160gb just showing 28.3gb?????

[LoboX]

Hi I've been reading about data recovery and i really like the subject, I've fix for now 2 Seagate bugs, and i was able to recover the data, but now i have a WD drive from my dad old PC and size of the drive is 160gb, but when i connect the drive to my PC its only showing 28.3gb, why is that? probably that drive had 2 partitions?

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks Guys.

[LoboX]

ok right now im using Partition Find and Mount to see if i can see any other partition, using the last scan option, only finding 30gb.

[LoboX]

nop no luck, trying other options

[Vulcan]

You haven't said exactly where the PC is showing the drive as 28.3GB. Where have you seen this (BIOS / Windows (My) Computer? Windows Disk Manager? Somewhere else?). Did you check in the BIOS disk setup screen to see what size is shown there for the disk?

What was happening just before this problem originally occurred?

Have you looked for an HPA using MHDD or HDAT2 etc.?

Can you read from that reported 28.3GB of the disk successfully, or are there problems doing that?

[LoboX]

ok i have not checked yet the BIOS yet, i see the 28.3GB in Windows (My) Computer and in Disk Manager. The problem that started the whole thing is that the mobo of the PC fried, so i was just going to do a backup of the drive when i saw the difference on size.

I have not check the drive yet using MHDD or HDAT2, i will try to do that quick.

Yes i can read from the drive i see folders and programs, but no pictures, no docs, nothing.

[LoboX]

Ok sorry i didn't reply sooner was fixing a mac, done with that, in the bios i only see 30gb too i will try and use now the MHDD or HDAT2.

[sathyan]

some versions of Gigabyte motherboard are affected by a bug which limits the capacity of the HDD
As Vulcan suggested, check HPA of the drive using MHDD OR HDAT2.

Yes i can read from the drive i see folders and programs, but no pictures, no docs, nothing.

If you have important data in the drive,and assuming you know the risks of DIY, make a clone of it when the drive is correctly detected in the BIOS.

[LoboX]

ok sorry for the delay this is what i got from the MHDD and the HD, it seems MHDD sees 60gb but still im short, hmmm

Attachments

MHDD

[LoboX]

I will try to use HDAT2 I've been reading that probably i need to change the LBA from 48bit to 28bit

Attachments

Checking LBA

[hddguy]

Have you tried NHPA from within MHDD?

[LoboX]

not yet let me do that

[LoboX]

ohhh nice now i have LBA 312,581,808, let me check in the bios now how much does the pc can see.

Ok now the BIOS can see 137GB, i will clone the HD now, thanks i will keep posted.

[Vulcan]

ohhh nice now i have LBA 312,581,808

Good, so that has removed the HPA and as far as the drive is concerned, all 160GB is now addressable - but...

Ok now the BIOS can see 137GB

... so the BIOS has the old 28-bit addressing limit.

i will clone the HD now

Be careful - some cloning software will be affected by the BIOS limitations in that PC. Ensure that whatever cloning software you choose can recognise and clone all 160GB.

[LoboX]

ohhh nice now i have LBA 312,581,808

Good, so that has removed the HPA and as far as the drive is concerned, all 160GB is now addressable - but...

Ok now the BIOS can see 137GB

... so the BIOS has the old 28-bit addressing limit.

i will clone the HD now

Be careful - some cloning software will be affected by the BIOS limitations in that PC. Ensure that whatever cloning software you choose can recognise and clone all 160GB.

Ohh ok thank you for those details, yeah im using an old DELL to do the recovery cause the HD is PATA, all my PC are SATA, now on windows im able to see 2 partitions i used Partition Find and Mount to get the other partition.

Ill try to use ddr.

[LoboX]

Ok guys keeping you posted, i was able to make the image not a clone 160,041,885,696 bytes this is how much i see in the file on windows, now im using R-Studio to find the docs any pics any excel sheets, weird thing is in the user folder they are blank, is so weird.

I see a lot of folders but no folders with docs, or pics, and i know he had docs in this drive

Maybe im missing something of the drive is not full on size yet.

[LoboX]

Oh OK hmm i have an empty space, all the data must be there, funny thing is when i use find and mount i get like 70g more on another partition but still i don't have the complete data. this is getting cooler and weird every time.

Attachments

Empty Space

[LoboX]

ok i am reading some stuff and using a couple of soft to see what i can find, i will keep posted.

[LoboX]

Oh i think i found something, still searching...

[LoboX]

Ok one thing why the weird name on those folders?

Attachments

Weird Folder

[lcoughey]

From what I see, whoever installed the drive into the client's system cut it down to 32GB, likely because the system was old and wouldn't access anything larger. The drive was partitioned and formatted that size and anything beyond the 32GB mark is likely data from a previous owner.

I don't see any reason to believe that the drive suddenly did this on its own, coincidentally re-sizing the partition to size to match.

Are you sure that you don't have everything from in the 32GB NTFS partition?