It is difficult to give an unambiguous conclusion in this category, since it cannot be said that it will help to restore hDD without detailed diagnostics. For ordinary users, we do not recommend trying to reanimate the device in order to avoid negative consequences. Before starting such work, the computer’s HDD needs to be studied, its algorithms understood, how to navigate the command line, etc. Simply put, it's best to leave the job to professionals. Moreover, data cannot be saved from formatted disks and other media after a complete overwrite.
We recommend that from time to time, if a hard drive is suspected (files disappear or open for a long time, Winsows XP-10 runs chkdsk before each system boot, etc.), check its surface and SMART using HDDScan. The utility can be downloaded for free, you only need to understand English minimally. She reads all the important information hard.
To restore data, apply Hetman partition recovery- it will pull out a maximum of information, even if the volume is no longer correctly displayed in the explorer. A step-by-step wizard will help you complete the procedure quickly and easily. Zero Assumption Recovery or Acronis Recovery Expert from Acronis Disk Director. We also recommend the effective tool Seagate File Recovery, but pay attention to its feature - compatibility exclusively with Seagate hard disk.
We will tell a little about each worthy, in our opinion, utility.
HDD Capacity Restore Tool saves when the disk size unexpectedly "decreased" from hundreds of GB to several MB. The application is moderately simple, effective, able to return capacity hard drive after a failure or if the manufacturer of the laptop initially "cut off" part of it for the needs of the subsystem.
Low level format tool - A good thing for flash drives and disks for which information is not needed. Recover data after it fails. The main function of this program is the so-called. “Low level formatting” - overwriting both normal and broken areas with zeros. This helps permanently erase files and improve speed. hard work disk due to lack of fragmentation for new data.
Program HDD Regenerator it is mercilessly criticized by experts, but it is useful for the “semi-pro”, as it makes resuscitation of damaged partitions an easy task. You boot from the disk / flash drive, select the drive, ask the tool to scan and restore it, and calmly drink tea. Boot sectors and "logical bads" she "cure." Such removal of damage 100% does not hurt, the utility itself is easy to use, but it is expensive.
The cohort of professional solutions is trinity HDAT2, Victoria, MHDD. The last two are very popular. Initially, they were created under DOS, but alternative developers were able to port applications to Win, depriving only a portion of the "branded goodies."
Product features + - the same: “low-level formatting” and re-layout bad sectors (Advanced Remap). Simply put, setting a note on the impossibility of writing to a bad block. Against a large number of "bads" this will not help, but if there are several dozen of them, you will extend the life of the drive.
The utilization algorithms are similar. Keep Victoriayour computer is better due to the ease of disk selection, its interface is simpler than that of Mhdd. But the trouble is that both projects have stopped - support for the latest models of hard drives can be found only in HDAT2. The high speed of the programs also sets them apart from the HDD Regenerator.
Summarizing the foregoing, we note once again that it is better for beginners not to "play hard." In case of problems, simply restore individual files (images, audio, video, etc.) using the program Hetman partition recoveryand bring the “screw” to the workshop. If "making friends" with a solution from Hetman does not work, free, but less effective 7-data recovery suite, minitool power data recovery will come to the rescue.
Advanced users will appreciate LLF Tool, Capacity Restore Tool, HDD Regenerator or its cheaper counterpart DRevitalize, Windows version The popular DOS utility Victoria.
The choice of pros is clear - it's boot Victoria, MHDD or HDAT2 - A project that continues to develop unlike eminent "colleagues." Updates on the official website appear regularly; developers enthusiastically continue to improve the tool and add support for new drive models.
Program: HDD Regenerator
Program for hard recovery disk testing and diagnostics, HDD Regeneratorable to revive non-working hard disks and provides SMART system information on how to recover a hard disk without affecting existing data. As a result, previously unreadable and inaccessible information is really restored (except for the most deplorable situations)!
Next we will talk about the features of the program. HDD Regeneratorbut at the beginning a little introduction. Recovering a hard drive is not such a simple operation. Think of the computer as a collection of concentric areas, divided into separate sectors. Each sector section of each of the circles contains information (we will discuss this in the following articles). Some of the sectors of the sectors contain the contents of files: for example, a word-file for an article, a picture, and so on. Disks are read by a high-speed magnetic head (in fact, there are several of them), reading data, moving along the surface of the disks.
