A hard drive can be divided into multiple storage units referred as partitions. The idea for creating partitions in your hard drive is to have separation between OS and program files from user files, to have multi-boot setup, to have multiple file systems, to reduce the access time which in turn increases the system performance, to protect files by making it easier to recover a corrupt file system (if one partition is corrupt, other file system will not be affected) and many other benefits.
When it comes to partition your hard drive, there are several partitioning tools available in the market and even Windows has in-built disk management utility. These tools allow you to create, format, delete, undelete, expand, compress and merge partitions. Hence, helpful for creating disk space for new operating system and shaking up disk space as per your requirement.
However, using these partitioning tools or partition repair tools can be catastrophic also because any kind of error during partitioning process can cause corruption to partitions and even partitions may get lost or missed. This may lead to loss, corruption or inaccessibility of your critical data.
How data loss or corruption occurs in a hard drive partition?
- Due to conversion of a partition from one file system to another i.e. FAT16 or FAT32 to NTFS. These file system conversions causes the data or files to lose their EFS (encryption details) and file system permissions which holds entries regarding which users or system processes are granted access or which operation is allowed to a particular file (whether you can read, write or execute a data). Hence, will lead to inaccessibility of files in that partition
- Most of the disk partitioning tools lets you create dual or multi boot partitions, but any kind of partitioning error can corrupt or damage boot sector (first physical sector) of your hard drive which holds information regarding total no of partitions, which one is booting, total no of sectors, sector size, start and end point of the sector etc. Hence, corruption to boot sector will lead to apparent missing of your partition
- Virus infection is another main reason for data loss due to missing or corrupt partition. That is if the master boot record(MBR) which holds the partition table is damaged or corrupt due to virus attack then you will not able to see partitions. Hence, leading to heavy data loss
- Using third party tools for creating new partition or re-size the existing partition can cause deletion of partitions or data while trying to locate free disk space in those partitions
Is it possible to recover data from missing partitions?
Yes, it is possible to recover data from missing partitions and HDD recovery software is the right option for the same. It has advanced algorithms to recover lost / missing partitions even if the partition table is corrupt, damaged or recover data from formatted partition. Whether the partition is lost due to third party partitioning tools, OS-reinstallation, dual OS installation, virus infection, file system corruption, formatting, reformatting or re-partitioning, Yodot Hard Drive Recovery tool can easily recover your lost / missing partitions within few minutes.
Steps to follow
- Download and install Yodot Hard Drive Recovery software to your PC or laptop. If the partition table has gone corrupt and hard drive is not able to boot then connect it to a healthy computer and download and install the software to the new one
- Now, Run the software and follow the instructions that are coming on the screen
- As the main screen appears, then select "Recover Lost Partition" option
- After that a new window pops up showing all the physical drives present on your PC or laptop
- As you select the desired physical drive, the software will scan and display all the partitions / logical drives that are found (including the lost partitions)
- Now, select the logical drive / partition and as per the selection the software will scan the drive to recover all the lost data
- In order to search and recover specific files based on their unique signatures, select add file type option or else skip
- Once scanning process ends, software will display all the files that are recovered from the selected partition or drive in two different view types (for easy selection of files) i.e. "File type view" and "Data type view"
- Use "Save Recovery Session" option to save scanning information that can be used to resume scanning process after buying the software
- Store the recovered files to a drive or CD / DVD. You can even compress the recovered files to a ZIP archive
Tips for recovering data from Missing Partitions:
- Do not create more partitions when you need to recover a deleted or missing partition to avoid any overwriting
- Do not try to repair a partition, this may lead to further data loss
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