knackered metadata is the most common cause of that, it just takes a few bad sectors in that crucial header section to render the drive unmountable.

Can that explain the bizarre situation where it saw the partition, but could not recognize how it was formatted or that any of the memory within the partition was being used (the "Partition 1 [Unknown] 25000 MB (24999 MB free)" thing), and then failed to reformat it?

A corrupt MFT would, yes. Data can be recovered with relative ease in such cases but you'll lose metadata info, like file attributes and names.

NVM

If the drive doesn't even show up in the BIOS, that indicates a problem with the drive's electronics, not just filesystem corruption (like a bad MFT). The BIOS doesn't know or care about filesystems.


But if that were the case, SeaTools wouldn't detect it either, so something is amiss here.

Understatement there, methinks. But yes, the BIOS sees nothing connected to that (or any other) drive slot (but the others are empty). It does detect another HDD that I swapped it out for, though (despite the fact that that drive also has issues of its own; it kept 'losing track' of files, not knowing where they were despite their continued presence on the drive), so it's not the connection or the BIOS or something...


EDIT: OK, for the sake of getting an error code from SeaTools that enables me to return the drive and get a new one, I booted up the machine again, hit F8 to load the boot menu, and... the drive was there. It was not previously. This... is interesting. Deciding it best not to try anything that might make things worse (NifSE and ARES may be my top priorities, but they are by no means the only important things on the drive), I just went ahead and ran SeaTools, which again gave the SMART error. So... Should I attempt to boot the computer from the drive, grab important files, and such, or am I better off not risking it? The possibility that it simply will not boot because of the failed Windows installation is also a concern; if the drive is showing up, maybe I could retry that, but that seems like a lot of stress on a drive I don't want to stress... It is tempting, though, I feel like I have a window of opportunity...

This could be useful. Its only free for to day. I'd keep it on hand.

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/
Giveaway of the Day - iCare Format Recovery

What can iCare Format Recovery help?

* Formatted partition by mistake? - Try iCare Format Recovery
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* RAW Drive and is reading 0 byte while there are lots of important files there? - Try iCare Format Recovery
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If you've got a secondary HDD handy, boot through a live disc and see if you can start cloning it.

Seconded. Don't boot the OS on the drive, but boot something else with the drive connected, and see what files you can access from it. Avoid modifying anything on it.

Even if you don't have a spare hard drive to copy stuff to, you may be able to recover things onto a flash drive or something.

Hmm... both of the other drives I have, I'm not sure I want to trust with this. One I haven't touched in years after it, too, failed a SMART test, while the other never did but started spontaneously losing track of files (just a few weeks ago, oddly enough). I have an external that's about a 100 GB, but I have no where to put the files I actually have on there at the moment. Yes I do, I'm a moron, never mind that.

OK, would booting it off of an external HD work?

Or I could just use this computer (family desktop) that has Windows installed and is working perfectly fine. That makes a lot more sense. OK, so I take the failing drive, put it in this computer as a secondary, and boot this one and try to salvage things? OK, I can handle that - though I'm going to wait for confirm on that and since it's late that means probably will wait until tomorrow night, as I really don't want to start this and get caught watching the clock with class early tomorrow morning.

that sounds like a good plan. boot the other machine with your sick drive as a secondary. If windows manages to mount it then great - easy ride. Grab things a few at a time, stating with your highest priorities, and don't bother with anything you can replace. if not, then grab one of the many tools you've been pointed at and try to recover the files from it with that.

Cloning the whole drive is really a last resort, since it requires a lot more free space, it'd be much easier to index it and just recover the files you really need. I've done this successfully many times - I put myself through university working in PC repair shops and data recovery was a pretty common issue, though nine out of ten times I just had to stick the drive in another machine to mount it. That's the thing, mechanical failure is really pretty rare compared to table corruption or dead windows installs.

One problem is that there are a lot of files that I "need" that I cannot replace. A lot of music and a fair number of movies, tons of papers and projects and things that I'd rather not lose, ARES and NifSE (and zlib and Niflib and really I should just grab my entire VC++ install because I know there are things in there that I installed and forgot about and might still need, and I'd have a hell of a time figuring out what they were if I lost it), etc.

Get your authored stuff first (papers, projects and code etc). Music and movies can be replaced more easily and will take longer to recover (unless you authored them yourself). If at any point the drive dies permanently, you'll regret that 700 meg movie if it costs you other things. That said, if you get access in a given session, the chances are you'll be good until you restart - the drive powering up and down is likely to be worse than just accessing it, so make sure you've got everything you think you're going to need installed on the host machine *before* you plug your drive in.

What should I install for that? I guess that utility that zone linked to (already downloaded it), any other suggestions? Should I wait til I get the replacement drive, and boot things up, try to recover what I can through Windows, and then attempt a disk image onto the new drive if there's anything I still want?

