the flash drive or change the boot priority in BIOS/UEFI again, so that your hard drive is the first boot option.