Often users personal computers face problems hard drive that affect the operation of the system. The main causes of hard drive failure are: bad sectors in HD D and bad file system. In this article, we will describe a detailed HDD troubleshooting process, and also describe information recovery methods hard drives if it is defective or completely out of order. I would also like to note that problems that are associated with the hard drive should be given special attention. For example, if the HDD becomes completely faulty, then you are unlikely to be able to recover information from it. That is, all your documents, personal videos and photos, and other files may be permanently lost.
If files are not copied on your computer, programs freeze after opening, then possible cause this may be bad HDD. Usually this behavior operating system connected with bad sectors in the hard drive. To be sure that the problem is related to bad sectors of the HDD, and not to malware, the first step is to confirm this hunch. If the situation described above is observed on the computer, we will install the utility on it CrystalDiskInfo. This utility describes the status of all hard drives installed on your computer. You can download CrystalDiskInfo from its official website http://crystalmark.info. The utility supports Windows operating systems from XP to Windows 10.
To check information about the hard drive, the utility uses self-diagnosis technology SMART. SMART technology is used on all manufactured HDDs. Below is an example of checking SMART readings using the CrystalDiskInfo utility in a hard drive WD1200JS. From this window, you can see that the program has detected its status as " Fine" - this means that this hard drive is in perfect order and you should not worry about it.
In the following image, in the SMART readout, CrystalDiskInfo has detected the status of the screw with the message " Anxiety". This message means that the hard drive already has bad sectors or it is overheating.
If you see the message " bad”, then this will mean that all bad sectors have been reassigned on the hard drive and soon it will completely shut down.
In both cases, when the program found the messages " Anxiety" And " bad", you should do backup all data on the computer, as soon the screw will become unusable.
One solution that can temporarily fix your screw is the utility Victoria. This utility can do REMAP BAD sectors, that is, it will reassign bad sectors to backup ones. In the next section, we will describe in detail the process of REMAP BAD sectors using the Victoria utility.
Utility Victoria created by a Belarusian programmer and distributed free of charge. You can download the utility on its official website hdd-911.com. The Victoria utility is distributed in two versions for Windows and DOS. In our case, we will download the Windows version. After running the Victoria utility on Windows, we will get into such a window.
To fix the hard drive, we need to go to the "Tests" tab. On this tab, we are interested in the area with the radio buttons Ignore , Erase , Remap and Restore , as well as the button Start . To fix it, we need to select the Remap radio button and click Start.
After these steps, the Victoria program will begin the process of correcting sectors, which can take quite a long time.
After reassigning the sectors, Victoria may be able to restore the bad sectors, and the CrystalDiskInfo utility will display the value "Good". But the magic fix may not happen, as the reserve sectors may simply be missing and Victoria will not be able to help. In this case, there is only one way out - do a complete HDD replacement. In addition to screw treatment, Victoria also provides verification of testimony SMART tab SMART».
I would like to note that all the operations that you perform with the help of Victoria, you do at your own peril and risk. Using the utility, an inexperienced user can damage the hard drive, as well as deprive it of warranty service.
Many users on Windows computers often experience problems related to file system errors NTFS. File system problems are caused by malicious utilities and various software . Also, most often problems in the file system occur out of inexperience the PC user. For example, improper handling of the utility Acronis Disk Manager. To solve this problem, Windows itself will help us. Windows provides file system fixer. To fix the file system on a specific partition, you need to go to its properties. In our case, this is the system partition of the operating room. Windows systems 10. To start the fix, we need to go to the tab " Service».
This tab has a Check button which we will click.
After this action, a window will appear in which you need to confirm our actions.
After confirming the action, Windows will scan this partition.
After scanning, the system will display a message with the results of scanning the partition for errors.
Using this method, many users have restored their operating system to normal without having to reinstall it. If the problems lie in the HDD itself, then no disk check and reinstallation of the OS will help in this case. The only option in this case is that you can resort to the Victoria utility or do a complete replacement of the screw with a new one, while reinstalling Windows.
The software is the perfect tool to create a full backup all local partitions, including the system. This opportunity is used by many administrators around the world. The created backup of local disks can be restored in a very a short time. For example, if the system has been infected with a virus or the HDD is broken, in this case you will restore all OS disks in a short period of time. You can find Acronis True Image 2016 on its official website www.acronis.com. By running the program in question, we will get into such a window.
First of all, we will show our readers how to back up local partitions of Acronis True Image 2016. On the first tab "Backup", you can see that the entire computer is selected for backup. That is, a full backup of all local partitions, including the system partition, will be carried out. In the next block, you need to select a location for the backup. In our case, this is the local disk E. After choosing the type of backup data and where to save it, click the button Create a copylocated in the lower right corner.
