Need Help With "Boot Failure" Problem

[marretas 0]

i have a problem with me PC. When he try boot the follow warning is showed to me : "BOOT FAILURE".i think is the hard drive, but i installed the hard drive in another pc to extract the important data inside, and windows xp can detect but in "My computet" only can see the C:\ Drive icon. Need some tips to solve this kind of problems. cheers

[Transcendum 0]

Hello marretas...When you connected your hard-disk drive to that other computer, did you use the same data cable you used in your own computer, or was it a different cable?If it was the same cable, then perhaps you should try using another data cable, and see how things turn out. But if it wasn't, then I believe your MBR (Master Boot Record), which is that group of sectors on your hard-drive that contains important information about the arrangement and structure of your hard-drive, is corrupted.But don't worry, that doesn't mean your hard-disk itself is damaged. But I don't think you'll be able to redeem any files that already exist on your hard-disk. To repair this problem, simply connect your hard-disk to another computer that's running any version of Windows, and run FDISK from the COMMAND PROMPT, delete the partitions, and then create them again. This partitioning could simply be done on any other operating system, of course, but I sense you're using Windows primarily .But still, the first thing you should try is changing the data cable. Perhaps it's the problem.And good luck!

[marretas 0]

cable change its not the solution. I ve tryed . If i use Fdisk and delete the hard disk partitions i will automaticlly delete all information inside. I dont give a damn for hard drive, i just want to recover my data inside the damage drive. Cheers and thks alot

[Transcendum 0]

Hello again, marretes...

 

Well, I hope I'm wrong, but unfortunately I don't think I am. I've had way too much trouble with hard-disks over the years that I don't think there's any type of hard-disk problem that I haven't faced yet.

 

I believe that your data aren't retreivable at this point. But you can try software such as Partition Magic to try and fix the MBR, even though I'm not sure that'd work. Perhaps you could try this command at the command prompt...

 

FDISK /mbr

 

This works at cases of MBR corruption to try and retreive a back-up MBR. I don't know whether it can even work in your case, but it's worth a try. At least, it won't do any harm.

 

Good luck!

[CaptainRon 0]

Here is a sol, use diskmgmt to delete and then recreate all the partitions you had earlier and in the exact sizes. Like if you had two 10GB partitions, make 2 ten GB partitions. Do not format the partitions, if you do that the data is gone. Then use a software like Recover4All (any tool that can recover deleted files), and make it scan ur damaged HD's newly created drives. Theoritically it should recover most of your files.

[yordan 10]

windows xp can detect but in "My computet" only can see the C:\ Drive icon.

OK, the other computer did not see the files, but do you know why ? In order to know what happens, you need to go to the Windows XP Disk Manager. It's reachable by going throug something likeStart->Settings->Control Pannel->Administration tools, etc..
then, in the disk Management you should see both of your disks, and look it there are partitions on the second disk.
If The disk manager sees no partitions, that seems that you lost all of your data.
Also see if the disk manager sees the second disk with it's right size, else this means that you will not be able to simply use this disk.
Regards
yordan

[CaptainRon 0]

OK, the other computer did not see the files, but do you know why ? In order to know what happens, you need to go to the Windows XP Disk Manager. It's reachable by going throug something likeStart->Settings->Control Pannel->Administration tools, etc..
then, in the disk Management you should see both of your disks, and look it there are partitions on the second disk.
If The disk manager sees no partitions, that seems that you lost all of your data.
Also see if the disk manager sees the second disk with it's right size, else this means that you will not be able to simply use this disk.
Regards
yordan

yordan dude, the disk management starts with the simple command diskmgmt.msc
secondly, the method i suggested, takes in consideration that the mbr is gone (all partitions gone). marretas needs the files on the hard disk more importantly.

[Grafitti 0]

If you have your disk set up as a dynamic drive instead of a basic one, if you stick it in a different computer windows XP will not automatically show it as a listed drive in explorer. again, you have to go to diskmgmt.msc and activate the disk. If it still won't show up due to an actual bad hard disk, once you've exhausted the safer methods posted by Trance & The Captain, you can try hard disk regenerator. As long as you can see the hard disk in the bios setup, hard disk regenerator goes through the disk and attempts to actually recover the bad sectors. they don't advise you use it on a hd full of data, but if you've got no other choice, and there's only a small bad patch on the drive, then it will only overwrite those portions, which probably would have been lost anyways. i tried it on an 80Gb drive that someone dropped, it could be read in the bios and in diskmgmt but i couldn't format it. with this HHD regenerator i got back about 60Gb space, but it took about a week to fix every bad sector (disk had 100% bad sectors). it's worth a shot.And while i'm on this topic, can someone explain to me what the actual practical difference is between basic and dynamic?