Accidentally deleted partition (am i screwed?)

event

Member
Apr 28, 2007
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I was trying to create a partition on my external hard drive (seagate freeagent desk) and while messing around with it somehow deleted the whole partition, I think? Now no matter what pc I plug the external hdd into, the pc will not recognize it. How can I get the computer to recognize the external hdd again?

Any help would be much appreciated.
 

denis280

Diamond Member
Jan 16, 2011
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right click my computer and choose Manage.then Storage. the external drive will commonly be identified as Disk 1 or Disk 2.
 

event

Member
Apr 28, 2007
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66
I see it down there ask disk 2. How do I get it to show up again as a letter drive? lol
 

MoInSTL

Senior member
Jan 2, 2012
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Based on your second screenshot, it shows as Unallocated. Right click and choose Format. It will format the drive and assign a drive letter.

Edit: Format will delete anything on the drive. But anything on it is gone at this point since it unallocated. Should only take a few seconds/minutes to format it. Post back with results.
 
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Blastman

Golden Member
Oct 21, 1999
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Yup, you're screwed.




End thread/.:p




Sorry, could help cracking a joke at this bad time for you. Carry on … hope you get things fixed.:)
 

ViRGE

Elite Member, Moderator Emeritus
Oct 9, 1999
31,516
167
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If he hasn't done a NTFS "full format", then the data is likely partially recoverable.
Indeed. What's with all of this terrible advice? If he just deleted the partition and hasn't overwritten it, then it can easily be recovered.

event: Look into TestDisk. It's a free utility that can scan your drive and recover the whole partition (so long as you haven't overwritten it). It's not the easiest thing in the world to use, but it's very powerful and it's free (unlike so many other data recovery solutions out there).
 

ashetos

Senior member
Jul 23, 2013
254
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event: Look into TestDisk. It's a free utility that can scan your drive and recover the whole partition (so long as you haven't overwritten it). It's not the easiest thing in the world to use, but it's very powerful and it's free (unlike so many other data recovery solutions out there).

I can confirm that TestDisk is amazing and it's also free. If you're interested in recovering specific files instead of the whole partition you can also try using photorec, which is in the same package as TestDisk.

Formatting the partition was a bad idea, it most definitely destroyed your chances of perfectly recovering the partition. This is where photorec fits in, you can try rescuing individual files.
 

MoInSTL

Senior member
Jan 2, 2012
392
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76
If he hasn't done a NTFS "full format", then the data is likely partially recoverable.


He didn't mention anything about recovering data. I don't think it was an issue.

I inadvertently formatted a drive a few years ago and did two things: Stopped using it to even read it and then used Easeus Disk Wizard back when it was new and free to recover everything.
 
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