Depending on the amount of data to be saved, the time to create a backup will depend.
Having completed backup, we will describe the process of restoring a computer. For this we need to create boot disk or an Acronis True Image 2016 flash drive. You can do this by going to the " TOOLS/BOOT DRIVE WIZARD". Below is a wizard that should open.
In this wizard, we will select the first item and continue. In the window that appears, select where we will save the boot drive: into the image or to a flash drive.
After saving the boot drive, the wizard will display a final window.
By creating a bootable flash drive or optical disc with Acronis True Image 2016, you can start data recovery. To do this, download from bootable flash drive when starting the computer. After booting from the boot drive, we get to the Acronis True Image 2016 menu. We select the first item in this menu, after which we get to the main Acronis True Image window.
In the program window, go to the "" tab and find the backup copy of the entire system that we previously created.
Now to restore system disk with Windows and local drives, click the button Disk Recovery.
In the wizard that appears, select the item " Recover disks and partitions and continue.
In the next window, select all local drives and continue the wizard.
In paragraphs " Destination» for the first and second disks, select the original HDD. If there are many hard drives installed in the system, then be careful not to mix up the screws. In the final window, click the Proceed button.
The backup recovery time depends on the size and speed of the HDD. In our case, it took 10 minutes.
The example shows how easy it is to back up an entire computer, so if you master software package Acronis True Image 2016, then you can easily restore its performance in cases where the system is infected or the hard drive is broken. Also, after mastering the program, you will not have questions about how to recover data from a hard drive.
There are cases when reinstalling Windows or when using Acronis software, users mistakenly erase all information from the hard drive. If you have exactly this situation, then you should not be upset, since all the information can be restore. A free utility will help us with this task. Recuva. You can download the utility on its official website www.piriform.com. After starting the utility, the user enters the wizard, which will help you restore all the data. Below is the sequential work of the wizard.
The example shows that data recovery using Recuva is a fairly simple process and almost any PC user can handle it.
From this article, it can be emphasized that restoring a hard drive is not a very simple task, but depending on the situation, even an ordinary PC user can handle it. I would also like to advise laptop owners to handle it as carefully as possible. For example, if the laptop is dropped or subjected to a strong impact, it may damage the HDD. In addition, if you yourself have identified a problematic screw, then do not be afraid to open the laptop case yourself or desktop computer, since replacing the HDD is a fairly simple task. And we, in turn, hope that our material will be useful to our readers and will allow you to restore your hard drive.
Probably, sooner or later it happens to everyone - once my usb hard drive has crashed.
Somewhere in a hurry and just pulled out lace from the USB socket in the laptop (as is often the case).
I come to work, I connect the HDD, and it is empty ...
Of course, you shouldn't panic.
First of all, you need to remember the main rule: the less manipulations you perform with the storage medium, the more likely it is to recover your information. No need to copy, cut, delete anything.
There may be various symptoms disease"of your media: some folders/files disappear, copy errors, the system asks you to format your media, etc.
Each case, of course, must be approached individually, so it is important to have several different tools / programs for testing.
I always keep a folder with the main software on my laptops, home and work PCs, portable HDDs, which may come in handy someday. Well, of course, there were a couple of programs for working with hard drives and data recovery software in stock.
For example, there were: EASEUS Partition Master, Norton Partitionmagic, PartitionManager, Active File Recovery, Error Repair Professional, HDD Regenerator, HDDScan, Raxco PerfectDisk, R-Studio, Recover4all.
Before I crawled in EASEUS Partition Master And Norton Partitionmagic. The first is practically lightweight and free version second.
The programs showed the presence of media, but could not determine the type of file system.
Approximate program interface:
First of all, of course, you can simply format the media in the file system we need and it seems that we will get a working hard drive again, however, the information stored there was important to me, so I left the formatting as radical method to restore the work of my hard.
Unfortunately, there are no screenshots of testing all the programs, but in the end, after sorting through the programs and reading various forums for an hour, I downloaded another small utility from the network - testdisk.
Program interface on English language, but for a person who knows at least a little technical English, it will not be difficult to figure it out.
Using the "poke" method, I began to poke around in this program:
1) We choose whether we need to keep a log. I do not need. 
3) Select the type of partition table. In my case - Intel. 
4) Next, we already go to the menu with possible operations on our media. 
