Unmountable Unrecoverable

This is for those with Windows XP

The first thing depending on your settings is if your computer automatically restarts on a failure is to get it to stop that. For on that Blue Screen are codes and error messages, these are tip offs to diagnosing your problem.

While booting up hold the F8 key before Windows starts booting. Then select from the options menu "disable automatic restart on failure". Good practice anyways as that information on the Blue Screen has leads to solving your problem.

Continue to boot. (now unfortunately it's been a little while since I've had an unmountable volume). Get the error. Since we are dealing with the Unmountable error, something like this should appear.

"STOP 0x000000ED UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME" Error Message When You Restart Your Computer or Upgrade to Windows XP

According to Mircosoft Tech site, here is the perscription for fixing the problem.

1. First and easy. BIOS configured to force a faster UDMA.

• Enter your BIOS (F2, Del, or what your computer requires at start up)
• Load the 'Fail-Safe' or default settings. Save and exit.
• Computer boots.

2. If the above fails, onto the second and more painful solution: Checking the hard drive cable (on recently installed hard drives either 1 or 2 could be a problem)

• Open your computer up - make sure your grounded - TOUCH or USE a Ground leash to your metal casing.
• Make sure the cable is a 80 pin wire, good shape (I did have one with a nick - broken wire), and properly seated.
• After replacing cable if needed close up the computer and reboot.

3. Alright, all else fails, it's your file system is corrupted, or damaged - This is not necessarily indicative of a hard drive failure but could be. Things do happen. If your computer had been running fine and no upgrades done to the hardware recently, and you get the Unmountable error, odds are you can by pass the first two steps. (unless others play with your computer).

• 1.Insert the Windows XP CD-ROM into the CD-ROM drive, and then restart the computer. Click to select any options that are required to start the computer from the CD-ROM drive if you are prompted.  
• 2.When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.  
• 3.If you have a dual-boot or multiple-boot computer, select the installation that you must access from the Recovery Console.  
• 4.When you are prompted, type the Administrator password. If the administrator password is blank, just press ENTER.
•  5.At the command prompt, type chkdsk /p /r , and then press ENTER.  
• 6.At the command prompt, type exit , and then press ENTER to restart your computer.

Now we are assuming that Chkdsk did it's job, you should be able to boot.

If not you can try following all the above steps again and use fixboot and hit Enter to repair any damaged boot files. Do this at step 6. When prompt for yes or no type Y.

• 7. type Exit and restart.

Chkdsk usually resolves most problems. But as my title is, suppose Chkdsk fails. With this error:

"one or more unrecoverable problems."

Ugh. The trouble is now deeper my friend. Now panic wants to sweep over you as you realize your precious data is condemned. Too late for those well intentioned backups.

So Chkdsk comes back with an error.

First let's not panic yet. And whatever you do don't reinstall, reformat, fdisk, or whatever destroy your data on that hard drive. It can still be recovered.  Let's see what options are available to you. 

Here is where having access to a second computer is good, or having a spare hard drive around with an operating system on it (Windows XP).  Even with a Linux computer/Live CD you can at least check the health of your files on the ill drive.  So with a second Windows XP system: 

1. Take the ill hard drive and install it with the proper jumper settings set to slave.
2. Install the second hard drive as a master (check jumpers).
3. Boot up.
4. If Windows Xp starts Chkdsk for the ill drive (as it did for me) let it run.
5. You can then run Chkdsk again as a check. (note my system is Windows XP Pro sp2), so the chkdsk initiated from Windows itself is more powerful than from the recovery mode.
6. Once chkdsk is run and finished. Shut Windows down properly.
7. Reinstall the ill hard drive back as primary master.
8. Boot.

That should solve the problem. Also with a second hard drive as the primary you can check what files are recoverable on the ill hard drive and recover what you want if need be. If you can see them, your problem may be fixable, and if not at least recovery will be easy.

If Chkdsk fails from the second drive, and you can't probe the ill drive. It may be necessary to find some data recovery software (depending on the importance of the data to you).

Now from what I experienced with a relatively new 500GB drive. It was purchased to replace my older 200GB drive (and their seemed to be issues with it, so replace it before failure) . I encountered both errors after about 5 months on the new drive. So a good set of questions for anyone is:

Do you have a second hard drive? A Linux Live CD around?

In my case both was a yes. But a second hard drive with Windows XP on it or access to a friend's computer is just as good. Having a second hard drive or computer is more important than the Live CD.

Just to check on my computer and the data on the hard drive, I ran the Linux Cd (Ubuntu 8.04 to be exact). And Praise the Lord I could still read my hard drive and all the data on it. Sweet. So at the worse I could recover my personal data, and reinstall. But lose my other software, and have to reinstall it.

I opt to see what I could do with my older 200GB hard drive (semi retired it, as it was having some issues). See if we could at the worse, copy it back on the 500GB, it would be the closest to the way things were.

In poking around on the help and tech forums for "unrecoverable errors" and "unmountable" it was suggested turning your error reading drive into a slave and using another Windows XP hard drive to run Chkdsk and recover it.

So the setup was 200GB primary and 500 GB slave. Booted up just fine and chkdsk wanted to run on a check on my slave (don't stop it, like I did or you have to reboot or set chkdsk manually to run on next boot up). Let it rip. It went through all 5 stages and fixing, and repairing some bad files. Ran chkdsk at least once more on the 500GB.

Let the computer finish booting. Then do a proper Windows shutdown.

Reinstalled the 500GB back as a primary (I do have a 60GB where I keep all my critical data - so my panic for lost data wasn't severe. just the pain of reinstalling everything). It booted up fine without any issues.

Now I do have a separate 500GB USB Free Agent which I use for backups. Plus I do dual boot either into Windows XP or Linux Ubuntu, depending on my mood. So having Linux Live CD's around is handy.

There are various recovery softwares out there if all else fails. Some as freeware. Remember Don't do anything to the ill drive, till you recover what files you want. There is a Live Clonezilla.