Windows 7 not seeing data partition of hard drive in enclosure.

[tinman9898]

I am trying to backup data from a windows 7 Home premium hard drive to another windows 7 home premium hard drive data partition using a usb caddy/enclosure. Both hard drives currently boot when connected to the motherboard of my pc and both OS partition and data partition are available. However when I put one or other hard drive into the enclosure, Windows 7 HP only shows one drive and says I need to format the drive. I have tried connecting the enclosure to a notebook with Windows starter installed and although I still cannot access the OS partition the data partition is available. The Netbook does not have a big enough hard drive to back up the data so I really need to find a way for Windows 7 HP to access the data. Please advise if I can do anything to fix this issue without formatting or using recovery software.

 

[TrainableMan]

With the external drive attached, could you run diskmgmt.msc and upload that screenshot here.

 

[tinman9898]

The drive in the caddy is disk 3 ( H: ) ... Showing as RAW and only as one partition instead of 2. When I try the same in Windows Starter, using Netbook, it shows both partitions. The second data partition as NTFS but doesn't show the partition with Windows 7 Home premium on it as NTFS. 'Upload a file button' not working so have uploaded capture to external image host.

 

[TrainableMan]

The OS partition should never be allowed because you can't have two OS partitions in W7 but the NTFS data partition should. Two possibilities, this external drive may be going bad or the cable might be bad ... how long has it been since you plugged it into the starter machine and it worked? If it still works in the starter machine today when you try then I can only surmise it is an issue with the drivers for the enclosure on the home premium machine. Try a different USB port or a different enclosure.

 

[tinman9898]

When plugged into the mother board of desktop both partitions are shown as NTFS in Disk manager. Had it working using the enclosure in the Netbook with Windows starter yesterday. This would lead me to believe that it is a problem with Windows 7 Home premium through a process of elimination. I have tried both usb ports on the front and back of the desktop with the same results. The only thing left would appear to be the caddy drivers in home premium. I shall travel further down this line of enquiry and update later.

 

[TrainableMan]

Every instance of this problem that I can find has the person either using a recovery tool or formatting the drive and starting over.

What is the make/model of the enclosure. I would check the enclosure manufacturers website and see if they official support W7 and if there are newer drivers/firmware updates/etc that might help.

 

[tinman9898]

Formatting or recovery is a bit drastic at this stage as I can access everything on the drive by connecting it to the mother board directly and push come to shove I can back up the data files incrementally. bit by bit by moving it onto a flash drive then swapping the drive out and moving the data onto the other drive. I haven't tried slaving either drive yet, so that may be another option. However it would be easier to get the caddy working. It is a Chinese make called CiT. It came with a small instruction booklet but no links or support info. I have tried looking online but no joy in finding a web site for the manufacturer yet. The current drivers are just the generic windows drivers which load up when the device is connected.

 

[TrainableMan]

Saw this idea in another thread that may be worth a look. Is it an old hard drive in the enclosure that still has jumper pins? If so, are they set for Master, Slave, or CS (Cable Select)? It should never slave but try CS and if that has no effect try master. Not sure what this would do but seems easy enough to try.

 

[tinman9898]

The drives are sata drives, less than a year old but did investigate the jumper secenario previously. I 'll post an update if I get any further. If you hear of any other fixes feel free to post an update.