2nd HDD not formatted apparently!

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:19 PM

I installed SUSE on a spare HDD i had laying about. I stuck it in with a second HDD I use in Windows 2000. This disc holds all important data on it. I can see the drive contents in SUSE but when I change the HDD back over and boot up into windows I can see the drive but cant see its contents. It just says the drive is not formatted. I really cant aford to loose this data! What has SUSE done to my drive?

david_ross · 02-22-2005, 12:33 PM

What filesystem does the partition use?

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:35 PM

Even more problems.

Ive stuck the SUSE HDD back on and now it just comes up with a GRUB command prompt.

Code:

GNU GRUB version 0.95 (640K lower / 523200K upper memory)

[ Minimal BASH-like line editing supported.  For the first word, TAB lists possible command completions.  Anywhere else TAB lists the possible completions of a device/filename. ]

grub >

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:35 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by david_ross
What filesystem does the partition use?

NTFS

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:42 PM

Ive done a google and it seems now that its fucked both discs.

Code:

grub > geometry (hd0)
drive 0x80: C/H/S = 1024/255/63, The number of sectors = 39851760, LBA
Partition num: 0, Filesystem type unknown, partition type 0x42

grub > geometry (hd1)
drive 0x81: C/H/S = 1024/255/63, The number of sectors = 312581808, LBA
Partition num: 0, Filesystem type unknown, partition type 0x4

Am I ever going to get my data back!?

abisko00 · 02-22-2005, 12:42 PM

Let me repeat if I understood you correctly: you have a system with 2 HDD, one with Win2k, the other a probably NTFS formated data disk. Now you took out the Win2k OS carrying HDD and replaced it by an empty on, where you installed SUSE. SUSE was able to see and mount the NTFS data disk, but when you took out the SUSE disk and replaced it by the 'old' Win2k disk, the data disk was gone. Right?

If SUSE can still see the data it is not lost. You may save the data from the Linux OS. What SuSE might have done to your second drive, I really don't know. Probably nothing. Are you sure you exchanged the Linux drive and not your 2nd HDD? The SuSE-drive would appear in Windows as HDD with unknown format.

EDIT: Okay, it took me obviously too long to write this post. Please forget it

david_ross · 02-22-2005, 12:43 PM

Did you mount the ntfs partition in read/write mode?

Has anything changed with the suse drive since you last used it? Has it been put back in the same place on the same ide channel?

david_ross · 02-22-2005, 12:45 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by ]SK[
Ive done a google and it seems now that its fucked both discs.

How are the drives configured in the BIOS? Are they set to autodetect?

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:49 PM

abisko00

Yes that is correct. It seems I cant boot into SUSE either now. Everything is going against me right now

I am using the correct HDD since the SUSE one is 20Gb and the Data drive was 120Gb. Windows just sees it as a 120Gb unformatted disc.

Davd_ross

I didnt mount anything. I installed SUSE this morning. Came home from work to find that I dont have a second HDD. SUSE found the drive itself and I could access the files on it via My Computer. I ran an MP3 to test my speakers but nothing else.

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by david_ross
How are the drives configured in the BIOS? Are they set to autodetect?

Yes

david_ross · 02-22-2005, 12:53 PM

It may be worth setting the drives geometry explicitly in the BIOS just to test.

If SuSE mounted the drive in read/write mode then it is possible that the filesystem has become corrupt as ntfs write support is not yet stable in linux.

You could try booting into the win2k recovery console and running "chkdisk" on the partition.

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 12:58 PM

Code:

chkdsk D:

The volume appear to contain one or more unrecoverable problems.

abisko00 · 02-22-2005, 01:02 PM

I think the SuSE standard kernel comes with NTFS write support disabled, so that should be no problem.

I just looked up the partition types your HDD's show: 0x4 is FAT16 and 0x42 is SFS (whatever that is). Strange!
'filesystem type unknown' is OK for the NTFS partition, however not for a Linux filesystem.

Are you sure that the drives contacts are clean? Could an electrostatical discharge have occured?

I think David's suggestions are the best you can do right now.

EDIT: again too late. David, do you think it could be worth trying to set the partition types correctly with e.g. cfdisk from a bootable Linux CD? Or does that destroy the partition table even more?

]SK[ · 02-22-2005, 01:04 PM

Ive tried manual BIOS setup. Even with only the SUSE drive installed. Its slowly getting worse.

It now just says

Code:

GRUB Hard Disk Error

I cant do anything but reboot.

*EDIT*

Forget the above. I can get back to the GRUB command prompt if I put both drives on. If I use just the SUSE drive I get the single GRUB Hard Disk Error. Odd no? Looks like SUSE has done something to the second HDD?

david_ross · 02-22-2005, 01:22 PM

You could try what abisko00 suggested and rewrite the partition table but I'm finding it hard to believe that both drives are having the same problem.

Do you have another computer you could put the disks in? I'm wondering if the ide controller is damaged.

If you don't have another machine to hand then you could try moving the drives to the other channel, assuming they are on the same one just now.