External HDD not recognized anymore

[taspats]

Hi.
I have ADATA external Hdd 750GB.
I was doing some copy with files (safe removed without intercepting copy process) -- everything was good -- unpluged hdd -- remembered about some other files -- plugged again -- win7 showed that drive is not recognized and offered to format it.
Drive type become RAW from NTFS.
Is it possible to recover HDD in normal state (NTFS) without using software to copy files and format external HDD?


Will options in 'testdrive.exe' as cylinders and structures change anything?

btw.
USB ports are fully functional.
Disk wasn't dropped and wasn't interrupted in copy process.

 

[Sylverac]

Have you done a chkdsk on it yet? Have you rebooted the machine since having this problem?

If chkdsk doesn't do it for you, try hdtune (http://www.hdtune.com/) or CrystalDiskInfo (http://crystalmark.info/software/CrystalDiskInfo/index-e.html).

 

[taspats]

No, I haven't done chkdsk (it does not work for RAW format). Yes, I rebooted - nothing changed.
Right now in background I am scanning with 'testdisk.exe' this external HDD and as it continues scanning there is notification 'check_FAT: can't read FAT boot sector. Invalid boot sector'. After this scan I will tray HDTune. What I have to look for?
But do you have any sugestions for direct change from RAW to NTFS without standart 'copy-format-paste' ?

 

[Sylverac]

This thread has a lot of good info: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/263779-32-change-file-type-ntfs

A user in this thread says EASEUS helped when having the RAW partition issue: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/5094-63-blackout-ntfs-format-help

 

[taspats]

Yeah - posts contain some interesting info, but they doesn't help a lot.

 

[fzabkar]

HD Tune or HD Sentinel should give you a SMART report for the drive. Look for realloacted, pending, or uncorrectable sectors.

As for the file system, I would use a disc editor (eg DMDE freeware) to examine sectors 0, 63, and 2048.

Sector 0 contains the partition table, while sectors 63 or 2048 should contain a boot sector, depending on the OS version.

 

[taspats]

About sectors - boot sector (0) as screenshot down below, but sectors 63 and 2048 are zeros only.

HD Tune or HD Sentinel should give you a SMART report for the drive. Look for realloacted, pending, or uncorrectable sectors.

As for the file system, I would use a disc editor (eg DMDE freeware) to examine sectors 0, 63, and 2048.

Sector 0 contains the partition table, while sectors 63 or 2048 should contain a boot sector, depending on the OS version.

 

[fzabkar]

Sector 0 contains Windows 7 MBR code:
http://thestarman.pcministry.com/asm/mbr/W7MBR.htm#CHS

The partition table contains a single partition beginning at sector 2048 (= 0x800) and with a capacity of 750GB.

0x57545000 x 512 = 750 153 367 552

http://www.google.com/search?q=0x57545000+x+512+in+decimal

The partition type is 06 rather than the usual 07 for NTFS. I don't know what happened here.

If the original partition was in fact an NTFS (type 07) partition, then there should be a backup boot sector at the end of the drive.

Type Ctrl-End to go to the last sector. Then select Tools -> Search for Special Sector -> NTFS Boot Sector. Select the Backward radio button. If a backup NTFS boot sector exists, DMDE should find it within a minute. Abort the search if it is taking too long.