Other sectors of sectors contain tables with information about the location of files on the disk, file size and a list of areas of the disk that are free to write. Depending on the operating system, names can be like “File Association Table”, “Network File System”, “i-number”, “-table of nodes” - in general, these are typical names for these tables. The same concept applies to other storage devices, for example, sd-memory cards and usb flash drives. Other, similar issues apply to other storage devices when restoring (regenerating) information from a hard drive.
There are some parts of the file system that allow you to recover files, even if they were supposedly “permanently deleted” or the hard drive does not work. Software, which uses information stored in various areas, in general, require some technical skills when using special regenerative software or commercial products. One such product is the well-known Norton Utilites package. Download HDD Regenerator software to recover HDD drivecan be here.
Reference Information. What is a hard disk or HDD?
Abbreviation HDDstands for hard disk drive, translated into Russian - a hard (solid-state or fixed) disk used for storage and reading digital informationusing constantly rotating disks containing magnetic material. Thanks to this, the hard drive is in working condition. Data is stored on disk even if it does not receive electricity. Data is read randomly. The HDD also contains a spindle and head, which are necessary for reading and writing all kinds of files and other digital information. The first hard drive was introduced by IBM in 195, after which this device began to dominate the computer market, starting in the 1960s. Thus, hard disks proclaimed a new era in the history of information storage on a PC. More than 200 companies around the world are engaged in the production of HDDs, including Seagate, Toshiba, and Western Digital.
More useful information on what a hard drive is is available on Wikipedia.
Before you use a commercial service to restore a hard drive, think carefully about the consequences of such a repair HDD. The employee will be able to see all the data located on your disk before regeneration. regeneration - recovery). Moreover, experts will be able to all the information, even the one that you would prefer to hide. You should not use recovery services if the security and safety of private data on the storage source is key to you.
Introducing HDD Regenerator 2011
Downloading the program is very simple: we download the distribution kit from the link below, install it on a disk different from the one that will be regenerated. The program is distributed free of charge and in Russian. Rescue Utility Distribution Size hard drives takes about 8 MB. The company is developing this product. Abstradrome, namely Dmitry Primochenko (Dmitriy Primochenko).
HDD Regenerator 2011: Main Window
The main features of the regenerator when restoring a hard drive
Before loading HDD Regenerator to your disk, let's focus a little on the main functions of this effective application.
- The utility determines the cause of failures for non-working hard drives. That is, it takes on the function of diagnostic software for testing.
- She also knows how to quickly find, scan bad sectors on the surface of the storage device and restore them, or rather, overwrite, so that these areas are not occupied by valuable files. In addition, the program is able to fix the bad sectors on the physical structure of the disk using a special generator called Hysteresis loops.
- Program for full hard testing drive and software troubleshooting. You can figure out the causes of malfunctions yourself. If the damage is physical, then HDD Regenerator will not help in terms of repairing hdd.
- In any of the modes hDD recovery you are insured against data loss, because it works purely in read mode, without making changes to the current structure or file configuration of a working or non-working HDD.
- Actually, what is the regeneration of the HDD? This is a thorough recovery of damaged data (the program makes everything unreadable on the hard disk drive readable and writable).
- The downloaded program tests the hard disk, completely ignoring the file system, so scanning takes place at the physical level. It can read FAT, NTFS or other popular file systems; it also works with unformatted and unallocated HDDs.
- HDD Regenerator is easy to use, the hdd testing program does not contain complex settings. No need to change a bunch of complex and obscure options to restore the hard drive or conduct its diagnosis. The program was originally sharpened for maximum performance and results.
- The regenerator works under running windows XP / Vista / 7/8, therefore, after downloading the program, you should not have compatibility problems.
- A boot regenerative flash drive can be created and used for the process. auto recovery. Bootable resuscitation CD / DVD allows you to start regeneration under the control of DOS, and does this automatically
- It works with any file system without data loss, there is support for 4K sectors.
