Lost C: Drive/Partition - Help Needed

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15 Jan 2006
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408
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Hi, hope someone can help.

My computer is about three yers old and running Windows Vista on a Maxtor 6V2000E. It has been working fine and I have not recently changed anything or uploaded any new software.

It was working fine all day yesterday then in the afternoon it crashed for no apparent reason and I was not even using it at the time. It rebooted itself and I got the message "DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER". I tried rebooting a couple of times and the message went away but the computer then hung at a black screen.

I then booted from the Vista CD and tried the repair option. The programme could not find my operating system, on C:drive, and asked to load drivers. I do not know where they are although I was able to view the D: and E: drives/partitions and all of the folders in them so I do not think my hard disk has died. When I selected the C: drive the programme greyed out and obviously could not see or access the drive/partition. I then tried reinstalling Vista, but got the message that the reinstallation needs to be done from within Windows! I have the upgrade version.

I then went on to the Maxtor site, on laptop, and made a Seatools diagnostic floppy disk. I booted from that and the short test seemed to run OK but when I selected the long test I got the message that the "disk was not responding to commands" and to check the cable and connections. I did that and it made no difference.

Not sure what to do next and whether or not my hard disk has gone, or if it is just the C: partition with the operating system on it that has become corrupted.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Axel
 
The fact that it is failing the test when booting from a diag floppy makes it sound to me like it is on it's way out tbh. And that the h/w failing has then corrupted the disk which is stopping you booting etc.

Personally I would probably use a boot disk like UBCD4WIN, Trinity Rescue Kit, or a Linux Live CD and copy off what ever data you need onto another storage device asap.

Once the data is off you could try a full format of the disk and a reinstall but again the fact it fails the diags would probably make me not risk it and just replace it.

It's a pain but a decent HDD isn't a huge amount of money and for the peace of mind I think the cost is worth it.

Definitely try and get your data off of it now though as opposed to later, at least that way you can safely play about with the disk with out risking losing anything more.
 
Yes I will try the Live CD.

Any recommendations for a replacement compatible drive?

Axel
 
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