Drive became Unallocated and not having much luck recoverying

Note: I have edited my last para in my last post. Restore the original Sector 0 where the partition Table was all zeros and then AOMEI Partition assistant as suggested by SIW2. Over to SIW2.

jumanji said:

I have no objection if you want to try AOMEI Partition Assistnt and Partition Recovery with it.But save your current sector 0 so that we can get back to it.

That can wait - it's a very long shot which is 60% through and it's not finding anything nor do I think it will. I am going to stop it in a bit and restore the partition to how it was to continue this line.

jumanji said:

If both the Primary NTFS sector and backup sector are good you should have only gone for MFT Repair in TestDisk. I don't know how you slipped and tried to rebuild an already good BS.

Yes it was my fault for not reading what it does but I didn't know which option to choose at the time. However, I do believe it hadn't done anything since it was displaying "searching for MFT....". I would imagine that when it does do something it this message would change to something more informative. I exited quite early in that process.

jumanji said:

Now read this thread External hard drive visible in Partition Magic but not explorer Just read it and keep it in your mind. The OP's situation is exactly what it is like in your case now. Just look at his first post and the Windows Disk Management shot and Partition Wizard shot. He also explored the partition after a Quick scan and could see all his files.Finally at post#16 he was advised to run check disk and he regained his drive.But don't rush to this now. You have already attempted Rebuild BS and I don't know how it would have affected the then existing right NTFS boot sector. We may have go through many extra steps to confirm both the Primary and Backup boot sectors are OK and the primary boot sector has not been mauled by the Rebuild BS action.

Except that his situation was to go to RAW immediately instead of like mine - unallocated. He can also see his files whereas I cannot - nothing so far has been able to show me a file listing.
Also I have tried chkdsk J: /r and it refuses to run with the following message:

"The type of the file system is NTFS.
Unable to determine volume version and state. CHKDSK aborted."

jumanji said:

Now you could go ahead with SIW's suggestion after backing up the current Sector 0 which I feel has the right partition table. I shall take a back seat and relax for a while.:)

Let's continue with your ideas I think it's better. So do I run Testdisk now and try RepairMFT?
My sector 0 information is back in place so my drive letter and RAW state is back to how it was after Testdisk write

Well it looks like Repair MFT isn't an option. See the last shot - when I choose this it simply tells me that they match perfectly.

Just for completness - partition Wizard cannot see any files:

You are not allowing me to relax. I will be the happiest person if somebody takes over. .

From your TestDisk pictures - and you are smart right - I would have asked you to do this to confirm everything is OK. And it does look everything is OK.

Check once again that the partition table is present in sector 0 with bootice - just confirming that you have restored properly and saved it to disk.( will be happy if you post the screenshot.)

And in PW, you straight away said explore . Nay, run Partition Recovery Wizard, Quick Scan now. Does it find the existing Partition?. Post a screenshot of Partition Found window. I would like to see all the information in it like start sector,etc, etc., Double click on the found partition and check whether it shows all your files. Post a screenshot. Then cancel/close PW.

Just for info:
(If the partition is found and it says existing and the Preview disk map at the bottom turns from Unallocated to showing the drive as it is when you open PW (the first screen) then even if you select that partition by placing a tick mark in the square and Finish you will not be able to "Apply" it ( APPLY will be greyed) since the partition table exists and it will not rewrite it.)

jumanji said:

You are not allowing me to relax. I will be the happiest person if somebody takes over. .

Seriously, I've taken so much of your time already so if you would like to relax and stop all this I'm perfectly ok with it. I thank you for your efforts anyway, you are a star and have been an immense help!

jumanji said:

Check once again that the partition table is present in sector 0 with bootice - just confirming that you have restored properly and saved it to disk.( will be happy if you post the screenshot.)

I had done that and it looks ok.

jumanji said:

And in PW, you straight away said explore . Nay, run Partition Recovery Wizard, Quick Scan now. Does it find the existing Partition?. Post a screenshot of Partition Found window. I would like to see all the information in it like start sector,etc, etc., Double click on the found partition and check whether it shows all your files. Post a screenshot. Then cancel/close PW.

The scan has begun.

Please let me know if you need to stop. I am close myself to needing to relax and perhaps give up on this

No need to stop. Wait for it to complete.

I was just joking. But sure I want to hit the sack now. So I shall wait for another 50minutes (till midnight here)

Just post the screenshots asked for. I shall see it tom morning and we shall continue tom.

Louiscar said:

....I've been busy saving all my important sectors for all my other hard drives ... Something to do for peace of mind I suppose ...:)

That's a good job. Shall be back tom.