Windows just Trashed 1TB data External HDD

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  1. Posts : 579
    Windows 10
       #1

    Windows just Trashed 1TB data External HDD


    Hi,
    Just 12h after upgrade from Win8.1 to Win10 , and the Worst Case Disaster happened: I lost 1TB data on my external HDD in Seconds!
    I lost my last Windows 8.1 System Image, so I can not go back!
    I lost 3 VM´s, which contained very important Data and I have no means of recover them, is lost for ever.
    Are that people at MS aware of the DAMAGE they are doing to people?!

    Background:
    I had a Vitual Machine Win 10 (VHD) on a External HDD.
    I tried to make a System Image saving it to that external HDD and there was a error, File/Directory error.
    I run Scan and Fix from explorer, It asked to run now or by the next reboot. I answer Now.
    At once the HDD was showing in Explorer as it was Empty/Unformated. I checked it , there 0 bytes Free and 0 bytes available at Volume Name was Empty.
    I run CHKDSK. There was a long list of corrections (see LOG Attachment). I was looking at it and it says: First NTFS was unreadable, was using Second NTFS. After data it says it was DELETING all the wrong information, at the end, I lost almost all Data there was in Drive.
    So, CHKDSK was NOT correcting , was DELETING all data!!!!
    After this I was trying to Explore Drive and there was a message "Access Denied".
    The next step was "Take Ownership" .
    I have been looking to the "Security Settings" of the Drive (see pictures) and I concluded that the main Problem was coming from that Security, some of the Default Settings were removed, the Ownership was assigned to a "Account Unkown".
    Because of that stupid "Security and Ownership" I lost my precious Data!
    I am pissed off!

    Question:
    - Is there a way to recover my Data? I do not believe in it.
    - Is there the possibility that It can happen again? Can it be that it could happen to any Partition on my PC?
    - It there a possibility to completely Disable all that "Security / Ownership" in System

    It seems it is a recurrent problem, as I could read in this post Secondary Drives is locked, assessed denied. Unable to get permission. - Page 2 - Windows 10 Forums , almost from 1 Year ago.

    Thank you

    EDIT: I don´t think there was any Errors on HDD, Windows simply was getting "confused" with "users and Ownership".

    Attachment 93142Windows just Trashed 1TB data External HDD-access0.jpgWindows just Trashed 1TB data External HDD-access3.jpgWindows just Trashed 1TB data External HDD-access4.jpg
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  2. Posts : 4,752
    Windows 11 Pro 64 Bit 22H2
       #2

    Windows didn't destroy your drive, the External drive had several Bad Sectors on it. The data that was on the Bad Sectors was corrupted and unreadable. Check Disk tried to move the data to a good sector near by, but there were too many. And the files became orphaned and Check Disk stated removing them.
    Try the free TestDisk program I have had the best luck with GetDataBack. You will need another drive of the same size or larger to restore your files to.
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  3. Posts : 579
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #3

    spunk said:
    Windows didn't destroy your drive, the External drive had several Bad Sectors on it. The data that was on the Bad Sectors was corrupted and unreadable. Check Disk tried to move the data to a good sector near by, but there were too many. And the files became orphaned and Check Disk stated removing them.
    Try the free TestDisk program I have had the best luck with GetDataBack. You will need another drive of the same size or larger to restore your files to.
    Thank you ,
    I think all Data that CHDSK was not able to recover is lost for ever. Do you believe there is a chance with GetDataBack to recover it?
    I doubt very much that there is any Hardware problem with the Drive. It is less than 2 Years old , is an external Drive and it has little usage, just Backup usage and it has been always carefully stored , so I consider it more or less a fresh Drive.
    Anyway, see the link above, it seems that it is a Bug in OS.
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  4. Posts : 22,740
    Windows 10 Home x64
       #4

    Adalwar said:
    Thank you ,
    I think all Data that CHDSK was not able to recover is lost for ever. Do you believe there is a chance with GetDataBack to recover it?
    I doubt very much that there is any Hardware problem with the Drive. It is less than 2 Years old , is an external Drive and it has little usage, just Backup usage and it has been always carefully stored , so I consider it more or less a fresh Drive.
    Anyway, see the link above, it seems that it is a Bug in OS.
    One way to find out if it is the OS is to plug the external drive into another PC and see what happens. To date I've never heard of an OS trashing a HDD.
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  5. Posts : 8,057
    windows 10
       #5

    Part of the problem is your files were owned by the old Windows user so when you sign in with a new version of Windows it doesn't have ownership of the files. Your first move should be to try and take an image of the drive as any messing with it can stop any recovery by overwrite data
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  6. Posts : 579
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #6