4.1 Analysis of the existing partition structure and search for lost partitions: 
4.2 Additional section - Utilities for the file system: 
4.3 Disc geometry: 
4.4 And the key section for us is " MBR code". Overwriting the boot sector.
"Master Boot Record" - Master Boot Record, the first physical sector (512 bytes in size) on a hard drive.
Where approximately poked:
I selected the required disk - Checking sectors - Rewriting MBD - Rewriting the boot sector.
At the same time, it rebooted once and that's it. The hard drive is back to original working condition with all data.
After this incident, I copied this console utility to my folders with the necessary software, and for good reason.
Soon a work colleague turned to me with a request to look at the computer - it stopped loading after a power surge.
The problem of recovering a hard drive and the information that was stored on it is one of the most urgent problems on this moment time. In view of the seriousness of the issue, it is advisable to always have a tool on hand that could troubleshoot the hard drive. It can be either a comprehensive HDD recovery program or a utility capable of diagnosing specific disk functionality.
HDD Regenerator is a program for recovering bad sectors of a hard drive and creating recovery boot disks. Its main advantages include a simple interface without unnecessary troubles, the ability to monitor the status of the HDD, as well as support for various file systems. And the disadvantages are that official version The product costs almost $90 and the fact that using this program it is impossible to recover information after formatting the hard drive. It eliminates only bad sectors, and then only at the logical level.
R-Studio is a universal program that is perfect both for recovering a hard drive after formatting and for restoring its damaged partitions. It works with a huge number of file systems and is one of the most effective programs for recovering lost data. It also has an intuitive user interface. Well, the main disadvantage, R-Studio, just like HDD Regenerator, is a paid product license.
The program compares favorably with other analogues due to the interface in the style Windows Explorer, which allows its users to easily and quickly deal with the problem. Also Starus Partition Recovery has the ability to view files before restoring them and has a built-in Hex editor, which will come in handy for experienced users. The price of such convenience is 2,399 rubles - which is also the main disadvantage of the program.
Another paid, but very convenient and effective program for recovering a hard drive after damage. It has extensive functionality and allows the user to do whatever he wants with the hard drive, from recovering damaged information to optimizing. Fast, powerful, paid.
A free program for diagnosing and repairing hard disk partitions. Its main task is low-level HDD testing and evaluation of its performance. Its main disadvantages are that the program is no longer supported by the developer and has a complex interface that will be difficult for an inexperienced user to cope with.
With the help of most of the programs reviewed, you can easily manage hard disk partitions, recover lost and deleted data, and also carry out diagnostics HDD work. Unfortunately, almost all of them are paid, but they have a trial version or demo modes. Therefore, you can try and evaluate the work of all programs and choose the one that you like the most.
The question that arises among users, how to restore a hard drive, can actually be resolved without the help of various computer masters, offering for a fee to return your hard drive to working condition. Software developers offer several options for recovering bad sectors, which can be used by a person with almost any level of computer literacy.
To understand what bad sectors are, you need to understand how a hard drive works and how information is stored on it.
The hard drive consists of several rotating magnetic disks, over which the reading heads move. When recording, these heads magnetize certain areas of the disk, writing information to them. The disk itself is divided into tracks, and they, in turn, into sectors.
If information from the disk cannot be read, it is considered broken. The cause of such a problem may be a power failure, physical wear of the disk, mechanical stress or overheating.
Depending on the cause, two types of unreadable sectors can be distinguished:
In any case, restoring unreadable sectors is worth a try, if only to make sure that the hard drive is completely inoperable and, with a clear conscience, replace it with a new storage device.
First, let's figure out how to restore a hard drive using a simple but functional program HDD Regenerator. This utility works with hard drives at a low level, that is, it has exclusive access not only to sectors and hard drive clusters, but also to its mechanisms and controllers.
HDD Regenerator, unlike other similar utilities, does not block access to bad sectors, but tries to restore them by remagnetization.
Other programs simply block access to the sector, which leads not only to the loss of information stored on it, but also to a decrease in the size of the hard disk. Restore deleted files after such a procedure is very difficult. Another question is that this approach allows you to quickly deal with an idle disk, but if you do not a large number of bad sectors (up to 100), then it is justified to use the HDD Regenerator program. 
The latest versions of the utility are distributed for a fee, but you can use the demo version to get acquainted with the capabilities of the program. In addition, HDD Regenerator belongs to the type of programs, the payment for which is beaten off by their functionality and usefulness.
Download the utility to your computer from the official website. Install it on your computer and, if necessary, Russify (all the necessary files can be found in the public domain).
