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ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2014 5:42 pm
by stebo
Hello, just joined this forum and hope someone can help me. I just air dusted my emachines t3656 computer, hooked it back up, and got this, "error loading operating system".

Using the ubcd's hdd diagnostics the results were that "one or more corrupted sectors found".

The options are, 1 Erase Disk; The entire disk will be rewritten. And
2 Sector Repair; Corrupted sectors are rewritten.

Tried HELP file on Test Results page. Same info.

Which is the best option to save my data and be able to boot windows again ?

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 20, 2014 9:11 am
by The Piney
First thing I would suggest is to check all your connections, inside and out. Especially the drive connectors. During cleaning, if you were moving any wires around it is pretty easy to slightly dislodge the cables.

After that if no improvement, I would probably boot to a live CD (PartedMagic included w/ UBCD) or such and try to copy any important files to a flash drive or secondary hard drive or partition.

Then I would run "chkdsk c: /f" from a command prompt.

If none of that helps, I would then run the manufacturer's diagnostic/repair such as Western Digitals DLG.

Good luck.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 20, 2014 6:42 pm
by stebo
Hello again and thank you Piney for those suggestions.

Tried checking all connections inside and out, especially the SATA connection between the hard drive and the motherboard. Hooked everything back up. Same result.

I cannot get to the black screen that has the command prompt. I pressed every key on the keyboard but the flashing command prompt that follows "error loading operating system" dose nothing.

I tried booting into safe mode by pressing F8 or F12 after restarting using ctrl+alt+del. Got nothing but the same message.

Went to manufacturers website. Found hdd diagnostic download that works only if you can boot into the operating system.

Will have to get an external hdd to copy files using ubcd.

Do you have any suggestions about what the UBCD found in my previous post.

Or any other suggestions would be helpful.
Thank you
Stephen E Hill

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 20, 2014 8:57 pm
by The Piney
What hard drive do you have and what program did you use?

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Mon Apr 21, 2014 7:39 pm
by stebo
It's an Hitachi Model HDS72616PLA380, S/N ZH06TL8N, 160GB SATA.

I downloaded WinDFT093, where DFT stands for Drive Fitness Test from HGST.com.
Which I got from Googleing Hitachi HDD Diagnostic.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2014 6:46 pm
by The Piney
DFT (Drive Fitness Test) 4.16 is included in the latest UBCD but not sure which version is on the UBCD ISO you downloaded (UBCD4?) but it should be there AFAIK. I would run DFT and try that before using anything else.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2014 2:50 am
by stebo
DFT is on the UBCD 4.11, after googleing UBCD 4.11, which is the version I have, I found that the DFT on this version is 4.09.

Be advised that is what I ran to get the results in my first post.

Are suggesting that I download,burn and run the latest UBCD version and DFT ?

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2014 11:43 am
by The Piney
stebo wrote:DFT is on the UBCD 4.11, after googleing UBCD 4.11, which is the version I have, I found that the DFT on this version is 4.09.

Be advised that is what I ran to get the results in my first post.

Are suggesting that I download,burn and run the latest UBCD version and DFT ?
I do usually run the latest that I have but have used older versions as well. I've had times when a newer version wouldn't see the drives, especially when connected via USB so I go with what works. If a newer version has bug fixes it only makes sense to use it over a previous version.

If you do download the newest UBCD - 5.2.9, I would boot to PMagic first to see if I could get anything off before doing anything else that could further corrupt data. If nothing important is on the drive, I'd skip that and just re-partition, re-format and re-install/restore OS.

Also - corrupted sectors don't always mean bad sectors but wouldn't hurt running a full scan of surface before re-installing/restoring OS.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2014 3:34 pm
by stebo
Thank you for your patience PINEY. I going to try using UBCD 5.2.9 since I don't see a version of PMagic on my version of UBCD. Try and save any important data I can find off the drive and repartition, reformat, and reinstall Vista.

There's just one problem. Can I repartition and reformat the drive using UBCD alone?

And all I have to try to reinstall/restore the operating system is a recovery dvd that the system prompted me to create when I first turned on the computer.

I do not have an operating system cd/dvd.

Just so you know I already tried the recovery dvd to restore the operating system from it's current state with no luck.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2014 8:57 am
by The Piney
You can use GParted which is included in PMagic to re-partition the drive. There are several formatting utilities in UBCD but I usually use the OS I'm installing to do that.

