After merging partition, file can't show...!

[iamgood]

oh dear, pls...pls...need some help here.

recently i decided to merge my 2 separate partitions
back into 1. So i open the Partition magic, go to the
2nd partition, right click and choose "merge'. A msg
box pop up and show that my 2nd partition (D) will
become a folder in the 1st partition (C). After this i did
not change any setting nor request any other changes
and the computer reboot and start doing the merging.

I've done this before and roughly know that this wouldn't
take long but this time it took 2 hours to finish the
process during which i saw some weird msg like
'correcting error in file...', 'deleting index entry...' and
recovering orphaned file...'

Finally it's over. But i was so surprise to see that after
all this time waiting, the 2 partition DID NOT merge.
What worst is that and all the files in the 2nd partition
disapprear!! But later i found out that there was actually
files in the 2nd partition but just can't see them, the
computer is not showing them, coz when i click
'property' in 2nd partition i can clearly see that the
partition is occupied but just CAN'T see the files. I
further check with Partition magic and the program also
show that there was some files in the 2nd the partition.
However, in partition magis the status of the 2nd
partition was show as 'None' rather than 'Active'.
I would really appreciate you guys to kindly guide me on
how to recover my precious files in the 2nd partition.

Pls let me have your reply very soon. Thanking you in
advance.

Jo
bravousm@gmail.com, ex58888@lycos.com

 

[Seekermeister]

I don't know the first thing about Partition Magic, so anything that I say is probably wrong. But that never caused me to keep my mouth shut before. The only way that I know that files can be invisible, is if the are hidden or protected system files. Check in Folder Options>View Tab and uncheck these boxes. If they remain invisible, I have no idea of how to see them, unless a recovery program can access them.

 

[Bozo Galora]

I see this is your first post - so welcome
FWIW - partition questions dont go in Gen Hardware, but no matter, no one else here pays any attention to where they post stuff.
Are you female? - just so I know how mean I should be -

Anyways, Partition Tragic is definitely not the software to use if you have "precious files" on one of the partitions you are moving. merging, or splitting. While peeps here will say "well I used it 800 times and never had a problem", any minor glitch (like bad sectors) will wreck you partition table and leave you in file table limbo, with a bunch of data with no file addresses. Normally, this would leave you with a "RAW" data state, but the PM software makes a temporary file table called PQrp, or PowerQuest reserved partition (or "PowerFLEX") - something it creates to use to insert in your current file table, but this time couldn't. So now you have space in your system that is "unallocated" - but actually the data is there without the NTFS file associations, and is invisible to Windows.
(Note that PowerQuest was bought by Symantec)

You must NOT do anything to try and fix this or you will be deeper in doo doo.

There are basically three escalating states of PM trouble:
Action completes, but after a long time - like 2-24 hours.
(One must NEVER stop PM until it finishes - if at all possible)
Action freezes at ~93+%
Action freezes at ~50% or less

This may involve 3 levels of recovery.....
Using PTEdit to change partition from 3C to 7
Using RStudio
Using diskpatch

I can help get your data back, but I need to know several things
I need to know exactly what partitions you had on this drive, their sizes, and which one has the data and which one you wanted to merge into
I need you to go into Win XP disk manager, and note what it says for this HDD as to all partition types and file systems
Like "C" 50GB primary active NTFS etc.
Which version of PM were you using?
What type of files are you trying to save?

 

[hoorah]

If you leave your email address like that posted in a message, the spam bots will find it and send you lots of goodies.

Better to post it as nameREMOVETHIS@mail.comf

 

[iamgood]

hi guys,

thx for the opinions.

i'm using some recovery program recommended by some friends and so far managed to recover some of the files. this maybe time consuming but i think i've learned my lesson and will back-up my data if i were to use partition tragic next time after this...I'll also try other recovery program...hoping to c a +ve result...will later let u guys know the outcome.

Seekermeister, Bozo Galora, hoorah, thx so much for ur opinions...appreciate it...

Good day.

 

[Blain]

Using a file recovery application is very helpful experience along the PC road.
* It can get your files back.
* It can teach you valuable backup lessons.