Hard drive problem

Got a 550g hard drive that has bad sectors on it, and not enough room on the drive to run chkdsk.

Is there any workaround, or am I going to have to take the thing to one of those data recovery places?

Why do you think it doesn't have enough room left to run chkdsk?

I haven't run into that, but I have run into partitions getting locked by other apps on the way up (especially antivirus and antispyware programs).

I'd try msconfig.exe with the safeboot option set in boot.ini tab.

Then run from the command line chkdsk -F if it's a NTFS partition or scandisk if it's FAT32. That will map and isolate the bad sectors.

If it really is an issue with not enough drive space, just hook it up as a slave to a buddy's PC and access it that way. /tmp will be local to his PC, not your disk.

Well, it's telling me that there's not enough room to complete the repair operation on the disk. Chkdsk runs on boot, but then stops just as it attempts the fix, then gives me the message about 'not enough diskspace'.

I will try the safeboot thing......if it works, I'll name our next kid after you.

Demiurge Octavian has kind of a snappy ring to it.

LOL.

Actually, that sounds more like you'll need to connect that drive up as a slave to another system to access it, but you might as well check the first way, it'll be quick.

But all file operations require temp space, even just writing out your password for validation - when your disk becomes completely full it can definitely cause problems with accessing it.

Have you tried reversing the polarity?

Here's the thing, Demi.....it's not a primary drive, it's already a slave (although, it's a sata, not an IDE), which is why this is so vexxing.

And.....the polarity thing? You're kidding, right Volpone?

The Ultimate Boot CD has some utilities that might prove helpful. I also believe FreeDOS has a version of CHKDSK that might prove useful.

I was about to say - ultimate boot disk. I've pulled much data off of corrupt raid's with it.

Hey Peter! Sorry, didn't check back on this thread in a while? Ever get access to the disk?

The IDE/SATA thing shouldn't matter - the file system on the disk does. If you have your OS up then things should be a lot easier. The Ultimate Boot CD is a great little tool. You might want to go up to the manufacturer's website and download any disk checkers they have - either partition or surface scan.

Hope you get what you need!

Have you tried a bubble bath to wash out the naughty sectors with scrubbing bubbles?