The recovery DVD will format and possibly partition the drive. If your system had a recovery partition it should re-create that partition and restore the system partition/drive to factory settings. If your having problems with the recovery DVD you may have to get another from the manufacturer or replace with a retail version. You can often find ISOs of recovery DVDs available on the net, some legal downloads and other not so much.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2014 9:41 am
by stebo
I tried running PMagic. At the "Copying files to RAM" part of the PMagic setup I got this,"Cp read error: Input/output error.

Mounting PMagic_2013_08_01.SQFS...mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/loop1, missing codepage or helper program, or other error.

Mounting //sqfs_disk/PMAGIC_2013_08_01.SQFS failed.

So I never got to the PMagic desktop screen.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2014 12:37 pm
by The Piney
Did you check the MD5 of the ISO you downloaded?

Are you booting from a CD or USB?

You can try another Live CD/DVD or USB to copy over files.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2014 5:49 pm
by stebo
You are helping me sooooooo much. I am using a CD-RW for the UBCD ISO Image. So using ImgBurn I fully erased the cd and burned it again, this time also using ImgBurn's Verify feature.

Put the CD-RW Disc in the computer and got to PMagic's desktop screen.

I can see the files in the Recovery Partition. But the files on the Windows Partition, I get this error message"udevil: error 64: unable to determine device fstype-specify with-t".

I guess that means I can't recover any of music, videos, or documents.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2014 10:30 pm
by The Piney
You can try to recover the partition, testdisk is included in PMagic... If your able to recover the partition you should be good, but I would still copy everything over to another drive and reload/restore.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Mon Apr 28, 2014 12:41 pm
by stebo
Found TestDisk. The result was, the partition can not be recovered.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Tue Apr 29, 2014 12:22 am
by The Piney
Chances are the files are lost, drive is possibly dead.

See if you can access the recovery partition when booting, I found forum posts showing F8 and F11. The timing can be a bit of a pain with some systems and when to hit the button. I usually keep hitting the key every couple seconds, mainly as the cursor starts flashing in the upper left corner on some.

If you can't get that to work I would just replace the drive and try the restore CD/DVD again.

Good luck.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Fri May 02, 2014 9:00 am
by stebo
Hello Piney. Guess what, using Kingwins EZ-CONNECT USB 2.0 to SATA & IDE Adapter for 2.5" & 3.5" Hard Drives, I was able to hook the supposed failed hard drive to my other desktop computer and now I have access to all the files on that drive.

Still plan to replace that drive. Is there a way to copy this entire (failed drive) to a newer drive, put the newer drive in the computer and make it work as before?

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Fri May 02, 2014 7:36 pm
by The Piney
UBCD has several "Cloning" programs, you can find them in the menu under HDD/Disk Cloning. I've used EaseUs Disk Copy and others with little to no problems. The hard drive manufacturer's boot CDs usually have something for this such as Western Digitals DLG having Acronis True Image which is excellent.

If the recovery partition from the old drive is still good, you may even be able to restore from that again after cloning the drive.

Note: If there are corrupt or worse, bad sectors on the drive the data may still be lost but hopefully you can get what you need off of the drive. It's nice to hear that you are able to access the drive that way.

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun May 11, 2014 7:46 pm
by stebo
Hey Piney, my computer is back up due to Acronis True Image. I was able to clone the Recovery Partition only, to a new hard drive of the same size as the original 160GB. I put the new drive in the computer hooked up the monitor, keyboard, started it up and it booted to the recovery partition. On the System Recovery Option screen I had two choices, 1. Choose Operating System. 2. Load Drivers.

I clicked Load Drivers since there were no Operating Systems showing.

The Add Drivers window came up next asked for Installation Media for the device.

Since I didn't have a Vista disc, I put the Recovery Disc in the DVD-+RW drive clicked ok and the window that came up next showed all the drivers on the Recovery Disc but I didn't know what drivers to click on. So I clicked back and clicked Cancel and that's what got the ball rolling because the computer took over from there loaded every thing it needed and in about an hour it was was loading the Vista Operating System as before.

Just wanted to let you know that time was well spent. Thank very much again for all help.

When I get the chance I am going to sent you a donation to help with UBCD Project.

Stephen E Hill

Re: ubcd4 - hdd diagnostic results. now what ?

Posted: Sun May 11, 2014 8:49 pm
by The Piney
Great news!!!

Thanks in advance for the donation to UBCD, every bit helps to keep this great resource available.