Tried to Reinstall Windows WITH EXTERNAL PLUGGED IN! Please help!

soakfor1

Junior Member
Apr 3, 2007
2
0
0
i just did something extremely stupid. I tried to reinstall windows on my desktop but forgot my external was connected. I formated what I though was the main drive, but it turned out to be the connected external. The external was a 250gb almost entirely full of all my pictures, schoolwork, and 200gb of music, most of which i ripped over a period of months from my cd collection. This is bad.

I plugged it into my laptop and windows didnt even recognize it. I can't even begin to try to recover the data, as no program can see its connected. I am really at a loss as to what I should do at this point. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much.
 

WoodButcher

Platinum Member
Mar 10, 2001
2,158
0
76
Reformat your desktop w/o the external, plug in external and format it, strart ripping again......


Unless you can afford recovery services (which won't save it all and are extremely expensive) your out of luck...
 

VirtualLarry

No Lifer
Aug 25, 2001
56,570
10,205
126
If all you did was a quick format, then it is likely to be recoverable. I would take it out of the external case though, most data-recovery software only works over the IDE port, not USB.
 

soakfor1

Junior Member
Apr 3, 2007
2
0
0
After much searching, I found a great little program called active partition. It found the drive and recovered the erased partition in minutes. Everything is there. Their site is http://www.partition-recovery.com - I used the windows gui program, but they have other options. Great stuff for anyone else with similar problems.
 

Skitzer

Diamond Member
Mar 20, 2000
4,414
3
81
Hmmm ......... member for 1 day, 2 posts, profile not enabled ....... I smell fish.
 

RichUK

Lifer
Feb 14, 2005
10,341
678
126
Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
If all you did was a quick format, then it is likely to be recoverable. I would take it out of the external case though, most data-recovery software only works over the IDE port, not USB.

There?s no difference in the format carried out between the quick and the normal, apart from the normal format runs chkdsk as well ? Hence the longer format times.
 
Oct 4, 2004
10,515
6
81
New member who didn't bother changing the avatar from the default africanamerican....check.
Plugging a product almost no one has heard of before...check.
Didn't even bother saying 'Hi, I'm a long time lurker but finally signed up to ask this question'...check.
Didn't acknowledge help offered by previous poster...check.
Didn't post any follow up questions...check.
Profile not enabled...check.

Damn, Skitzer...I think you might be right.:p
 

RichUK

Lifer
Feb 14, 2005
10,341
678
126
Originally posted by: theprodigalrebel
New member who didn't bother changing the avatar from the default africanamerican....check.
Plugging a product almost no one has heard of before...check.
Didn't even bother saying 'Hi, I'm a long time lurker but finally signed up to ask this question'...check.
Didn't acknowledge help offered by previous poster...check.
Didn't post any follow up questions...check.
Profile not enabled...check.

Damn, Skitzer...I think you might be right.:p

However, he does hold a smidgen of credibility due to the fact he hasn?t yet offered us a link to a free ipod.
 

Roguestar

Diamond Member
Aug 29, 2006
6,045
0
0
Originally posted by: RichUK
Originally posted by: theprodigalrebel
New member who didn't bother changing the avatar from the default africanamerican....check.
Plugging a product almost no one has heard of before...check.
Didn't even bother saying 'Hi, I'm a long time lurker but finally signed up to ask this question'...check.
Didn't acknowledge help offered by previous poster...check.
Didn't post any follow up questions...check.
Profile not enabled...check.

Damn, Skitzer...I think you might be right.:p

However, he does hold a smidgen of credibility due to the fact he hasn?t yet offered us a link to a free ipod.
True, but he didn't mention the usual "I tried using Partition Tragic and now it's all gone :(" as opposed to getting it perfectly right first time ;).
 

HannibalX

Diamond Member
May 12, 2000
9,359
2
0
I have used similar products in the past and they have worked the first time.

Data doesn't go away after a format until new data is saved where the previous data was.

I don't know about the product he posted though.
 

Rubycon

Madame President
Aug 10, 2005
17,768
485
126
Download the demo of R-Studio here.

Run it and see what it finds. The demo is essentially useless for recovery since it only allows recovery of files 64kb or smaller.

NEVER put ANYTHING on the disk that was formatted. You will need another disk to recover the files to. It can be a mapped drive on a network. NEVER try to recover lost files to the same disk!

Most likely everything will be intact UNLESS you put something on the disk after it was formatted. The pay version will allow you to recover everything it finds. Good luck.
 

Operandi

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
5,508
0
0
Originally posted by: Rubycon
Download the demo of R-Studio here.

Run it and see what it finds. The demo is essentially useless for recovery since it only allows recovery of files 64kb or smaller.

NEVER put ANYTHING on the disk that was formatted. You will need another disk to recover the files to. It can be a mapped drive on a network. NEVER try to recover lost files to the same disk!

Most likely everything will be intact UNLESS you put something on the disk after it was formatted. The pay version will allow you to recover everything it finds. Good luck.

Agreed. R-Studio is wonderful.
 

Pciber

Senior member
Feb 17, 2004
977
1
0
I think there is some hidden meaning in his username, if he is indeed fishing... He responded with the link just a little more than 1 day after his original post