Recovering data from dynamic hard drive

[Zinthar]

I backed up a large amount of data to my secondary HDD (a 320gb Seagate) before I encountered a crash of my primary HDD (which had WinXP installed).

I decided to use the opportunity to upgrade to Vista, so I just installed Vista on my new primary HDD and reconnected the secondary HDD with my backed up data on it and Vista refuses to read it. I never got a chance to correctly uninstall the secondary HDD before moving it. Vista disk management reads it as "Dynamic" and "Offline." This disk is completely healthy...I just can't get to the data.

Is there any hope for recovering the data on the disk? It's an NTFS partition. It says that if I convert to Basic that all data will be lost. Would I be able to access it from XP or am I totally screwed?

 

[Auric]

Try booting from XP disc to recovery console or a BartPE/WinPE disc and see if the data is accessable and copy it to the new one. Was the backup drive formatted Dynamic and if so why?

 

[JonnyBlaze]

I don't think your going to have any luck. I used dynamic disks once and my main drive failed but I lost everything on all the drive. No RAID or anything like that either.

It stores all the information about the files on the drive which you probably formatted while installing vista. I remember finding something from MS's site that might work for you but you have to contact them to get it. No direct downloads.


I'll see if i can find that again.

 

[Zinthar]

Recovery console from the XP disc only sees the new C:Windows installation of Vista, and doesn't give me access to it (it asks for an admin password, which I never set in the first place, for either my computer or the OS).

I'm guessing that I formatted as Dynamic because it was the default and I was stupid and didn't think of the potential issues of such an occurrence.

What does dynamic mean with regard to NTFS formatted HDDs?!? If I reinstalled WinXP on the primary would it be able to read the data of the secondary HDD so that I could properly uninstall it?

 

[Auric]

That would suck if the file system info was indeed on the primary. Hopefully there is a solution as JB alludes to otherwise my only guess would be to try the usual recovery proggies. Good luck.

 

[zagood]

I had a similar problem with an office machine, didn't have the time to get too involved, so I went to circuit city and bought a $20 HD enclosure. Popped the hard drive in there, plugged it into a USB port and pulled the backed-up data off. Formatted the drive to use as additional storage and re-installed to IDE port.

Just a suggestion.

-z

 

[Zinthar]

Originally posted by: zagood
I had a similar problem with an office machine, didn't have the time to get too involved, so I went to circuit city and bought a $20 HD enclosure. Popped the hard drive in there, plugged it into a USB port and pulled the backed-up data off. Formatted the drive to use as additional storage and re-installed to IDE port.

Just a suggestion.

-z

Hmmmm, interesting -- I'll give this a try tomorrow.

 

[cascable]

have you tried using a knoppix livecd. it's linux but i use it all the time at work:

http://knoppix.com/

 

[RebateMonger]

To get Windows to read that disk, you've GOT to get it "Online". You can't do diddly with an "Offline Disk".

And, "Dynamic Disk" is NOT the default for a new disk. With XP, the Disk Management utility defaults to "Basic Disk" and NTFS. In Windows 2000, the default was to make it a Dynamic Disk. (The option was called "Upgrade the Disk".)

Did you try this?

To reactivate a missing or offline dynamic disk
Using the Windows interface
Open Computer Management (Local).
In the console tree, click Disk Management.
Where?
Computer Management (Local)
Storage
Disk Management
Right-click the disk marked Missing or Offline, and then click Reactivate
Disk.
The disk should be marked Online after the disk is reactivated.

Notes
To open Computer Management, click Start, and then click Control Panel.
Double-click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer
Management.
You must be logged on as an administrator or a member of the Administrators
group in order to complete this procedure. If your computer is connected to
a network, network policy settings may also prevent you from completing this
procedure.
A dynamic disk may become Missing when it is corrupted, powered down, or
disconnected.
A dynamic disk may become Offline if it is corrupted or intermittently
unavailable. A dynamic disk may also become Offline if you attempt to import
a foreign (dynamic) disk and the import fails. An error icon appears on the
Offline disk. Only dynamic disks display the Missing or Offline status.
Only dynamic disks can be reactivated.

 

[Nocturnal]

Buy GetDataBack, chances are, your data is still there although you will need a data recovery program such as GetDatBack to retrieve your data. Also I don't know if GDB works with Vista yet so you may have to reinstall XP and then use the program to retrieve your data, save it to maybe DVDs and then reinstall Vista. It'll be time consuming but if your data is worth anything, you would do it. I know I would.

 

[ryetronics]

I was going to post a new topic about this but luckily found this one. Here's my issue, which is similar...

I have a dual boot configuration of XP and Vista, with each OS on
their own respective HDD's. I also have a 3rd HDD that has all of my
media documents on it. Through XP, that media drive is linked to [My
Documents]. But when I try to access that drive in Vista, it is
listed as Offline. When I right-click on it in Computer Management,
my only options are Convert to Basic, Properties and Help.

Obviously I don't want to have to change the drive to Basic as I'll
lose my files, but why is it that Vista won't recognize it as being
online when it's Dynamic? Is it because it's already linked to My
Documents through my XP setup?

Anyone know of a solution here that doesn't involve reformatting the
media drive? I don't know how that drive was formatted as Dynamic b/c I don't remember doing that myself when I bought it less than a year ago. Also, the drive works perfectly fine when booted into XP.
Thanks!