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For an unknown reason, my laptop's windows 10 stopped booting correctly this week. after analysing disks, it appear that the first disk with the OS was in a terrible shape (lot of noise when reading/writing,...) and but the second with data (1TB) seems fine... but unreadable ! I plugged it with usb adaptator, but it showed as GPT protective partition in another windows 10 "disk mgmt" console. and nothing can be done, all options grayed out.

I executed gparted to read partitions, mbr,... but not sure on how not screw the data on the drive...

here is the output of gparted when launched on the drive :

c:\temp>gdisk64.exe \\.\physicaldrive1
GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 1.0.1

Partition table scan:
  MBR: protective
  BSD: not present
  APM: not present
  GPT: not present

Creating new GPT entries.
************************************************************************
Most versions of Windows cannot boot from a GPT disk except on a UEFI-based
computer, and most varieties prior to Vista cannot read GPT disks. Therefore,
you should exit now unless you understand the implications of converting MBR
to GPT or creating a new GPT disk layout!
************************************************************************

Are you SURE you want to continue? (Y/N): y

Command (? for help): l

Disk \\.\physicaldrive1: 244190646 sectors, 931.5 GiB
Logical sector size: 4096 bytes
Disk identifier (GUID): EE734396-FF46-48DD-A2D3-40E508B33FA3
Partition table holds up to 128 entries
First usable sector is 6, last usable sector is 244190640
Partitions will be aligned on 256-sector boundaries
Total free space is 244190635 sectors (931.5 GiB)

Number  Start (sector)    End (sector)  Size       Code  Name

Command (? for help): r

Recovery/transformation command (? for help): i
No partitions

Recovery/transformation command (? for help): o

Disk size is 244190646 sectors (931.5 GiB)
MBR disk identifier: 0x00000000
MBR partitions:

Number  Boot  Start Sector   End Sector   Status      Code
   1                     1    244190645   primary     0xEE

I also tried to read disk on Fedora, but no more luck.

Is there anything to do to, at least, copy the data, or better repair the partition table (or something else that is broken).

if any information is missing to make a better diagnosis, tell me Thank you

Edit and solution : As Rod pointed out, the laptop's hardware configured the drive's sector size to 4096 bytes. Once the drive plugged into the original laptop (and not on another with USB cable), the drive is recognized and fully operational.

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2 Answers 2

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STOP!

There's a warning sign in your output:

Logical sector size: 4096 bytes

The vast majority of hard disks today use 512-byte logical sectors. Some external enclosures and adapters, though, translate groups of eight 512-byte sectors into 4096-byte sectors. Doing so has certain advantages, but it makes it very difficult to safely move a disk from a direct connection to a connection involving an adapter that does such a translation. Changing the sector sizes in this way renders critical data structures, such as the partition table, invalid. If you start writing data with your USB adapter, you're almost certain to do additional harm to your disk.

To recover your data, you should first connect the disk in the way it was connected before your problems began, or at least find a way to connect it that will produce the same sector size as it had when it was connected normally. Only after you've connected your disk in this way will you be able to extract useful data for diagnosis and repair.

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  • Thank you to pointed out this, Rod. As I'm waiting for a new hard drive to replace the broken one, install windows 10..., I won't be able to update this question before. once done I will relaunch gdisk and edit question with correct output.
    – LouisJ
    Dec 7, 2015 at 17:25
  • Hi all, I finally received the new drive and installed windows 10 on it. Once down, I plugged the second drive, which is the subject of this topic. And, after windows booted, the d: drive appeared correctly. So your statement was correct Rod, the sector size was hardware dependant and the drive can only be read by this laptop and inside, not plugged through USB. So all is allright, nothing to change or modify in mbr or gpt, and hopefully, no data to recover. Thanks!
    – LouisJ
    Dec 11, 2015 at 20:44
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did you ever try GParted live? its very effective. after converting your gpt hdd system to mbr, do not change or write on your hdd. use ufs data recovery software for recover your data. also ufs have raw explorer. if you want, you can directly copy/paste your datas.

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  • I didn't, I try the gdisk to read information about disk, partition,... And the main question I have is : Is converting gpt to mbr will make data readable "as is", or a recovery tool is needed after ? because the HDD is 1TB and it will be very long to recovery, and I don't have another big disk to backup at sector level the disk.
    – LouisJ
    Dec 7, 2015 at 14:26
  • you need at least 1tb hard drive. because, when you try to recover your files from hdd, to same hdd, possible to write on your another file and this create a unrecoverable file problem. Dec 8, 2015 at 16:44

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