- Auto mode Reconstruction works with any media except CD / DVD. The utility is especially useful if the hard drive does not work and you need to find out the causes of the breakdown.
- Support for scanning and simultaneously on multiple hard drives.
- Real-time notification mode. In HDD Regenerator, this is a fairly powerful and accurate function that, after downloading, allows you to “guess” future problems on the disk. It is enough to download the application installer, install it on the disk and diagnose it for potential failures, so that subsequently you do not have to give the HDD-disk for repair.
Key features of the program
The pre-scan mode is very useful for HDD regeneration; it is effective for diagnosing and subsequently determining the location of bad sectors if there are a lot of them on the hard drive. This saves valuable user time. Corrupted, damaged, not working and formatted hard drives are scanned in this mode even faster than working HDDs!
HDD Regenerator Principles
Almost 60% of all damaged hard drives contain bad sectors. The developers came up with an algorithm that is used to restore the surface of a hard disk. This technology is independent of the hardware of the computer, supports many types of hard drives and repairs disk damage, even if it does not help. As a result, information that was not previously read will be restored to the hard disk drive, just download the HDD Regenerator and verify this. Thus, more than 60% of those killed can be brought back to life, i.e. idle drives.
- If cyclical damage is fixed in Windows, it is recommended to scan the HDD in boot CD or flash drive mode
- If the hard drive is external, it is recommended that you also attach it as internal storage
- By and large, 1-2 delays for a disk when reading it is not a problem. In other words, hard drive recovery makes sense even in such "difficult" cases.
Regular delays while reading a disk mean that hard hard disk drive long time trying to read sectors. In fact, it is already a surviving HDD, and - which is dangerous - it can cause the loss of valuable data. You can try to test and regenerate the HDD using the “Regenerate all sectors in a range” program option. Also, delays can be corrected in the “scan and repair” mode (scan and restore), subject to the following conditions:
- the hard drive has been fully scanned at least once
- HDD does not contain bad sectors
- hard drive not working
- hDD was not repaired
- hDD Regenerator 2011 program downloaded from the official site
HDD recovery: important notes
Since the program for testing the hard disk and its recovery HDD Regenerator 2011 does not make changes logical structure In the storage medium, the file system may still mark some sectors as bad, and other utilities, such as chkdsk (Microsoft's system program), will detect bad sectors even after full regeneration.
Answers on questions
We dropped a working laptop, they say the hard one was damaged. It was possible to download info from it, albeit slowly, but we did the wrong extraction of the usb of the device in which it is located. The hard drive stopped opening on the computer. They gave it to the programmers, but not all. What to do? Which program to download?
Answer. Of course, you can install programs to restore the hard drive, but there will be little sense from this. The fact is that in some situations, disk recovery is not possible, especially if it is associated with physical damage.
In some cases, HDD Regenerator can help recover hard performance disk, if it is connected with bad sectors, bad blocks, violation of the file table.In any case, we advise , it can find deleted file partitions on the disk. And after that, you can use standard software for data recovery.
Hard drive problems are very common, and many users do not know what to do in such situations. And every program for repair hard The drive is designed to perform certain actions depending on the type of failure. Further it is offered to get acquainted with some types of failures and software tools that allow them to be addressed.
Checking and repairing a hard drive: Windows programs and tools
Before using such a tool, you need to find out the nature of the failure. Among the main types, the following can be noted:
- violation of the file system structure;
- damage to the surface of the hard drive;
- software bugs;
- loss of information due to crashes or formatting.
Do not underestimate the funds presented in operating rooms. windows systems. Hard repair program windows drive 7 or any other system is called ScanDisk and in the simplest case it is called from the section properties menu, where the scan start button is used on the service tab.
In this case, it is necessary to indicate the automatic correction of bad sectors, and if desired, you can also use surface verification.
However, using a similar applet (chkdsk) called from command line (cmd) running as an administrator in the Run console looks much more preferable. You need to enter additional attributes for this tool. Among the most frequently used ones, one can single out a check with space-separated combinations of / f / r and / x / f / r. If system components are damaged, you can use the sfc / scannow command.
