External HDD - Access Denied error

Hi.

I use an external HDD for backups. I have found the following:
1. When using Macrium Reflect backup, post backup process, the HDD is not accessible by me. But Macrium reflect can still access it.
2. I've changed ownership on the HDD after searching about Access Denied issue. I was able to get the access and data back. However, as soon as I run `chckdsk F: /f /r` the HDD is no longer accessible.

This behavior is very strange. Mostly because when my backup software is done, the HDD is no longer accessible. I have never encountered this before.




I'm on Windows 11, but this problem was also present on windows 10.

Hello

From all the problems i had with this, and 1000's of other Microsoft users, its seems to be that the problem is with chkdsk itself. Its actually causing the issue. It does it on Win8.1 Win10.

Have a read on the error and good luck. I believe it has something to do with a simple command which runs from *.ICO files and turns the NTFS partition into RAW. Not a nice bug

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/error-message-when-you-run-the-chkdsk-exe-utility-in-read-only-mode-on-a-windows-based-computer-the-volume-bitmap-is-incorrect-or-error-detected-in-index-$i30-for-file-5-fdc5e722-816e-844c-2e6c-f2fe7cc03946

- - - Updated - - -

Say, there is ALOT of Microsoft users who have lost 20 years worth of files, pictures, new borns, marriages and almost ruined their lives.
It happened to me about 3 years ago. I lost 15 years worth of family pictures, festivals, my life all gone in the flash of chkdsk.
It got me down for a long time and i still havnt got over it, well, im getting there

Pluginz said:

Hello

From all the problems i had with this, and 1000's of other Microsoft users, its seems to be that the problem is with chkdsk itself. Its actually causing the issue. It does it on Win8.1 Win10.

Have a read on the error and good luck. I believe it has something to do with a simple command which runs from *.ICO files and turns the NTFS partition into RAW. Not a nice bug

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/error-message-when-you-run-the-chkdsk-exe-utility-in-read-only-mode-on-a-windows-based-computer-the-volume-bitmap-is-incorrect-or-error-detected-in-index-$i30-for-file-5-fdc5e722-816e-844c-2e6c-f2fe7cc03946

- - - Updated - - -

Say, there is ALOT of Microsoft users who have lost 20 years worth of files, pictures, new borns, marriages and almost ruined their lives.
It happened to me about 3 years ago. I lost 15 years worth of family pictures, festivals, my life all gone in the flash of chkdsk.
It got me down for a long time and i still havnt got over it, well, im getting there

According to the link you provided, this bug supposed to be fixd already.

However, this is not limited to chckdsk. This happens with Macrium Reflect as well.

Hi Gil,

Which one is not available after backup the source or the destination drive ?

Sometimes after restoring or making a backup The system does not remount the source / destination drive correctly, This can happen with nearly all software that does this kind of work... And I have some disk that will always fail to mount others never...

It's normal for windows to have unmounted the disk that it is checking and you should not worry with that until it completes.

MaloK said:

Hi Gil,

Which one is not available after backup the source or the destination drive ?

Sometimes after restoring or making a backup The system does not remount the source / destination drive correctly, This can happen with nearly all software that does this kind of work... And I have some disk that will always fail to mount others never...

It's normal for windows to have unmounted the disk that it is checking and you should not worry with that until it completes.

The destination drive is not available.
The source is C: drive. This drive is being backed up. I don't need to restore it (hopefully never).
F: drive is the destination. During or post backup process, F: drive is no longer accessible, even after a PC reboot.

gil said:

According to the link you provided, this bug supposed to be fixd already.

However, this is not limited to chckdsk. This happens with Macrium Reflect as well.

Ahh thats interesting to know

This is why redundancy is needed when saving these files. Not only on local backup, also on multiple cloud backups.

Still it does not eludes why the destination drive is disappearing from file manager...

@gil. Can you verify how the drive is doing with something like HD sentinel or Chrystal disk info ?

Backup destination normally never comes offline doing a backup.

MaloK said:

Still it does not eludes why the destination drive is disappearing from file manager...

@gil. Can you verify how the drive is doing with something like HD sentinel or Chrystal disk info ?

Backup destination normally never comes offline doing a backup.

It does since I was able to change ownership and stop using Macrium Reflect backup software. Since then the HDD is accessible. Once I start using Macrium, this will happen again.
So for now, not using any backup software keeps the HDD accessible. This is WD BLUE 5400RPM.
Mind you, this happens with a 2TB WD Black HDD as well. I swapped HDD's to verify if it's a faulty HDD, obviously it isn't. It's something to do with the backup process / vss / windows.

Ok,
When i had this problem with my USB hard drive, i kind of found my own work around which has seemed to clear it manually for now.

Corruption was being caused by a secondry 'volume' which had attatched itself to the USB disk whilst connected at some point. Maybe possibly in a Windows setup, i still dont know.
In the Windows setup, i could see that the problem USB disk had this bogus partition attatched to it, which was 0mb in size.
I just couldnt remove the damn thing. Well i could, if i wiped the whole drive.
So i deleted the whole disk, then created a new one, and it would re create itself and the 0mb partition re appeared in the Windows setup. Sticky thing.

I went to the Command Prompt and loaded up Diskpart.

I used the 'List Disk' command first. Then selected the problem disk with, 'Select Disk 1' for example.
Then i used the 'List Volume' and i found the little bugger!
The problem 0mb partition it looked like had attatched itself as another volume showing as 'Volume 0' !!!!

When i selected volume 0, next i did 'Delete Volume' this removed the 0mb partition i saw in the Windows setup, hooray

This has fixed the error for good. This same USB hard drive has now been installed into my desktop machine.
I have ran Seatools as its a Seagate Barracuda, with 100% good disk and no problems since !