Deleted Partition

[EpOxY]

I thought I found the answer when I searched for other people's problems with partitions, but they don't seem to answer...

When trying to setup/format a new HD, I accidentally deleted the partition off of an older HD. I didn't format, so I assume everything's still on there... but window's isn't recognizing the drive (as expected) so I can't check to see what's there.

I downloaded GetDataBack NTFS and scanned, and it appears that everything's in there, but they require that I purchase the software, and even then... it seems like they'd just end up copying all the files to a new location instead of just rebuilding the filesystem onto the disk itself.

Is there something out there that will just rebuild the filesystem without needing me to copy everything to another drive? Something that will rebuild the partition information for me so I won't need to copy, then reformat, then recopy again?

 

[volrath]

I was in the same situation recently. Just formatted it. =( Bump for answer.

 

[EpOxY]

*bump*

if nobody gives me a response soon, I'm just gonna reformat...

I think i recovered everything with GetDataBack, but I'm not sure cuz there's too much data to check.... so I'd still rather just fix the disk directly instead of relying on the copy that i don't know is complete...

 

[Smilin]

Short answer:

Yes it is possible to recover your data quite easily. If you format you're probably done for.

The only thing that gets changed is the partition's entry gets removed from the partition table. All you need to rebuild it is the starting and stopping sector of the partition. You can find these by locating the boot sector at the beginning and the backup boot sector at the end. They'll have the letters "NTFS" in caps starting at an offset of 3 bytes in the sector. You can fill in the remaining data for the partition entry with junk, it won't matter (heads 255, sectors 255 etc). You're gonna need someone with some diskprobe experience to do this. It's *just* a bit more than you can walk through in a forum thread.

You showed some wisdom in not doing anything else once the mistake occured. A repartion would have made things difficult, a format could have made them impossible. If you stopped just after the deletion and used a data recovery program I wouldn't be surprised if you have 100% of your data back with no problems at all.

 

[EpOxY]

is there any software that will do this automatically?

 

[FlyingPenguin]

iRecover, EasyRecovery Pro, Disk Commander.

 

[luke007]

I suggest you use Partition Table Doctor to resolve your
problem.The software provides very useful functions:
Backup partition table, Restore partition table, Rebuild
partition table, undelete partition, Fix boot sector,
rebuild mbr,etc.

First thing I recommend you download the demo version of
Partition Table Doctor.( http://www.ptdd.com/download.htm )

Run the program and select "Rebuild Partition Table",
then choose "Interactive" mode. If you can find the partition
you need, that is Partition Table Doctor can help you. Otherwise,
Partition Table Doctor cannot help you.

See more: http://www.ptdd.com/recoverylostpartition.htm
http://www.ptdd.com/recoverdeletedpartition.htm
http://www.ptdd.com/partition-recovery.htm

 

[BruceLeeBoy]

Epoxy, have you had any luck with this?

I am in a similar situation. I have a Maxtor 300GB External One Touch II USB drive. The main (and only) partition somehow got deleted. I used BinaryBiz to do a scan and it found all of my files on the HD. So, like you, I haven't done anything yet.

It appears that the files are there; I just want to rebuild the partition table b/c I simply do not have enough room to transfer 240GB of files (what I have on there now) onto some other medium (my main HD is only 60 GB).

I would just pay Binary Biz, but the estimate on 240GB is in the quadruple digits. Please let me know what your experience was and, most importantly,

Am I right in thinking that I want to rebuild my partition table in my situation?

Thanks in advance!