The best applications for the treatment of Winchester and information recovery
In order not to deal with the above procedures, many users also use third-party utilities, among which the following can be singled out separately:
- HDD Regenerator.
- Viktoria.
- R.Saver.
- Acronis Recovery Expert.
- Hetman Partition Recovery, etc.
Immediately, note that applications like Recuva, designed to recover deleted files or missing information from damaged HDDs will not be considered solely because of their absolute inefficiency.
HDD Regenerator
HDD Regenerator is a relatively recently developed program for diagnosing and repairing a hard drive, designed not to restore lost information, but to search for problems associated with physical damage to hard drives or software failures.
According to its creators, the work is based on the principle of magnetization reversal of the HDD surface, which allows full recovery hard drive performance. It works in DOS mode, which causes users some problems with the application, however, in some cases it shows good results when no other tool helps.
Viktoria
The program for repairing Viktoria hard drive from Belarusian developers, according to most professionals, is the best in its field and allows you to fix many software problems related to the file system, the appearance of bad sectors, etc.
It can be launched in two versions: in DOS-mode emulation and in the form of a standard Windows application. However, as noted, it is better to use the first method, since checking in this mode is more effective, not to mention eliminating crashes and errors (by the type of difference in launching the standard Windows tool).
R.Saver
R.Saver hard drive repair program is designed to recover deleted or lost information. Its use is justified because the utility is able to find files, among which there may be important system components, even after formatting the disk or logical partition, completely reconstructing the file system.
Scanning, however, takes a lot of time, but the application finds files that the user may not even be aware of. And in most cases it is the application of this program that is the best option even for removable USB HDDs, flash drives and memory cards of any standard.
Acronis Recovery Expert
This program for repairing a hard disk is mainly used in case of violation of the file system structure and even allows you to create bootable media for those cases when starting the OS from the hard drive becomes impossible.
At the same time, the application has support for a huge amount file systems and hard drives of large volume.
Hetman partition recovery
Although this utility is positioned as a means of recovering information when it is lost after formatting or when software crashesHowever, it can be used to find problems with the HDD.
The main advantage of the application is that it can be launched both manually and using a special “Wizard”, which makes it possible to automate the processes of analysis (scanning) and data recovery.
Summary
These are far from all programs capable of producing service hard drives, but only a few of the most popular. But even a brief acquaintance with them allows any user to understand the principles of their functioning and scope. If you recommend some universal solution, at the first stage of repair you need to use the system tools (if possible), HDD Regenerator or Viktoria, and for the subsequent restoration of information - R.Saver or other software products.
Naturally, accidental and intentional deletion of files destroys information previously recorded on hard drives, which can be restored using special utilities. But you can also find cases of fast or full formatting of hard drives, when data is believed to be permanently deleted, not to mention damage to the hard drives themselves. What to do in this case? Here programs come to the rescue. For free, you can basically download the simplest utilities. However, even they help, as they say, bring the disc to life. Consider the most popular utilities, including both free and paid ones.
How is the process of deleting files from the hard drive?
Before considering the main topic, we make a small digression into the theoretical part and see how information is deleted. In Windows-based systems, there are two ways: removal to the "Recycle Bin" and without it. In the first case, the files are simply moved to the area reserved on the hard drive, so restoring them from the Recycle Bin is as easy as shelling pears.
In the second case, what happens is when the first character in the name changes to unreadable ($). If during the work in the clusters where such a file is located, the overwrite was not performed, information can also be restored.
The situation is worse with the fast or full formatting of disks and partitions, as well as with situations when the hard drive starts to “crumble” or is simply exposed physical damage. Many users mistakenly believe that it is impossible to restore files in this case, they say, only professional experts can do it. Nothing like this! If you use, for example, the same Seagate Barracuda, with which at one time there were many problems, such a process can be carried out by any, even untrained user. And it’s completely elementary.
Programs for recovering hard drives after formatting: can this be done?
In the case of quick formatting of the hard drive, the partition tables are overwritten, and with full formatting, the disk surface is also checked with the subsequent correction of bad sectors. At the same time, we are not talking about the factory at all.
