One Out Of Three Ain't Good!!

[Wonky]

My PC runs 3 different drives and operating systems. (Don't ask why - it's just my thing.)

1. Win 10 on 1TB SSD
2. Win 10 on 1TB HD (basically a fallback for 1 in case of problems, but not linked in any way to 1 by backup etc)
3. My old Win 8.1 on 2TB HD.

Each drive is partitioned into a Windows drive and also a separate data drive.

For a while now when I occasionally did boot to 2 (Win 10 on HD) to keep Norton and Win10 up to date it was taking so long to load that I got frustrated and bought another SSD from America (960Gb). I then used Acronis True Image supplied with the SSD to copy the 1TB HD to 960Gb SSD. (Both Win and data partitions.) Booting to the cloned Win 10 on the 960Gb SSD failed with (from memory) some sort of efiloader??? error.

Here I believe is where I stuffed up because at that point even though the screen gave other options none of them except F9 (Choose another operating system) worked so I booted back to my primary OS (Win 10 on 1TB SSD) with the Win 10 CD in the drive. Unfortunately, I now realise that when installing Windows you get the option of choosing what drive to install on but not when doing a Windows repair. Doh!! Instead of repairing the cloned Win 10 on the 960Gb SSD it actually tried to repair my previously good, main Win 10 on the 1Tb drive.

Problem is for some reason something went wrong and it wouldn't boot to that either any more! So now I’ve booted to Win 8.1 as it’s the only one of my 3 that now works and using Easeus Partition Manager can see my main Win 10 on 1TB I don’t seem to be able to do anything with as it’s lost it’s assigned drive letter and instead has just an *

Using the Explore option in Partition Manager I can see all the files are there but cannot access them to copy individually and can’t even copy the partition, I assume because it no longer has an assigned drive letter.

I’m happy using DISKPART and other DOS level commands but don’t know how to proceed to resurrect my main Win 10 partition.

[Micks]

Hey Gaz have you tried,

SFC stands for System File Checker. SFC is a DOS command that is mostly used in conjunction with the SCANNOW switch separated by a / sign. SFC /SCANNOW is used to detect and automatically fix the corrupt or missing files in Windows 10.

[Wonky]

Doesn't that only check the system you've booted from? I can't boot to anything but Win 8.1.

[Micks]

If you access W8.1 are you still able to access all your saved data/files? If so back those up & perform a fresh install of W10 not a repair.

[Wonky]

No, that's the problem. If I use Partition Magic and Explore I can see all files are there but can't access them. I set up a new partition as you might see above on my 2TB drive (Win 10 1TB SSD BU) ready to copy that partition too but looks like whilever it has an * and not a drive letter I can do nothing with it.

There must be a way to fix that and maybe it's in the new version of Partition Manager Pro (12.5) which I have on the 2 SSD drives but unfortunately my paid for key is in my email folders which I can't access.

I seem to be in a catch-22 situation.

[Wonky]

Playing around further I find if I hide then unhide that partition using Partition Manager (PM) it assigns it a letter but as soon as PM refreshes it disappears. However, it then appears in Windows Explorer but says not accessible if you double click on it and still shows in Disk Management as basically a "nothing partition".

Results from program called DMDE. I don't like the fact Win 1TB SSD sector seems to appear twice, with the same start point but different end points???

[Micks]

Gazza how did you end up with OS problem?

[Wonky]

Still battling. Can see the files all there but can't access them. Tried Windows repair (which I believe originally caused the problem) and EasyRE (Repair/Recover) with no success. Going away a few days so will do more research.

Not overly worried given I can see the files.

[Micks]

Ok, I know it's convenient to have your drives partitions all on the one box..But I prefer to have all important stuff on a separate powered Hdd box/enclosure as there is less chance of loss or infection.
With my business being a smaller concern I run that also off a separate SSD in it's own enclosure & back that up at least once a week to another.

[Wonky]

Dat'll learn me to back up my important data files more than once a year.

[macca_779]

Stick important stuff in the cloud is what I’ve done for a while now.

[Wonky]

Success (of sorts). The crucial thing is I was able to get my data from it using a program called MiniTool Partition Wizard which let me hide and unhide that partition, as Partition Master 10.8 would temporarily, but unlike that program MiniTool Partition Wizard actually retained the new drive letter after it refreshed. That then allowed me to clone the partition.

Even though the original drive, even after being assigned a drive letter, was deemed inaccessible by everything I tried within Windows, the cloned partition is fine!

I then wondered about allocating my original C: partition as free space and then cloning its copy back onto it, but then figured now I've recovered (and backed up ) all the stuff in My Documents it's probably about time to do a full Win 10 reinstall on that drive anyway to clean things up. Still have the copy on another partition just in case.

[Micks]

Gaz I can see why you like to partition, but regular back ups are vital Have seen so many scenarios like yours when something fails can be a night mare.

[Wonky]

Yeah, I was just a slack bunt!