Russification applies only to the program interface. The DOS mode, in which the main work of the utility takes place, will still be presented in English, and this cannot be corrected.
After launching HDD Regenerator, you will see a window like this: 
To start testing and subsequent recovery of the hard drive, click on the top menu "Click to fix". You may see a warning on the screen that you need to reboot and configure the BIOS by setting the SATA controller to IDE mode. If these words don't mean anything to you, click No. This will not affect the performance of the program in any way.
In the next window, the program will display all hard drives connected to the computer. In the "Select disk" field, you need to double-click on the hard drive that you want to return to life, or select it and click the "Start" button. 
The utility will try to start DOS - working environment, through which direct access to the equipment is provided. Since you are working with the program on a running system, a message will appear on the screen stating that HDDR could not gain exclusive access to the hard drive partitions.
To fix this error, close all applications and end the processes running on behalf of the user through the "Task Manager".
Click "Retry"; if the error reappears, restart your computer and try to end all running tasks again. 
Another way is to start the system in safe mode by marking it in the boot type selection menu (F8 key when starting the computer). In extreme cases, you can simply click the "OK" button, ignoring the warning. The program will continue to run, but its performance will decrease slightly.
In the DOS window that starts up, you will see several lines, the purpose of which must be said separately. In total, you will be offered four options for the program:
When you first start the program, it is recommended to select item number 2. To do this, press "2" on the keyboard, and then "Enter". The following window will appear, prompting you to select the scan order. You can specify a specific sector span, enter a disk size, or simply start testing from the beginning. 
If you have a rough idea of which section the bad sector is located in, then you can try to specify a specific interval. However, it is more convenient to start checking the disk from the beginning, so as not to miss anything. Such a scan will take much longer, but its result will be the most complete. 
After selecting the test mode, a disk check will start, during which the screen will display the number of checked and detected bad sectors. You can stop the scanning process using the Esc key.
The system may freeze during the check - this means that HDDR has found bad sectors and is trying to determine the extent of their damage.
After testing is completed, the trial version of HDDR will give you a message about the need to purchase a licensed copy of the program in order to continue disk recovery. You will be shown the number of detected bad sectors, based on which you can decide which is better - to buy full version utilities or go straight to the store for a new hard drive. 
If you bought the full version of the program, connect a USB drive - you will need it during the sector recovery process. After starting the program, select the "Bootable USB flash drive" item and select the connected media. 
All data will be erased from the drive. Instead, the program will write its files to the USB flash drive, making it bootable.
Loaded into DOS system, you will see the same windows as when you were running the demo. This time, you need to choose the first option - scanning and repairing sectors.
The recovery process itself can take a long time, so if you need to pause it, press the Esc key and be sure to wait for the prompt to exit the program. In this case, a program stop point will be written to the USB flash drive, from which scanning will start at the next start. Why these difficulties? In order not to sit in front of the computer for days, but to check it in several approaches. For example: recovery of 100 bad sectors may require several days of continuous HDDR operation.
One of the most popular methods among users is hard drive recovery using Victoria. This program, unlike HDDR, is distributed under a free license.
Victoria can work both in Windows and in DOS mode, allowing you to view the SMART table, scan the disk surface for bad sectors, restore them, and also perform low-level formatting.
Before proceeding to check the disk, you need to configure the hard drive controller in the BIOS. On the "Main" tab, set the "SATA Mode" parameter to "IDE". After that, you can start using the bootable Victoria flash drive. 
After booting from the drive in DOS mode, select the IDE channel you want to work with. To do this, press the P key and check the item "Ext. PCI ATA/SATA" (if the drive is connected via SATA interface). For IDE drives, select the appropriate port. 
A list of channels will appear on the screen, which will be numbered in order. To select your hard drive, press the number that corresponds to its number, and then press Enter. 
You can also detect errors without scanning - just look at the SMART table of the hard drive. You can call it with the F9 key. Note two points in the table:
The more bad sectors, the less chance that the disk can be restored. However, you can try to restore it to working capacity by starting the scanning process.
To call up the disk scan menu, press the F4 key. Select "BB: Erase 256 sect" using the arrows on your keyboard and press Enter. The scanning process will start, which will be quite lengthy. You can stop scanning with the Esc key. 
If a sector is found, the program will try to erase it. If it is physically sound, then the attempt will be successful and you will get rid of the broken parts of the disk. In this case, the information will be deleted, but you should not worry much about this - it would still be problematic to pull it out.
If the sector is damaged on physical level, then an attempt to erase it will fail. An error message will appear on the screen. However, this does not mean that you need to stop scanning the disk.
