NTFS bad block repair needed.

[Alfie]

Aside from scandsk and chkdsk does anyone have or know of a way to repair a bad sector (LBA) on an NTFS disk?

My Norton Ghost is refusing to copy a C: drive because it cannot read LBA 316616 and the usual scandisk / chkdsk dont even see it as bad!

Any ideas anyone?

 

[wallingd]

Disk developing a fault. Buy a new HDD and copy stuff from it - it may be on the way out.

 

[traser]

Refusing to copy a file? This happens sometimes when the file is in use. Can you boot into safe mode and copy it?

What OS do you have and what are you trying to copy, is it a system file or personal?

 

[Alfie]

Disk developing a fault. Buy a new HDD and copy stuff from it - it may be on the way out.

I already have a copy of everything but I want to clone the disk so I can simply replace it. Ghost refuses to do it complaining about the bad sector and paragon also complains!

I guess what i need is a straight forward byte by byte copy routine which ignores (completely) bad blocks and sectors. Pitty its not Linux or Unix as dd will do just that!

 

[Sp!ke]

You can set a switch in ghost to ignore the errors but by doing so you'll often import problems from the old disk to the new.

 

[wallingd]

Or maybe it's time just to do a nice fresh rebuild on a new drive.

 

[w124coupe]

Usual fix for this is to schedule a chkdsk (via tools menu), making sure both the "automatically fix file system errors" and the "scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors" boxes are ticked.

Chkdsk will run after the reboot and "should" find the errors and instruct the drive to mark them bad and use alternates in their place. You may lose data IF there were file fragments in the damaged areas.

If chkdsk fails or hangs, then the next step is to use the disk manufacturer's utility instead (usually requires a bootable dos environment to run).


Alternatively, if the disk is to be scrapped or reformatted, Ghost has an option - smartsector copying - which copies only used areas of the disk and ignores empty blocks.

Personally, I have had a lot of issues using Ghost to clone the XP boot disk and use Acronis True Image instead - you can use the free trial and then uninstall it...

 

[Alfie]

You can set a switch in ghost to ignore the errors but by doing so you'll often import problems from the old disk to the new.

Tried that and it still fails!!!!!

I'll try some other cloning tools I think.

 

[Alfie]

Usual fix for this is to schedule a chkdsk (via tools menu), making sure both the "automatically fix file system errors" and the "scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors" boxes are ticked.

Chkdsk will run after the reboot and "should" find the errors and instruct the drive to mark them bad and use alternates in their place. You may lose data IF there were file fragments in the damaged areas.

If chkdsk fails or hangs, then the next step is to use the disk manufacturer's utility instead (usually requires a bootable dos environment to run).


Alternatively, if the disk is to be scrapped or reformatted, Ghost has an option - smartsector copying - which copies only used areas of the disk and ignores empty blocks.

Personally, I have had a lot of issues using Ghost to clone the XP boot disk and use Acronis True Image instead - you can use the free trial and then uninstall it...

I've tried chkdsk etc. I'll try the package you mention, thanks.

 

[Ted]

Put the disk in a linux box and dd it.
Should do a binary copy, so the o/s is irrelavent

 

[guydewdney]

hddreg.exe - google it and you should find a copy - it fixes errors on the disc level - and I have fixed non bootable discs with it..

 

[richard]

Put the disk in a linux box and dd it.
Should do a binary copy, so the o/s is irrelavent

Even easier, download ultimate boot cd (ubcd) burn it onto CD and just boot linux on the box from the CD, then use dd !! - theres lots of different linux;es on there so chances are one will work with any strange hardware you may have

Cheers

Richard

 

[scotth_uk]

There's a recovery product that I've used before called R Studio, used by some friends who recover data frequently. There's copies 'floating around' the net. Takes a long time, but seems quite good.

http://www.data-recovery-software.net/

 

[Alfie]

Thanks all, i'll try a few of these and see what happens!

 

[Pietre]

You need to have access to the drive special code. This is where you can reassign the block and the drive will automatically go to the new LBA. There is a limit to the number of addresses you can reassign. This data is held in the PList and the GList.

 

[Alfie]

All sorted.

The evaluation copy of hddreg.exe fixed it. I have now run Norton Ghost successfully and have myself a nice 300GB system disk (without errors!) as opposed to a meagre 35GB disk with errors! Thanks to all for help and advice.