How to Recover Data From a Hard Drive With a Bad Sector

Eventually all hard drives will develop bad sectors, which are areas of the hard drive that cannot be read. Some bad sectors are caused naturally from normal use, others are caused from improper operation and viruses. Either way if there's important data on a bad sector you are desperate to recover that information and there are several ways you can do so without paying money.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. Enter the Recovery Console Disk. If you have Windows XP on your computer you probably have a Windows XP Recovery Console disk. Recovery console has an extensive diagnostic mode with special tools that allow you to detect and repair bad sectors.

2. Turn the computer on with the disk inside. A black screen will appear that says "press any key to boot from CD". Press a key and move to the next screen.

3. Allow the Recovery Console to Setup. You don't need to do anything while the software loads files in preparation for Recovery Console. When Setup is done press the necessary key to enter Recovery Console mode.

4. Choose the proper Windows installation then enter your administration password to verify the installation. (If you don't have a password or Windows logs you in automatically try pressing enter.)

5. When Recovery Console is fully loaded type chkdsk /r in the command prompt. The chkdsk command will scan the hard drive for damaged areas and if there is any readable data it will be recovered. If any problems are found they will be corrected and you will see a notification pop up on the screen otherwise chkdsk hasn't found any problems.

6. Take out the CD and type exit. Restart your computer.

7. If you still have not recovered missing data there are data recovery programs that can be downloaded from the internet for free, such as PC Inspector.

Tips & Warnings

• Once data is recovered make sure to save a back up file on another hard drive or a disk.