Error message X:\ is not accessible the device is not ready

whs · 13 Feb 2016

Jumanji explained that a lot better than I could have ever done.

Layback Bear · 13 Feb 2016

Using my 3 brain cells I think I got it.

If a RAW drive has a drive letter try running Check Disk.
It may or may not solve the problem. Two out of two times so far it solved the problem.

jumanji did I understand you correctly?

If so I have a question.

I have never had a RAW drive so here is the question.

If a RAW drive does not have a drive letter can one be added and then run Check Disk?

jumanji · 13 Feb 2016

Layback Bear said:

......If a RAW drive has a drive letter try running Check Disk.
It may or may not solve the problem. Two out of two times so far it solved the problem.

jumanji did I understand you correctly?.......

Absolutely. It should work in most cases where bad sectors have just started emerging but does not exceed a handful and not a deluge of bad sectors.

Layback Bear said:

.........If so I have a question.

I have never had a RAW drive so here is the question.

If a RAW drive does not have a drive letter can one be added and then run Check Disk?

I learn a lot when people ask questions because that propels me to find an answer when I don't know one :)...

In the Alonze Poodle thread, while he reported that checkdisk was successful and he is now able to access the drive, he had also posted a screenshot of the checkdisk run. Since it was in German language I didn't look into it deeply. There was a message in it ""Unbekannter Fehler (75736e6a726e6c2e 4f6)" He asked me what that "Unknown error" is.

I had to make a google search with the correct search terms. The final finding in my own words "The one positive thing that has emerged from this thread is that if Checkdisk gives a message "An unspecified error occurred (75736e6a726e6c2e 4f6)" that is a warning bell that the drive is failing and one should ASAP back up the data."

Your question falls in the same category :). A google search and what a surprise. There was atleast one user who was advised to give a drive letter to the RAW drive and check. And the OP reported that worked. Not even a checkdisk run was required. Just assign a drive letter.

Recover NTFS Partition on RAW Drive - Hard Drives - Storage

In the very next post another user reported that it did not work for him for "Change Drive Letter and Paths" was greyed out.

Whatever with this new-found knowledge, we shall henceforth ask users reporting a RAW drive without a drive letter, to try assigning a drive letter first. It isn't much of an effort to try that.

Thank you for the question.

Amaterasu · 13 Feb 2016

jumanji said:

That was a good suggestion by ComputerGeek.

I was mulling over your problem off and on since you posted it and was thinking off a few solutions you may try. I had some intuitive feeling a drive cleanup may resolve the issue. But the scene has changed now.

In your first post the drive did appear with a drive letter E: and a drive cleanup - which removes non-existent drives , and the drive letters associated with such non-existent drives and held in Windows registry - could have helped.

But now you say that the drive appears as "RAW" which it was not before. In the circumstances, a Partition Recovery attempt may help. First try Partition Recovery Wizard in Partition Wizard instead of TestDisk. Let us see what info it yields. MiniTool Partition Wizard | Best partition magic alternative for Windows PC and Server

1. For the record, post the Windows Disk Management picture showing your drive as RAW.( Please post a untruncated full screenshot with full information. Follow the guidelines here Disk Management - Post a Screen Capture Image to hide the Console Tree, Action Pane and adjust the seperators so that all the information can be seen)

2. Next run Partition Recovery Wizard Quick Scan and see what partitions show up. Post the screenshot of Partitions found Window.. Cancel and close PW till I see it and suggest further course of action.

Note: Stop trying other data recovery programs. Wrongly used without an understanding what they do and how they do may make matters worse. It is for this reason I don't want you to straightaway go to TestDisk. We shall use it later if need be but with proper guidance.

ok sorry about the wait here the screenshots you wanted. what's weird is that is back to the way this problem started when i plugged it in today. the PW didn't work as you will see in the screenshot below

jumanji · 14 Feb 2016

Your HDD is definitely not RAW. The Windows Disk Management picture is the same as you posted in the first post with only the additional information that it has 12.88GB free space which is visible now after you hid the Console Tree and Action Pane.

1. Just right click on it and "Explore". Can you see all your files inside that single folder??

Partition Wizard shows the same drive as Bad Disk - a little disturbing. Quick Scan shows a Lost/Deleted partition starting at LBA 0. That can't be true. The starting LBA should be either 63 or 2048 ( depending upon which utility formatted it).

2. Again run Quick Scan. On the Partition Found just double click on it and check whether you can see all your files in the resulting Partition Explorer Window. After the Quick Scan, Cancel and quit PW

$Error message X:\ is not accessible the device is not ready-08-02-2016-12-02-32.jpg$

3.Launch PW again and now run a Full Scan, which may take sometime to complete. When complete, post a screenshot of Partitions found.( Just select only that Window and take a screenshot. I don't need the PW screen in the background.) Again Cancel and quit PW.

Once you have posted all the above info,

4. Run CHKDSK E: /f /v /r /x Replace E: with the actual drive letter of the drive. Once started, do not interrupt/abort it for any reason for upto 24 hours. During this period do not use your PC for any other purpose. Leave checkdisk alone to run. When it completes/or aborts itself for any reason post a screenshot like the one Alonzo Poodle posted here No access to 2nd partition after hibernation: column filesystem: RAW from which we can see any error message. I want to see any error message as it appears in that screen.