This is what allows many developers to create programs for hard recovery disks that seem to produce the reverse process. This gives the same recovery effect. But first things first.
The best hard drive recovery programs
As for the most famous utilities to date, a sample list may look like this:
- Victoria HDD;
- R.Saver and R-Studio;
- HDD Regenerator;
- Acronis Recovery Expert and Active Partition Recovery Pro;
- Hetman Partition Recovery;
- Zero Assumption Recovery.
Naturally, a complete list is impossible, since today there are hundreds of such software products. But let us dwell on the above utilities in more detail.
Victoria HDD
If we consider the most popular programs for recovering hard disks and disk partitions, of course, the leadership belongs to one of the most powerful utilities of our time called Victoria HDD, the developer of which is Sergey Kazansky.
The program has five levels of hard drive testing, it is able to identify and display bad areas, eliminate errors, plot surface conditions, measure performance, etc. Operating modes also look interesting. The application can be run in a regular graphical shell, or you can use a somewhat unusual DOS mode. By the way, it is during such a check that the most powerful effect is achieved.
R.Saver and R-Studio
These two programs for recovering hard drives from a USB flash drive work just fine and are very similar to each other. They can even be used as portable versions.
The main advantage of these utilities is that they support almost all file systems known today and are capable of recovering data on any type of media, including even formatted or damaged cards memory.
HDD Regenerator
This utility is relatively new among all programs. It is designed specifically to restore bad sectors and, as the developers themselves say, even to reanimate the surface of the hard drive.
It uses the latest technology of the so-called magnetization reversal, which allows you to completely restore the hard drive and the information that was recorded on it earlier. It works, however, only in DOS-mode, which many cause some bewilderment. In addition, the technology itself seems almost unrealistic, because some do not imagine how to remagnetize the surface in a programmatic way. Nevertheless, everyone who came across it expresses admiration only - the application is able to reanimate even completely "dead" disks.
Acronis Recovery Expert and Active Partition Recovery Pro
Before us are two representatives of the family of utilities for HDD recovery. The peculiarity of these applications is that they support a large number of file systems and hard drives.
In addition, they have a creation mode. bootable mediawith which you can fix many problems if the start of the operating system from a problematic hard drive is impossible.
True, the first utility is paid, the second - no. But the second application is also interesting in that it can be run both from under DOS and from under Windows.
Hetman partition recovery
Another utility for recovering disks, USB drives or memory cards and the information stored on them is interesting in that it can work with all types of virtual partitions. It goes without saying that data can be restored even after full formatting.
But the most important thing is that the program can work both in manual mode and in the “Wizard” mode, which allows any user to use automation of the entire recovery process.
Zero Assumption Recovery
Finally, another small and fairly simple application, abbreviated as ZAR. This program is primarily for FAT and NTFS, although it can also be used for Linux. For users of Windows-systems, it fits perfectly.
But here it is worth considering that in this case we are talking exclusively about information recovery (even from bad sectors). In this case, the program on the hard disk itself does not make any corrections after analysis.
Conclusion
Of course, only the most basic programs for recovering hard drives were considered here. When choosing a program, you should be guided by the situation itself, that is, choose which operation should be applied (information recovery or troubleshooting on the hard drive itself), and only then make a decision about using this or that utility.
Before restoring a hard drive, make sure that there is no important information on it. For example, consider WD or Seagate devices. If there are surface defects on them, then even reading the data often affects their performance, so folders and files after restoration are often inaccessible. To save data, it is first customary to make a sector-by-sector image of the HDD with a special program.
It is better to launch applications for troubleshooting from another computer, connecting the damaged hard drive as a backup or boot from the recovery flash drive.
We work with HDDScan
A modern hard drive is a very reliable device, so if there was no fall, the probability that the disk is physically damaged is extremely small. Diagnostic utilities, checking the hard drive, take for bad blocks sectors with an incorrectly written checksum. This often happens due to a power failure at the time of recording to the HDD, Seagate USB drive, WD, etc., or in general due to poor quality power supply. But this can be treated even though the drive behaves like a dead one. Run HDDScan first in test mode to determine the number of bad sectors:
The wait may be long - small 250 gigabyte WD USB drives, Seagate will be tested for about 45 minutes. Scanning progress can be observed in the Test Manager window if you double-click to open RD-Read.
