incorrect size for 3TB disk in testdisk. In Windows it's OK.

[delirium83]

Hi guys,

I have a disk that lost its partitions while copying a lot of files (100k files with 900GB in total) and is shown as RAW in Windows 7 (64bit). It's connected via eSATA in case that matters. Windows correctly saw the disk as 3TB all the time and the RAW partition is shown to be ca. 2794GB, too.

My problem is that when I start testdisk, it shows me the disk as 746GB. Due to the warning at the bottom of the testdisk window and cases of lost data reported in this forum when proceeding with a problem like this, I'd like to get testdisk to correctly detect my disk before I try any recovery.

What could be problems that lead to this faulty detection in testdisk but a correct detection in Win7?

Any help would be greatly appreciated,
del

[Fiona]

Did you use the 64bit-version of TestDisk?
In your case only testdisk6.14WIP 32bit-version is recommended.
Probably your 764 GB at the bottom is not a disk but a drive?
It means a partition.
In case, you should use your disk instead of your drive.
Please repeat your diagnose and copy and paste the content of your testdisk.log.
Also some infos about your disk from your disk management console are appreciated.
Reason is, is your disk a GPT disk?
Disks larger than 2.2 TB needs to be a GPT disk.
Intel MBR is not supported and can cause loss of data.

It's connected via eSATA in case that matters.

Did you remove your disk from its enclosure or has it been internally?
Because a lot of external disk are hardware encrypted through a key chip and not even the user noticed it.

Fiona

[delirium83]

First of all thanks for your ideas! On your questions:

I use the 32bit version as recommended.
I used the disk, not the partition. But, The reason for the small size couldn't have been the partition as there is only one that spans the complete 3TB (GPT)

Please repeat your diagnose and copy and paste the content of your testdisk.log.

I'll post that file as soon as I get home from work.

Did you remove your disk from its enclosure or has it been internally?
Because a lot of external disk are hardware encrypted through a key chip and not even the user noticed it.

I used it in the external enclosure, however I doubt that encryption caused this issue (see next point).

I now circumvented the problem by connecting the enclosure (FANTEC DB-ALU3e) via USB3 (USB2 not tested), which showed the full 3TB. But I'd still be interested in a solution to this on eSATA, hence I'll post the testdisk.log later and maybe we can find the issue as I think it's very weird that Windows can see the full capacity over eSATA but testdisk cannot.

[Fiona]

Would it be possible to check your disk management console, is your disk listed as Basic (Intel-MBR) or GPT too?
Info would be appreciated

Fiona

[lezardsouffle]

My problem is almost exactly the same as that above, so I thought I'd post to this same thread.

3TB WD Caviar drive became inacessible and went RAW on me after 8 months upon writing about 2.2TB to it. I have not done any writing or formatting to the disk since it happened. WD's diagnostic utility (extended scan) says the drive passed, no errors.

Though Windows sees it as Basic/Healthy/RAW and 2794.39GB, testdisk_win only sees 746GB, and I can't figure out how to correct that so I can run TestDisk. Ideas? Thanks.

Background:
OS: Win 7 64-bit with ability to run 32-bit apps
drive is internal and data only - a single 3TB partition, containing mostly jpg, mpg, and mp3 files.
I don't know if I originally formatted it as GPT or not, since my understanding was that GPT was only necessary if you were going to boot from a 3TB drive, which I wasn't. (Right-clicking on the drive in Disk Management offers a grayed-out "Convert to MBR disk" option. The only live option is "Convert to Dynamic Disk".)

[Himajin]

I have this exact same problem, also with a 3TB WD Caviar drive.
My drive also only shows as 746GB in TestDisk, and the corruption seems to have been caused while copying files just as I reached the 2.2TB mark. The disk is listed as "Basic" in Disk Management, and I believe I formatted it as NTFS, believing that alternative formatting was only necessary if I was using it as a boot disk.

Could this be due to motherboard incompatibility with 3TB drives? (the correct size is listed in the bios, so I assumed I was okay in this area). Was I mistaken in believing that NTFS can be used for 3TB volumes when the drive is only used for storage?

I haven't had any luck retrieving any data with TestDisk, as none of the partitions found during analysis can be restored, and the correct size is not listed in the first place. Is there any solution for this?

Thanks in advance for any advice you can provide.

[MrTorque]

Hey.

I do also have a very similar problem (maybe the exact same). How did you guys solve the Problem?

[Schmill]

Hi - is there any solution to this?

I pulled the drive from a Synology NAS to try and recover files from it (from the "2790.01GB Healthy (Primary Partition)" ).

I've tried it on both Win7 32bit and 64 bit, and both give me the same problem.

Windows Partition manager correctly shows the size of the drive at 3TB:

DriveSize-Windows.JPG (36.18 KiB) Viewed 7820 times

However PhotoRec does not, and instead shows 801 GB as the drive size (it does correctly identify my native Windows drives as 1TB and 2TB respectively though):

DriveSize-PhotoRec.JPG (50.61 KiB) Viewed 7820 times

[cgrenier]

Do you have an incorrect disk size when using the 7.0 version ?
Can you also try the linux version of TestDisk ? See https://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk.pdf on how to create a Linux LiveUSB.