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Uh oh...where did my hard drive go in windows 7?

5

50

Platinum Member
Hello,

So here's what I've done the past 2 days. I had a 320gb Seagate that had vista and was no good (it had bad sector error as soon as I copied everything off of it whew), so I RMA'ed it and got a replacement drive. I installed Windows 7 on the replacement drive and everything was going swell. I had it going for about 2 days then got a 640gb WD black today. I installed Windows 7 on that drive and then began to start copying my stuff off of the RMA'ed seagate. I first reassigned the drive to be G. Then I started copying a folder from the drive. I tried to access my documents folder and it asked for permission. It kept hanging waiting to try to get in, so I removed User Account Control. For no reason, it said it couldn't find the folder it had been copying. I rebooted and the BIOS doesn't show the drive anymore. I tried changing SATA cables and power and no go. Have I lost all my data? I went to Computer Management and there's no sign of the drive. No sign of the drive in 7 either. Can I do anything? Thanks
 
Hint: If the drive isn't showing in the bios anymore, this has nothing to do with Windows 7.
 
Originally posted by: 50
Hello,

So here's what I've done the past 2 days. I had a 320gb Seagate that had vista and was no good (it had bad sector error as soon as I copied everything off of it whew), so I RMA'ed it and got a replacement drive. I installed Windows 7 on the replacement drive and everything was going swell. I had it going for about 2 days then got a 640gb WD black today. I installed Windows 7 on that drive and then began to start copying my stuff off of the RMA'ed seagate. I first reassigned the drive to be G. Then I started copying a folder from the drive. I tried to access my documents folder and it asked for permission. It kept hanging waiting to try to get in, so I removed User Account Control. For no reason, it said it couldn't find the folder it had been copying. I rebooted and the BIOS doesn't show the drive anymore. I tried changing SATA cables and power and no go. Have I lost all my data? I went to Computer Management and there's no sign of the drive. No sign of the drive in 7 either. Can I do anything? Thanks
Click to expand...

Now you say you started copying everything over but never said if it finished or not. And then tried accessing your documents folder. What drive were you trying to access it on? If you were copying the files over shouldn't you have them on your vista/xp drive, therefore, no files lost. When you are working with a beta version of a new operating system, especially as new as win7, you should have your irreplaceable files backed up on an external hard drive or another pc. The only thing I can recommend is try booting in safe mode.
 
If the drive isn't seen in the BIOS, there isn't much you can do.

Change out the power and data cabling, try another PC, or try a connecting device such as a USB/IDE adapter or USB/SATA adapter (depending on what type of drive you have.

If you still can't see it in the BIOS no matter what, you have a hardware failure on the drive. It might need a new PCB board, or it might have an internal problem.

This is why I've never RMA'd a hard drive. If it develops bad sectors or other defects, I wack it with a sledge hammer and throw it in the trash.
 
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