    BunnyJ said:
    One way to find out if it is the OS is to plug the external drive into another PC and see what happens. To date I've never heard of an OS trashing a HDD.
    Hi BunnyJ,
    I already connected to other PC, and Data is GONE!
    See the link above, suddenly there is that "Access Denied", it means, that the "Ownership" of HDD was changed without any reason.
    That was happening also with my HDD.
    I believe that it is all around the "Security/Ownership" that at a Time it goes wrong.
    I see no other explanation, my Hardware is quite new, I am experienced in PC, I am using OS and Utilities very normal, I know exactly what I am doing, I do not tamper with things around. I can not explain this, it is mysterious for me.
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  7. Posts : 11,247
    Windows / Linux : Arch Linux
       #7

    Hi there

    All HDD's should have data backed up regularly -- I have a media server with 9TB and 7.7 TB HDD's (RAID) and still back this up from time to time.

    There should be a BLOCK on anybody usuing a computer until the have understood the concept of Backup and have taken some.

    I really have ZERO sympathy here --backup programs are cheap or even free --add up your time to re-create the data (if it's even possible) and you can see that taking backups is one of the best investments in time and effort you are ever likely to make when using a computer.

    1 and 2 TB external passport HDD's are reasonably cheap --or even better get something like a 2 r 4 bay HDD sata--> USB3 enclosure --performance on these is more than adequate on USB 3 ports and you can have them off line after backup. Things like HORNTTEK have built in RAID / JBOD (works as 2X / 4X HDD as a single HDD) or individual HDD's if you prefer.

    Cheers
    jimbo
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  8. Posts : 579
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       #8

    Samuria said:
    Part of the problem is your files were owned by the old Windows user so when you sign in with a new version of Windows it doesn't have ownership of the files. Your first move should be to try and take an image of the drive as any messing with it can stop any recovery by overwrite data
    Hi Samuria,
    Could you please explain me that with "old user / new user" more Detailed?
    I believe the user is the same, I did the Upgrade and there was no new Account created, by my knowledge.
    Anyway, if there is anything related to users accounts, it should NEVER and EVER lead to loss of Data/FS Corruption what ever. That is NO Security at all.

    But, look at 1st picture, you see that the Ownership of Drive F: was changed to "Account Unknown". First , is it Possible to Assign Ownership to an nonexistent account???? I did not created it, who created it? It Exist on my System or it was assigned just on the fly to my Drive? OS Created it and Assigned it? I think there is a huge problem here with Accounts and Ownership.
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  9. Posts : 42,734
    Win 10 Pro (22H2) (2nd PC is 22H2)
       #9

    Just 12h after upgrade from Win8.1 to Win10 , and the Worst Case Disaster happened: I lost 1TB data on my external HDD in Seconds!
    I lost my last Windows 8.1 System Image, so I can not go back!
    Assuming nothing (else) goes wrong, you have the right to revert to your previous system from within Windows for up to 30 days (and the right thereafter to reinstall Win 10 on the same system).

    That doesn't need - if all goes well- an image of your previous system, but it is an excellent idea to have created one.
    Last edited by dalchina; 31 Jul 2016 at 09:10.
      My Computers


  10. Posts : 92
    Windows 10 pro 64bit
       #10

    Adalwar said:
    Hi,
    Just 12h after upgrade from Win8.1 to Win10 , and the Worst Case Disaster happened: I lost 1TB data on my external HDD in Seconds!
    I lost my last Windows 8.1 System Image, so I can not go back!
    *snip*
    Windows did not delete your files because of a security error. Chkdsk found errors in the primary ntfs table and tried to recover the files via it's secondary and was unable to do so. these errors could be hardware/firmware/USB related or just because of poor/incomplete writes due to the drive being removed to soon after being written too, to rule out hardware you would need to run the diagnostic tool of who ever made the drive (but don't do it now!)

    STOP trying to change ownership or edit anything on the disk, the more you do it the less chance of recovering data intact.

    Use a data recovery suit (getdataback or other) to try and rescue any data available and save anything you can on another drive.

    now check the drive with the diagnostics suit to see if the drive has actual hard errors, or it was a just a poor read/write caused by "something" (really this could be a long list), if it has hardware errors and is in warranty return it.

    As stated before using a single usb drive, being used for VM's is not a backup plan, everything on that drive should of either been cloned to another USB drive, or ideally either a USB caddy/NAS backup sollution.

    I have multiple USB drives created on many different machines and users and OS's and have not had this issue with upgrades/usb drive swapping.
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