Another geometry question - deadlock?
Posted: 27 Mar 2012, 16:58
Hello,
First of all i wanted to say great software and great support, it comes automatically to mind when reading this forum. Unfortunately my problem is not listed yet. Please allow me to explain.
There is this Thinkpad R60 of about 4 years old. It's an XP machine that crashed and lost its bootsector, it came up with "no operating system found". I whipped out the Mepis 8 live CD, a Debian based linux version, and let testdisk analyze the disk. Almost immediately it began to complain about the number of heads, 255 where it should be 240. Please use geometry to adjust. First i let it do a deeper search but no partitions were found. So i did adjust the geometry to 240, and this time it found the partitions. I could list the data too so I presumed this to be ok and wrote the partition table to disk. Then I let it copy the backup bootsector, an all looked fine. But the XP machine wouldn't boot, it just sat there with a black screen and a blinking cursor and nothing happened.
Ok, so i ran testdisk off the linux live CD again. This time it complained it is the other way round, 240 NTFS where HD says 255. Gparted mentions 255 heads too. Taking a look at the bootsector section shows the controversy between 240 and 255 too, where at first (when i copied the backup bootsector) it showed no warnings.
When i do a analysis with a 255 geometry it finds the partitions now, but theyre marked as Deleted. Accessing the data on them works fine though, in Deleted mode. Structure Ok. However the FAT32 Service partition gives a Structure Bad on anything else than the D-flag. Trying to change the D on the XP partition to a * (primary bootable) and save to disk doesn't do a thing because the XP install won't boot. Next time I run testdisk they both show up as Deleted again. Bootsectors are still warned about in terms of 240 and 255 heads that don't match.
So my dillemma is that I cant adjust the heads to 240 because that generates a heads mismatch and I can't adjust any partitions found under 255 heads. Linux will mount the disk, listed as 255 heads, although it must be forced to do so, resetting $logfile. I have copied off the data itself, works fine under linux. But XP just won't boot.
Please advise? It seems I am out of options on this one. I'm sure I'm overlooking something here but I can't think of what it might be. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Kind regards,
mvm - working on cwi's computer
First of all i wanted to say great software and great support, it comes automatically to mind when reading this forum. Unfortunately my problem is not listed yet. Please allow me to explain.
There is this Thinkpad R60 of about 4 years old. It's an XP machine that crashed and lost its bootsector, it came up with "no operating system found". I whipped out the Mepis 8 live CD, a Debian based linux version, and let testdisk analyze the disk. Almost immediately it began to complain about the number of heads, 255 where it should be 240. Please use geometry to adjust. First i let it do a deeper search but no partitions were found. So i did adjust the geometry to 240, and this time it found the partitions. I could list the data too so I presumed this to be ok and wrote the partition table to disk. Then I let it copy the backup bootsector, an all looked fine. But the XP machine wouldn't boot, it just sat there with a black screen and a blinking cursor and nothing happened.
Ok, so i ran testdisk off the linux live CD again. This time it complained it is the other way round, 240 NTFS where HD says 255. Gparted mentions 255 heads too. Taking a look at the bootsector section shows the controversy between 240 and 255 too, where at first (when i copied the backup bootsector) it showed no warnings.
When i do a analysis with a 255 geometry it finds the partitions now, but theyre marked as Deleted. Accessing the data on them works fine though, in Deleted mode. Structure Ok. However the FAT32 Service partition gives a Structure Bad on anything else than the D-flag. Trying to change the D on the XP partition to a * (primary bootable) and save to disk doesn't do a thing because the XP install won't boot. Next time I run testdisk they both show up as Deleted again. Bootsectors are still warned about in terms of 240 and 255 heads that don't match.
So my dillemma is that I cant adjust the heads to 240 because that generates a heads mismatch and I can't adjust any partitions found under 255 heads. Linux will mount the disk, listed as 255 heads, although it must be forced to do so, resetting $logfile. I have copied off the data itself, works fine under linux. But XP just won't boot.
Please advise? It seems I am out of options on this one. I'm sure I'm overlooking something here but I can't think of what it might be. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Kind regards,
mvm - working on cwi's computer