Bootmgr is missing - is hard drive toast?

[Paulgo253]

Got the message 'Bootmgr is missing' this morning. Been looking at potential solutions rfom the gurus on the forum, but neither the bios nor the recovery disc seems to be able to recongise the existance of the C: drive - as such I can't use any of the options that I've read on here in the tutorials.

Initially the drive did show up in the usual sata bios checks - but now nothing. It like ti's unplugged! tried swapping sata and power cables to no avail. Even the dos prompt can't find c:

Is there something else I can try or is my drive toast? :huh:

thanks

Paul

 

[Pauly]

It doesn't sound good if bios is not recognising your HDD. Try a bootable hard drive diagnostic program to see if it can scan for the drive or try plugging in another drive to see if it is recognised
SeaTools | Seagate

 

[Paulgo253]

Thanks - I plugged the hard drive into my media pc to see if it would recognise it as a slave - it didn't. My main concern is the loss of data on the drive.

 

[Pauly]

If the drive is toast then your only option would be professional data recovery which could be costly depending upon size of drive/amount of data stored

 

[Paulgo253]

Its a 1gb drive - I've not had this problem before - any tips on what to look for going down the data recoveryy path?

thanks Paul

 

[torchwood]

tutorial

try this tutorial
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/104341-bootmgr-missing-fix.html?ltr=B

Roy

 

[Paulgo253]

Thanks Roy - I tried that guide initially, but my C; drive is not showing up at all - even the DOS can't find it, so it must be something internal in the drive unless theres another tool that might be able to see the hard drive where this has failed?

 

[Pauly]

I have never used a recovery service so not sure how much/what to recommend will if I can find any other UK members that know more

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Just my two cents worth mate try this - there is a Linux Mint MATE version but I have always used this method I worked out for myself a long time ago

BOOTABLE UBUNTU

Make a bootable Ubuntu disk http://www.ubuntu.com/download

Set the BIOS to boot from the optical when themachine boots it will show you a screen with TRY or INSTALL >select TRY not INSTALL

When it is finished - it takes very little time youwill get a screen like in the pic .

Open the drive you want > User and dig downuntil you get to the data / settings you may be able to copy / paste thematerial you want to an external source or other installed drive doing this.

I am not sure if it will but I have recovered tonsof data etc using this method both on "dead" or just plain drivesthat you cannot get data from using Windows.

 

[Paulgo253]

Hi - thanks so much for the Ubuntu guide. I downloaded the disc from the Ubuntu Desktop option - but when I run it I get a message saying initramfs is 'unable to find a medium containing a live file system'. Have I downloaded the wrong disc or is something else up?

thanks

Paul

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Hello Paul mate that should have run with no problem at all - could have been a few tings from a bad burn to some corruption creeping in but I have never had problems with this one. I burnt mine with ImgBurn but just lately I have shown this which I found easier in my own thread http://www.sevenforums.com/software/383038-making-duplicate-iso-disk.html post#2 from Jumanji.

That site I gave you was one from a while ago and others have used it and this is the latest site https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BootFromCD have a read of this as well.

There is also this http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/287439-emergency-kit-save-your-files-dead-os.html

 

[Pauly]

Never personally used it but guessing your problem could possibly be related to no storage volume attached to the computer, Im wondering if it requires a HDD attached to the machine to use some form of pagefile or similar temp storage on the HDD
This is a pure speculation though on my part

heres the wiki summary
"initramfs, abbreviated from "initial RAM file system", is the successor of initrd ("initial ramdisk"). It is a cpio ("copy in and out") archive of the initial file system that gets loaded into memory during the Linux startup process."

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Hello Pauly mate just reading your reply gave me the idea maybe the RAM could possibly be a shade out of whack (chipset) because reading the Wikipedia article it does mention the system needing to load all the drivers before anything else can be loaded up. Mind you it does mention a Linux based system??

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initramfs

 

[Paulgo253]

Thanks again for the replies guys - I know it's not the disc as it loaded in my laptop to the 'Try' screen without issue.

I wonder if it's worth loading the bad drive as slave in my old media PC, which is also running Windows 7 and is ok, to see if it will pick up the duff drive that way.....?

 

[Pauly]

Its definitely worth a try incase the sata controller on your original machine is defective and that is why the disk is not being read, unlikely but possible.

Fingers crossed

 

[Paulgo253]

Ok - so it will boot and run the Ubuntu disc fine on my other PC when the drve that crashed is not connected , but when then drive is connected I get this message:

Do any of the error codes indicate anything to you guys as this just seems weird! :sarc:

thanks

 

[Pauly]

I would assume the faulty drive is corrupting the system somehow which to me further confirms the drive is indeed toast

 

[ICIT2LOL]

Well you could run the Ubuntu in the slave machine for that matter and hook up with an adaptor.

Plus there is nothing to stop you using the adaptor with the "faulty" machine