Trouble initializing a USB drive

Anonymous

I am having trouble initializing an HDD that I have connected to my PC via USB. I'm stuck, and I need some ideas. Below is detail.

I am running Windows 10. The outboard HDD disk in question was previously the internal C: drive on this PC. I replaced it with a larger drive about four months ago purely so I would have more storage capacity; it was running fine at the time I replaced it, and it has been stored carefully since. I am using a USB 2.0 to IDE SATA adapter cable to connect the disk to my PC via one of the PC's USB ports. I've used this same cable to connect other HDDs to this same PC in the same manner successfully in the past.

When I navigate to ThisPC, the drive does not appear. I right-click on START, choose Disk Management, and the following is displayed:

I click OK, and the following is displayed:

I run DiskPart, and I get this:

The Event Viewer shows me this:

... and this:

Note that the second to last screen says the disk was "not migrated due to partial or ambiguous match".

I have no idea where to go from here.

Easy responses would be "the disk is bad" or "the disk is old and no longer supported". I doubt that either is the case. The disk worked fine until it was excised from the machine and replaced four months ago. Since then, it's been stored carefully and not subjected to impact, moisture, extremes of temperature, etc.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

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53 answers

Anonymous

2018-07-19T16:04:19+00:00

Hi,

Just like you mentioned doing when you found the drive had no partitions...

Wait for it to automatically select the highlighted option (#1)….

After a period of time the DVD will eject and shortly after the Desktop will appear...

The first thing to appear will be a small window to verify the tome zone...

You will the have a "Desktop" screen that looks like an older version of Windows... The file Explorer in on the upper left...

I'm hoping that the File Explorer will be able to read stuff that has not been readable by other methods...

If not, maybe the Data Recovery in the Partition Editor will find it...
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Anonymous

2018-07-19T16:05:48+00:00

That's not what happens for me. I get no such desktop.
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Anonymous

2018-07-19T16:38:35+00:00

Hi,

What does happen ? I thought you said you did a Scan and Repair using Parted Magic... This is what you should be seeing awhile after you see the menu for the 32bit and etc. stuff...
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Anonymous

2018-07-19T22:06:02+00:00

When the machine boots, I get a rudimentary menu reminiscent of a BIOS menu. The default choice (#1) takes me to another similar rudimentary menu (not a graphical desktop like you show in your last post), from which I can try to restore or repair a partition, but there are not options for file recovery.

Back at the top level, there is a choice about halfway down for an "alternative graphical UI" (or words very close to those), but when I select that, I get a blank screen. I let that sit for about five minutes before giving up and booting back to Windows.
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Anonymous

2018-07-20T00:52:31+00:00

Hi,

I don't know what's going on with your machine, but I do not, and have never had, a second menu... It goes from the 1st menu to the Desktop on my machines... This is what I see...

Have you tried hitting the key for BOOT OPTIONS at the POST screen and selecting "UEFI CD\DVD Drive" as opposed to simply "CD\DVD Drive" ?

We could try a different program to try to recover your partition, but the other program does not have a File Explorer... It is just a bootable Disk Management program...
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