At the end of testing, you can see all the bad sectors found on the HDD of the computer. They are marked in red and blue. If there are any, most likely their logical structure and they can be cured at home.
Once again, the process will be accompanied by a complete erasure of all information from Seagate. Therefore, if you have not yet saved important data to external storage USB, it's time to start doing this so that no new deleted data appears on the device.
A sector with such defects cannot be read and can only be restored by forcibly writing zeros. This is possible in Erase mode. HDDScan completely fills the Seagate drive sector by sector with zeros, reads the information and compares it with the checksum. If after this there are no errors when accessing the bad sector, then WD restores operability and the system will again be able to fully use it if all the deleted data is then written to the drive. This mode starts in exactly the same way:
- The Suface Test window opens;
- The Erase method is selected;
- Scanning is started with the Add Test button.
After that, it is highly likely that all logical sectors on the device can be cured of reading errors at home, and it will be safe to store information folders on the device. Physically damaged as a result of the fall, no program can fix it.
We use the advanced features of Victoria
Many believe that this free application is the best utility for resuscitation HDD WD and Seagate, which appeared on the remote sector. Therefore, it is worthwhile to figure out how to conduct the process of recovering a hard drive using Victoria. It can be run from under Windows, but in this case the probability of successful treatment of bad sectors is greatly reduced.
This mode is more suitable for testing the hard drive.. But if you run Victoria from a bootable USB flash drive or disk, then she is likely to be able to restore or extend her life even completely killed Seagate HDD. In addition, the flash drive is very convenient for working with a laptop, if due to bad sectors it stopped loading.
The program for Windows and for installation on a USB stick is downloaded on the developer's site. An ISO image on a USB flash drive can be deployed using the UltraISO utility.
Testing Winchester with Victoria
Before starting to restore bad sectors, it is better to test the HDD WD or Seagate directly from under Windows, especially since Victoria spends seconds on this:
There are several important lines:
- Reallocated Sector Count - shows the number of reassigned bad sectors to reserve;
- Current Pending Sector - displays the number of unstable sectors that may soon become bad blocks;
- Offline scan UNC sectors - current number of bad blocks.
Opposite these lines are attributes, the meaning of which is very important to understand:
- val - parameter value at the current moment (should be as high as possible);
- wrst - the lowest value of val for the entire time of using the HDD;
- tresh - critical value of val, which on a healthy WD should be much less than the current;
- raw - in most cases, the real value of the value, on the basis of which Value is calculated, should have the smallest possible value.
Indicators that indicate the poor condition of the WD drive are highlighted in red. After the Get SMART button, there is an indicator that allows you to make a conclusion about whether the disk is suitable after a fall for further operation or not and whether it is worth returning deleted data to it. To do this, it displays a Good or Bad message with green and red indicators, respectively.
You can duplicate test results and verify their correctness using another free CrystalDiskInfo utility, the interface and results of which are displayed in Russian. Next, you can proceed to the treatment procedure.
How to fix bad sectors with Victoria
The WD and Seagate hard drive recovery application works most effectively in DOS mode, so it is best to boot the device from a pre-created bootable flash drive with this program.
Before this, do not forget to change accordingly bIOS configuration, or use the boot menu of the laptop to select the flash drive as the boot device.
Thereafter:
- A program is loaded from a flash drive, for which, in the start window, select Victoria Russian for Desktop;
- In the main program window, select desired driveby pressing the Latin P and moving the keys "up and down";
- Confirm hDD selection Enter key
- Enter the hard disk number (in the program it is called the channel number).
Press F4 to set the scan settings:
All that remains is to start the process by selecting Change end of test and pressing Enter. If bad sectors Since your HDD WD are of a logical rather than physical nature, it is possible to fix them at home using a program. How much does this work in the service center depend on how damaged the hard drive. In our case, we restored it with our own hands, but it is no longer worth using this hard drive to install the operating system. Keep on it folders with reserved data, or with those that are not a pity to lose.
