Resize Partition Failure (Part 2) - PW Partition Recovery found issues

RogerR said:

LaurieD227 said:

I'm looking for recommendations for how to proceed, since I have never used Partition Recovery or Rebuild MBR. (So far I have done nothing except run CHKDSK and do the Quick Scan.) I'm not sure how to interpret the scan results I'm seeing.

For instance,

-Since the drive sizes for "Existing" versus "Lost/Deleted" show as the same but the LBAs don't match in all cases, is it possible that the issue is a problem with the MBR rather than the partitions themselves?

-If it is, should I try to rebuild the MBR?

FWIW I've used the Rebuild MBR function in PW on numerous occasions. It has restored functionality several times, and when it did not, it did not do any other harm. In other words, there is no downside to giving it a try.

Thanks!

I am so glad to hear from someone who has actually done it - especially when it worked for them. It makes me feel like I'm operating with a little bit of a safety net

You're right, there's no downside in trying it - especially since I have already decided I am willing to reformat and start over.

I will probably do the Rebuild MBR step as a first step regardless, even if I then go on to reformat and start from scratch, because what a great way to learn and get more practice :)

AddRAM said:

Excellent advice :)

+1

I ran Partition Wizard's "Rebuild MBR" function, in case my problem was a corrupt MBR rather than a problem with the partitions themselves. PW indicated that the operation was successful. I then re-ran PW's "Quick Scan." The results were a little bit different the second time - one of the partitions no longer shows a "lost/deleted" listing as well as an "existing" listing - so I have attached a combined "before and after" screen shot. to illustrate the change. Two of the other partitions still show up as both Existing and Lost/Deleted.

I noted something else odd.

For any data that I want to save, I saved the files elsewhere (on a completely different drive) and deleted all files and folders in each partition. At least that's what I tried to do.

However, apparently it didn't quite work that way. The partition I had been trying to resize when this issue began now shows that there is about 24GB still in use, even though when I set the option to "show hidden files and folders" and look at the partition in Windows Explorer there are no files or folders showing. (And, yes, I remembered to empty the recycle bin.) So I have no clue what this 24GB of data represents.

Does anyone else have any idea what this 24GB represents? It's way too big for an MBR or a Partition Table as far as I know.

Right now, what I'm planning to do next is to delete my partitions using PW and then do a Diskpart Clean to make sure all old data and any code has been removed. Then I'll initialize the drive as an MBR drive and create the partition(s) that I decide I need.

The next step was to initialize the disk. I went ahead and just did it in Disk Management.

That seemed to work just fine also, so all I have to do now is establish my partition(s) and move my data back to this drive for backup/safekeeping