Lost half of my Hard Disk

[adhawan]

Hi

My name is Aakash, I have installed windows 7 again on my laptop due to some physical tables problem... but When I installed windows back again I lost half of my Hard disk, I am suppose to have 1 tb of hard disk space on the laptop, but I am only showing 465GB on my C:, I use to have a D: but its not there any more.

Can you please help me.

Thank you

 

[Golden]

Hi,

Please post a screen capture image of your maximised Disk Management screen.

Regards,
Golden

 

[adhawan]

Hey I am not sure what you mean by "maximised Disk Management screen"

I don't have know a lot of stuff about windows... But I managed to make a disk explorer from my tuneup utilities. If that helps....

Thank you
Aakash Dhawan

 

[Golden]

Hi,

Thats fine, thanks. It appears you have a huge backup of Windows in there -- see the folder called WindowsImageBackup

I suspect that when you did a fresh install, you never formatted the HDD. Is that correct?

To see your Disk Management screen, click the Start Orb, then in the search box, type disk managment, then select the option to format and/or create disk partitions.

Regards,
Golden

 

[adhawan]

Yes

I did not format was trying to keep all my old files, so I can use them again but lost them anyways... As I cant open them... I have copied the disk Management screen shot with this post.

 

[Golden]

Hi,

Are you 100% sure its a 1TB HDD? There doesn't seem to be any unallocated space on that disk, so I cannnot see where the other 500GB might be.

Also, can you search to see if there is a folder called Windows.old on your C:?

Regards,
Golden

 

[adhawan]

Yes, 100% sure I had 1TB its says on my Laptops sticker as well.

Yes I also have that folder called windows.old but its empty.

 

[seavixen32]

It may be that you have a 1TB drive set up as a RAID mirrored drive.

If that is the case you would have had a 500GB system drive mirrored by another 500GB drive for data backup and you'll need to install the RAID drivers.

Check Asus Support to see what your setup is: Acer Support: Downloads & Support Documents - Notebook / Aspire / Aspire 7745G

 

[adhawan]

Umm

I went to the site you linked and didn't find any RAID drivers for my laptop. Is there a different name for them...


Thanks..

 

[seavixen32]

No, there won't be a separate name so it seems that RAID is not the answer.

Are you absolutely certain your hard drive was originally 1 TB? It's just that I've never come across a laptop with a drive that big.

 

[adhawan]

Ok... Yeh I was originally storing my backup files in that partitioned hard drive, until I did the new windows. I have the sticker on my laptop stating it consists of 1000GB. HDD..

So yeh I am pretty sure..

Thanks anyways

 

[seavixen32]

I've done a bit of digging around and it seems your computer does in fact have two 500GB hard drives, which explains why the sticker tells you that storage space is 1TB.

Quote:
User Reviews (93)

This 2nd hard drive thing is STUPID!

By Dwgibson2000 (newegg.com)Read the full review
Can't understand why they would put slow memory and slow hard drive in a system with a fast processor. Acer support is the worst, makes Dell look great, may return it just for that reason because would hate to have a real problem and have to deal with...
Fast Processor, decent video card,HDMI port, full keyboard. I like the trackpad although had to speed it up all the way for it to act nice
Slow primary hard drive and NO Acer support on second hard drive bay! 2nd bay is why I gave up having an eSATA port. Called them with the numbers from previous post and they won't even talk to you about the parts. Manual is worthless! If I can't get...
End of quote.

Obviously, you need drivers for the second hard drive that has your data on it.

Go back to the link I gave you for Acer Support, and then download and install the SATA AHCI driver.

When you've done that, you might also want to check in device manager and see what drives are listed there and also check what shows up in Computer and Windows Explorer.

 

[adhawan]

I Tried

Yeh I tried installing the driver you mentioned but my computer said I already have a updated version of that driver. Plus I checked my device manager and found one disk drives I have added a picture of my device manager.


Thanks you

Aakash Dhawan

 

[Golden]

Hi,

That shows that your system only sees one physical hard disk. Assuming that the other one is still connected, then there seems to be a fault with either the disk and/or motherboard connection to the disk.

Lets confirm that : if you boot into your BIOS, how many hard disks are shown there?

Regards,
golden

 

[adhawan]

I am not sure But I think the Hard disk in Bios is knows as IDE, so there are 2 IDE 0 and IDE 1 and I found IDE 0 with no information after it and IDE 1 with some random number after it.

Hope this helps thanks..

AAkash Dhawan

 

[Dave76]

Re-seat IDE 0, open the back of your laptop and remove the IDE 0 hard drive, check for bent pins or dust, then re-install.
Check in BIOS if the HDD is showing.

 

[gregrocker]

How to access, reinstall HDD on your model:

 

[adhawan]

I tried looking physically

I was not able to find any connection problems with the hard-drive it seemed both were connected fine.. Not sure what is wrong.

Please help

Thanks

 

[gregrocker]

Is the HD registering correctly in BIOS now? If not then I'd replace it if you need the extra internal storage.

You can try booting the HD maker's HD Diagnostic extended CD scan to see if it sees the HD and can repair it enough to run Disk Check .

Sometimes free Partition Wizard when installed to Win7 can see another HD or external not seen in Disk mgmt, then if you run it's System File Checker it can even bring it back to life. But this is a long shot only for us diehards.

 

[MagusMagnus]

Expanding on what Golden already said, since your system accommodates and has two drives the quickest way to determine if this is in fact a drive failure (most likely as you say there is absolutely nothing listed in BIOS next to IDE 0) OR motherboard problem, would be for you to take the IDE 1 (working secondary) drive and put it in the IDE 0 (unrecognized primary) slot and check BIOS again to see if that drive is recognized from that slot. If it isn't, it's the motherboard, and if it is then the IDE 0 (unrecognized primary) drive has failed and needs to be replaced. Put the IDE 1 (working secondary) back in the other slot and go from there.

And be sure to discharge any ESD by touching bare metal or wearing an ESD bracelet before handling the drives, and only handle them by their sides.

Also, if its still under warranty contact Acer for replacement and restore of the operating system, whether its the drive or the motherboard unless you want to handle the drive yourself, go for it but you will need Acer to repair it if it is the motherboard.