If you can't restore sectors, try moving them to a spare area. Press the F4 key and use the arrows to select "BB: Classic REMAP". The scanning process will start again. This time, bad sectors will not be restored, but transferred to the backup area. 
After the disk scan is completed (provided that the sectors are restored), it is advisable to check the file system using the chkdsk utility.
Naturally, accidental and intentional deletion of files destroys information previously recorded on the information that can be restored using special utilities. But after all, you can also find cases of quick or complete formatting of hard drives, when data is believed to be permanently deleted, not to mention the damage themselves hard drives. What to do in this case? This is where programs for recovering hard drives come to the rescue. You can download mostly simple utilities for free. However, even they help, as they say, bring the disc to life. Consider the most popular, including both free and paid utilities.
Before considering the main topic, let's make a small digression into the theoretical part and see how information is deleted. In Windows systems, there are two ways: deleting to the Recycle Bin and without it. In the first case, the files are simply moved to the area reserved on the hard drive, so restoring them from the Recycle Bin is as easy as shelling pears.
In the second case, it occurs when the first character in the name is changed to unreadable ($). If during the work in the clusters where such a file is located, the overwriting was not performed, it is also possible to restore the information.
The situation is worse with quick or full formatting of disks and partitions, as well as with situations when the hard drive begins to “crumble” or simply undergoes physical damage. Many users mistakenly believe that it is impossible to recover files in this case, they say, only professional experts can do it. Nothing like this! If you use, for example, the same programs for recovering Seagate Barracuda hard drives, with which many problems were observed at one time, any, even an unprepared user, can carry out such a process. And it is absolutely elementary.
In the case of a quick formatting of the hard drive, the partition tables are overwritten, and with a full format, the disk surface is also checked, followed by the correction of bad sectors. At the same time, we are not talking about factory low-level formatting at all.
This is what allows many developers to create programs for recovering hard drives, which, as it were, perform the reverse process. This gives the same recovery effect. But first things first.
As for the most famous utilities today, an approximate list might look like this:
Naturally, it is impossible to give a complete list, since today such software products hundreds can be found. But let's dwell on the above utilities in a little more detail.
If we consider the most popular programs for recovering hard drives and disk partitions, of course, the leadership belongs to one of the most powerful utilities of our time called Victoria HDD, developed by Sergey Kazansky.
The program has five levels of hard drive testing, is able to identify and display failed areas, fix errors, plot surface conditions, measure performance, etc. The operating modes also look interesting. The application can be run in a regular graphical shell, or you can use a somewhat unusual DOS mode. By the way, it is with such a check that the most powerful effect is achieved.
These two programs for recovering hard drives from a flash drive work just fine and are very similar to each other. They can even be used as portable versions.
The main advantage of these utilities is that they support almost all file systems known today and are able to recover data on any type of media, including even formatted or damaged memory cards.
This utility among all programs is relatively new. It is designed specifically to restore bad sectors and, as the developers themselves say, even to resuscitate the surface of the hard drive.
Applied here latest technology the so-called magnetization reversal, which allows you to completely restore the hard drive and the information that was previously recorded on it. It works, however, only in DOS mode, which causes some bewilderment for many. In addition, the technology itself looks almost unrealistic, because some do not imagine how it is possible to remagnetize the surface programmatically. Nevertheless, everyone who has come across it expresses only admiration - the application is able to revive even completely “dead” disks.
Before us are two representatives of the family of HDD recovery utilities. The peculiarity of these applications is that they support a large number of file systems and hard drives.
In addition, they provide a mode of creation bootable media, with which you can fix many problems if it is impossible to start the operating system from a problematic hard drive.
True, the first utility is paid, the second is not. But the second application is also interesting because it can be run from both DOS and Windows.
Another USB device or memory card and the information stored on them is interesting because it can work with all types of virtual partitions. It goes without saying that data can be recovered even after a full format.
But the most important thing is that the program can work in manual mode, and in the "Wizards" mode, which allows any user to apply automation of the entire recovery process.
Finally, another small and fairly simple application, abbreviated as ZAR. This program is intended mainly for recovering FAT and NTFS file systems, although it can also be used for Linux. For users of Windows systems, it is the best fit.
But it is worth considering here that this case we are talking exclusively about the recovery of information (even from bad sectors). At the same time, the program does not make any corrections on the hard disk itself after the analysis.
Of course, only the most basic programs were considered here. When choosing a program, one should be guided by the situation itself, that is, choose which operation should be applied (information recovery or troubleshooting on the hard drive itself), and only then make a decision about using this or that utility.
