Drive not readable in XP after crash, fine in DOS

[GranSalseron]

It certainly sounds as if something has zapped the MBR, (
Master Boot Record, ) of the Secondary drive. If you
don't have rescue diskette sets from NAV or some other
program there is a longshot that will either fix it or
destroy the data on the Secondary.

IF YOU CHOOSE TO READ THE FOLLOWING YOU ARE PROCEEDING AT
YOUR OWN RISK!

Turn off your computer. Unplug the data and power cables
to the Primary drive. Boot up with a win98 startup
diskette. At the A: prompt type FDISK /MBR, press the
enter key and that should take you back to an A: prompt.
At the A: prompt turn off your computer. Plug in the data
and power cables to the Primary HD, turn your computer
back on and boot up normally.

Good luck if you chose to read this far! :-)

>-----Original Message-----
>Here's my deal, which is so laden with unlucky
coincidences it's kind
>of amusing.
>
>My basic setup:
>KT7A-RAID (not using RAID though)
>Primary: 40 GB Western Digital drive (FAT32, 6 partitions)
>Slave: 20 GB Maxtor drive (FAT32, 1 partition)
>
>After a crash today, the D: (Maxtor) isn't recognized
under Win XP. I
>receive "The disk in Drive D is not formatted. Do you
want to format
>now?" when I try to access it.
>
>I initially thought it might be an issue with the BIOS
(which is
>up-to-date) or the VIA chipset (I already have a wacky
problem due to
>an incompatibility with my generation of Western Digital
drives).
>However, I was able to boot to DOS (the D: used to be a
Win98 system
>drive, and I can still get to the command prompt). I
found that all of
>the folders are still accessible.
>
>Unfortunately, I can't run any utilities to check the
disk -- Windows
>XP's scandisk doesn't recognize the drive as having a
valid file
>system. And my floppy drive bit the dust, so I can't use
Maxblast,
>Norton, etc.
>
>I assume it's a Windows problem at this point. But, due
to a low disk
>space warning on a partition on my primary drive, I
cleared some
>"obsolete" files on XP's recommendations. Turns out
those obsolete
>files were probably my system restore points, because
when I looked,
>there weren't any! I manually create them on a pretty
regular basis,
>so there should have been something there.
>
>Any ideas on how to fix this problem, short of
reinstalling XP? The
>worst part is, I planned on building a new PC in 2-3
weeks anyway,
>because I've got to replace half the hardware anyway
(plus I'm sick of
>the VIA issues and want to switch chipsets).
>
>Thanks in advance for your advice.
>.
>

[Steak]

Thanks for the idea GranSalesron - what you say makes sense. I
vaguely recall having to do this once before on an old PC. I think I
got lucky that time...

I guess it wouldn't be the end of the world if rebuilding the MBR
hoses everything, since it's mainly just my MP3s. The downside is
that a ton were downloaded from emusic, and I've since cancelled my
subscription, or are conversions from my vinyl collection, so it would
be a bummer to lose the time investment. The ironic thing is, I just
bought an external drive to back up everything when I upgrade my
system. Ah, well..

Before I do anything drastic, I think I'll try slapping it into a Win
98 box I have, just for the heck of it. Since I can read the drive in
DOS, I'm hoping that Win 98 will have better luck reading it than XP.
I suppose that technically I could copy the files over to another
FAT32 drive using DOS, but I'm not aware of a way to copy entire
folders, and I think I'd go mad copying subfolder by subfolder.

In any case, I need to wait a week for my new PC's parts to get here,
so I guess I have some time to mull things over. Thanks for the
advice!

"GranSalseron" > wrote in message >...
> It certainly sounds as if something has zapped the MBR, (
> Master Boot Record, ) of the Secondary drive. If you
> don't have rescue diskette sets from NAV or some other
> program there is a longshot that will either fix it or
> destroy the data on the Secondary.
>
> IF YOU CHOOSE TO READ THE FOLLOWING YOU ARE PROCEEDING AT
> YOUR OWN RISK!
>
> Turn off your computer. Unplug the data and power cables
> to the Primary drive. Boot up with a win98 startup
> diskette. At the A: prompt type FDISK /MBR, press the
> enter key and that should take you back to an A: prompt.
> At the A: prompt turn off your computer. Plug in the data
> and power cables to the Primary HD, turn your computer
> back on and boot up normally.
>
> Good luck if you chose to read this far! :-)
>
>