Internal Hard Drive Troubles (Not Reading)

Yeah, it looks as though your first attempt with PW was incorrect.

The Boot partitions are just remnants of some previous schema.

You mentioned that the drive was originally split 50/50
931.51 /2 = 465.755

The full scan of PW shows PS3 as 628.65.
The Preview shows all 931.51 as unallocated (you haven't selected any partitions to recover yet).

Double click PS3 to explore it - see if the files match your recollection of what the partition contained.

I'll defer to jumanji on whether or not to recover the PS3 part.

There are other tools that might recover the images from the first partition - don't give up hope yet.

jumanji is probably asleep now. leave the PW window open, (minimize it) until he has a chance to review it.

You can do other things on your machine as long as they don't access the 2nd drive (that shouldn't be a problem, eh)

Anticipating jumanji's next move, please download, but do not run, testdisk & photorec:
PhotoRec - CGSecurity

That way if jumanji does want you to run either , you have them ready :)

Don't take any other action on that drive, just look for now and wait.

Post if you think the data on PS3 is intact.

Bill
.

Drat, lost a post when dropped.

I'll defer to jumanji - he's probably sleeping at this hour of the morning

You stated the drive was originally 50 / 50
PS3 reports as 628.65 which is more than half (931.51 /2 = 465.755), so I'm not sure if PW is wrong, if your 1st attempt to recover the partitions grabbed too much, or if your recollection is off a little.

Double click the PS3 partition and see if the contents look correct.

Just look and report if PS3 seems correct.

You can minimize the PW window so you don't have to run another scan when jumanji returns. You can do other things on your machine as long as you don't access that drive. The more fiddling, the less data can be recovered, if it can be recovered.
There's a good chance that it can be, but there's always a chance that it cannot be recovered. Don't give up hope just yet :)

Anticipating jumanji's next suggestion, please download Testdisk & Photorec
TestDisk Download - CGSecurity

Download only, do not run.
Take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with Photorec, you don't have to become an expert, but it helps if you understand the concepts and basic commands:
PhotoRec - CGSecurity

jumanji will guide you, if in fact that's the path he decides is best.

I'll check back to see if you have any questions that I can answer, but jumanji is the lead on this - he's knows this stuff.

Bill
.

hmmm, my 'lost' post was found - sorry for the double posting - they should say about the same thing - but I'll leave both.

From post 1:
(I am mainly after the pictures of my kids on there, the rest I have on other pen drives and is worthless.
.....
I just want to know have the pictures been lost forever, if so, I will just have to take a deep breath and smash the drive to bits
I would even be willing to pay someone to get the pictures off there, if they are able...

SevenForum never charges - we all volunteer our time.

jumanji: I thought perhaps you had too many cups of coffee before retiring.
Water utility: I had a similar issue a few years ago with our power company - they charged me my neighbor's usage! Then said they can't adjust my bill because it would affect their bill. Months later after many phone calls .... my bills were adjusted down on a small credit each month. They wouldn't give it all back at once, but in about 6 months time, I was even. All told about 1 year!

Bill
.

Sorry my friend, I might read up on bootice, but I'm not comfortable using it the first time on another person's machine.

Shaun will have to wait until you are refreshed - sleep well. Call it a night and pick up on this tomorrow - your time.

Bill
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Shaun: jumanji needs to sleep - it's early morning his time.

but.... please post a screne shot for him to look at next time thorugh your thread.

jumanji said:

Yep, just select the PS3 partition, Double click on it and see whether you can see all your files.Post a screenshot with PS3 partition selected.
After you post the screenshot, you may cancel and quit PW.

welsh said:

I can run PW again... Do I just need to select the PS3 drive and that is it?

yes please run a full scan again, then follow jumanji's instruction in the quote above.

make sure you grab the screen shot before closing PW

Shaun,

Download but do not run bootice
Download BOOTICE 32-Bit - MajorGeeks

there's a description on Major Geeks that you can read.

jumanji said:

may decide to write the partition only after taking a backup copy of the first sector using bootice. That tomorrow after I wake up. I don't know whether Slarty can guide you on doing that. I am already drowsy and can wait only till you post the screenshot.