Its ether "boot the other machine with your sick drive as a secondary. If windows manages to mount it then great - easy ride. Grab things a few at a time, stating with your highest priorities, and don't bother with anything you can replace." or wait till you drive comes. I would be tempted to plug it in as a secondary and recover the bare minimum. Its up to you. then do the rest when you have your new hard dive.

Well, the truth is there's not a great deal of good FREE disk recovery software (at least for windows). Most of the big companies will offer a freeware trial that will index your disk and show you what you *could* recover, but expect a registration fee before actually recovering it. Be prepared to pay $30-$50 or so for a decent bit of software. What you should probably do is have a browse around what's available and what they charge (they essentially work in the same way anyway) and pick one that takes your fancy, then get the freeware version, start the machine with the drive in and see if it mounts. If so, grab the data and you're done. If not try anything you might have for free (note that the one zone linked to probably won't do it, since it looks like it's designed just to recover formatted drives), the try the freeware tool and see what it comes up with. If you're satisfied that it's getting enough then pay for it and gather your data. I'd recommend choosing one that has a money back guarantee, as many of them do. That way if you can't get the data back at least you haven't wasted any money. Try something like this:

http://www.easeus.com/landing/file-recovery-software.htm?gclid=CJPbqMvEqKECFQ-Y2AodEHgMGQ

The key features you're looking for is the ability to recover from raw drives, and NTFS.

Since I know how much time an effort you've put into NiSE in particular, including a lot of work specifically to help me, and since I have a vested interest in its continued existence, I'd like to offer to pay for half of the software price. Drop me an email when you're done and we'll figure out how I can transfer that to you. Paypal or something similar should do the job.

HeX

$30-$50 isn't an issue, it's the $300-$800 that was completely outside my ability. Don't worry about the small stuff. Your help with this has been worth well more than $50 to me anyway, even just for the non-modding related files I have lost, if I can get them back.

It giveawayoftheday is a 3d party that promotes Software.http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/about/ You downloaded the Full version. You need to install it be for 12:00am to get it.

Up to you of course, but the offer stands. On a more practical note, if you need any live help while doing it you're more than welcome to call or skype me, depending what comms options you have available. Like I said before I have a certain amount of experience in recovering dead drives. Irritatingly, I've actually got platter recovery tools at work, but there's no way your drive would survive being mailed to the UK. Drop me a mail and I'll pass you the relevant number/details if I can help.

this may also be worth a read:

http://data-recovery-software-review.toptenreviews.com/

Perhaps this software (Net Reflector) can generate your source code back ?

http://www.red-gate.com/products/reflector/

NET Reflector add-ins

http://reflectoraddins.codeplex.com/

Wow, this is just horrible for you. Apart from possibly loosing NifSE I understand you may have also lost other important files. I don't really have anything to add to what's already been said, all I can say is that you have my prairs. Which is pretty much considering I'm not a religious man.

-kyoma

I had a HD crash one day as well, I lost (500 GB) all my stuff and downloads. Only one option remains, hardware replacement. Try to find an exact same version of that HD and start replacing parts.

1st - The print board
2de - the writer heads
3de - The HD motor

I was lucky to find one; even it was a 4 year old HD model. Replacing the print board was easy but did not help. Replacing the writer heads well I messed that one up, they got damaged in the process.

But hey you can give it a go as a last option.

Boo, I didn't realize that. I just downloaded it, saw that I had Setup.exe, and assumed I was good to go should I need it. Manz, that's annoying.


Thank you; zone offered the same, and I appreciate it from both of you. We'll see; Friday or Saturday, assuming I get the replacement drive by then, would be the time I'm looking to do this.


Thanks. Any personal suggestions on check marks I absolutely want this to have?


Thanks, if it comes to this, I'll give it a try.


I really hope it doesn't come to this. In fact, if it did, I don't think I'd try it. I have a new drive coming to me thanks to the warranty, but I worry that this will void said warranty... Plus if I ruin the new drive I have to buy a new one, one way or the other.

Then again, drives are cheap, probably worth quite a bit less than data I could potentially save...

ouch, thats really bad to hear DragoonWraith....

Ive had harddrive go bad before....i lost all my fallout 3 mods that way. Personally, Seagate are pretty dependable, Ive never had one break within at least 4 years of buying it, hell i have a 10 year old 36gig harddrive that still works like brand new (only 1 reformat it's entire life). WD drives have broken on me countless times though, i refuse to ever buy one of them again.

I keep around a Ubuntu CD that I can boot from, if a windows install goes bad or something, I can pop in the CD and generally get any files that i need off the harddrive before reformating the drive. If the drive itself is damaged though, its tricky. It works well cause it has full interface and whatnot and i can just plug in a portable harddrive and copy over what i need (in small sections to that i dont hit a bad bit as quickly).