PC is giving me an "Invalid Partition Table"?

Question

Here's the deal:

Western Digital 500GB Hard Drive, when I boot it, it says "Invalid Partition Table". When I connect it as a secondary drive, every system says "format disk" before it is usable.

I have run XP repair console, and all the usual fixes within that. I've used Hiren's Boot CD w/ HDD Regenerator. No bad sectors, etc.

HOW do I get the data off of there for my customer???

Answer 1

hi



Troubleshoot Invalid Partition Table



Observations



You power up your computer and receive the following error:



Invalid Partition Table



Possible Causes



When you power up your computer, the system examines the master partition table to determine what volume to use to boot up the operating system, and detected invalid information within it. This is caused by an incorrect or missing active partition.



Resolution



To resolve this issue, consider the following steps:



* Boot up the computer with a Microsoft Windows 98 boot up disk or Windows XP recovery console. Select the correct bootup device before you do that.

* At the DOS command prompt, type in: fdisk

* Now, you will be prompted with the following question



Do you wish to enlarge large disk support (Y/N) ?



* Enter: Y

* Now to check for active partition, enter: 2



Look under the Status column. The active partition is usually assigned to the drive which contains your operating system.



* If there's no active partition set, enter the number of the partition to make active



Restart your computer and the problem should be resolved.

Answer 2

For some reason you computer can't find a Windows partition. Either you deleted it somehow, the hard drive has bad sectors on it or a Virus has destroyed the partition. You will need a valid operating system disc and will have to reformat and try to install Windows fresh. If it doesn't work you will need to replace the hard drive.

Answer 3

Run TestDisk to attempt to repair the partition table. If that doesn't work, use Photorec to recover all data on the drive.



http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

Answer 4

I would try Partition Magic.

Answer 5

You may be able to use this method...



http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-5080480.html