External HDD/DSKCHK problem/question.

Hi and thanks in advance for the help.

tl;dr= Can I abort step 5 of CHKDSK /r ?

We have a fairly new (Day 27) WD My Passport USB drive that my wife was using with her laptop, which is Win 10, and it started clicking. Knowing that is a sign of impending drive failure, I hooked it up to my Win 7 laptop to image it with Macrium Reflect so as not to lose the data, and to return the drive. She had to force shutdown because her laptop froze completely.

The drive is 4TB but only has 256ish GB of data on it.

When I started the backup in Macrium I got a message in red I needed to run CHKDSK I: /F before it could do it's thing. Ok no problem Ive run into that before. It took a while to run the first 4 stages, and when I came back to it this morning, having left it running all night, it was on Stage 5, checking free space. I scrolled back thru CMD and saw it had found some errors and repaired them, and recovered some files. Two hours go by and it's gone from 16% to 19% on checking free space. I get it, 4TB is a lot of free space. Except that MY laptop froze. It seemed like Windows Explorer crashed as everything on the screen disappeared, including toolbar, start menu etc, all that was there was my background screen. I let it sit a while, in case it was a temporary hang and would resolve itself. After about 30 min with no sign of activity, no HDD lights blinking etc, I forced shutdown and restarted. Then I initiated CHKDSK /r again for that drive. It went through the first 4 with no errors, and got to step 5 again, checking free space.

As you can see ti the attached screenshot, Disk Management says the drive (I) is healthy.

So here's my real question. Can I abort CHKDSK in step 5 safely and image he drive, or do I need to wait another 24 hours for it to check free space. The intent is to return the drive during the 30 day window.

Thanks again for the help!
Michael

@miztrniceguy

1. If you still hear the clicking noise, posthaste initiate a return request.

2. Have you to return it to a store or Will it be picked up by the vendor on a date convenient to you?

3. If you have decided to return it, you may immediately abort check disk, if it hasn't aborted by itself by now - as I read 10 hours.

4. Download,install and run GetDataBack Pro free download and check whether it shows any data on in the disk. ( Read the documentation on their webpage on how to use it.) It is a "Try before you buy" software. You can even preview and check the integrity of the files. If it successfully shows your data on it, then we can try freeware TestDisk before you return the external disk. ( We are using Getdataback only to check whether data recovery is possible}

Data Recovery Software — Downloads

1. Connected to MY laptop, no clicking. Connected to my wife's Win 10 laptop= clicking about every 30 seconds.
2. Intent is to return to Walmart for refund.
3. Aborted CHKDSK upon reading your post. It was at 21% after all night.
4. Ran GBD as suggested. While there are a number of files in red as you can see in attached ss, the only folder of concern is not, and is listed as Lizzie ARCHIVE.

I should be okay to rerun Macrium to image the drive now, right?

Thanks again!

miztrniceguy said:

....I should be okay to rerun Macrium to image the drive now, right?

You may want to turn on 'Ignore bad sectors when creating images' in the Adavanced Backup Settings.

Dangit, even marked "Ignore bad sectors" and still get the message MFT corrupt, run CHKDSF /R

Bree said:

You may want to turn on 'Ignore bad sectors when creating images' in the Adavanced Backup Settings.

miztrniceguy said:

Dangit, even marked "Ignore bad sectors" and still get the message MFT corrupt, run CHKDSF /R

Try turning this one off.....

Thank you, that worked and image is in process!

Let the Macrium Image complete. Good advice from Bree.

I saw your post with the GetDataBack screenshot. Just I was about to respond, I had some visitor, my daughter with her birthday cake. So had been away. The GetDataBack screenshot - shows that the Master File Table is corrupt. Checkdisk could have deleted many files with corrupt MFT entries. All that is in RED are system files/MFT entries.

On the left Pane in GetDataback I could still see Lizzie ARCHIVE which is intact. Why didn't you click on the + to open it and check the files in it in the right pane? That is the only intact folder. You can open the lost and found folder also and check the files in it.

TestDisk unfortunately will not repair corrupt MFT - check disk has already deleted many and marked some as Lost and found,. I am not sure whether you will be able to get the files in that folders from the Macrium Image. I will leave it to Bree

Thanks for responding, Jumanji.
I actually figured out after my post that the system files were red. I then was looking at the expanded ARCHIVE folder. A lot of the files are greyed out. Does that mean they aren't recoverable? Image should be done in about a half hour.