Recovering data from HD - possible FAT problems

[Tiembo]

I have a 180GB and a 200GB drive that I'm looking to recover data from. I was tranferring files to/from the discs, when Windows XP stopped interfacing with them. Whenever I click on the drive, it prompts me to format it.

Placing these drives into another computer (whose BIOS recognizes the drives as > 137GB) didn't help, so I tried running recovery software. All of the ones that I tried recognized the partition to be around 137GB. Is there a way to rewrite the FAT so that the OS and these recovery softwares recognize the full amount? Could I just repartition in Windows' disk management without reformatting?

Hardware checks out fine with the utils from the respective manufacturers.

 

[montag451]

There are 4 ways. (well - there are more than 4, but what the hell!
the easiest ways
1 - find a newer system to hook your drives to.
2 - Use a usb2 drive enclosure
Or
3 - Get a pci ide controller card (promise)
4 - Flash the bios with a newer version
5 - Use drive overlay software which will trick your os into using the full capacity of the drive - allegedly. - Disadvantage=If the os goes down, you will need GOOD recovery software to have any chance of recovering SOME of your data.

 

[Tiembo]

Both systems' BIOS recognize the drives as 180GB and 200GB. I think Windows did something to truncate them, even though I was using them for months to their full capacity before this error occured.

 

[Tiembo]

Anyone?

 

[montag451]

As above

 

[birdpup]

It seems odd that data recovery applications could not recognize the full drive capacity. This situation leads me to believe part of the problem to be a hard drive controller issue. This would then support montag451's recommendation.

Instead of asking you which applications you tried. It may be better to recommend for you to try some of the following applications that you have not already tried.

[*]Data Recovery Programs

• TestDisk
• R-Studio
• Runtime's GetDataBack
• Ontrack's Easy Recovery Pro
• Quetek
• File Scavenger
• HDD Regenerator
• Freeware Data Recovery Tools ***Free***
• PC Inspector ***Free***
• ACR Data Recovery
• DataRecoveryWizard
• Digital Camera Memory Recovery: PC Inspector
• BadCopy Media Recovery

[*]Rescue Disks

• UBCD4Win
• BartPE
• Insert
• Knoppix
• Hiren's BootCD
• Ubuntu LiveCD

[*]Hard Drive Related Products

• Norton Ghost
• Partition Table Doctor and Super Fdisk
• DIY DataRecovery and iRecover
• Acronis
• Future Systems Solutions
• Partition Recovery
• Active@ Partition Recovery
• Paragon Software