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How to initialize an unknown hdd with all its space unallocated

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cpptrialanderror

PCHF Member
Jan 8, 2022
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#1
os windows 10
A little history, i had win xp on it 10 years ago and i bios locked it. Years passed, i found the hdd and i cant remember the password. So i formatted the hdd with aomei partition assistant(by the way, the hdd is 160gb and it took 5 days to format it with a single pass, fun!). Aomei sees all clusters bad. I don't believe it.
Disk management sees "Disk unknown" "Not Initiialized" and all space "Unallocated". Nothing can be done there, i always get the same error "the request could not be performed because of an i/o device error", whenever i try to initialize it. The hdd is internal and cables, connections work fine.
Diskpart sees: Disk 1 Online (size) 149 GB (free) 149 GB
I can 'select', 'clean' but i cannot create primary partition
"DiskPart has encountered an error: The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error.
See the System Event Log for more information.".
Last Cmd
i run "mountvol" on cmd to get this:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Possible values for VolumeName along with current mount points are:

\\?\Volume{10e1f55a-f479-11df-9ff4-806e6f6e6963}\
C:\
\\?\Volume{bf63a17f-0000-0000-0000-905474000000}\
*** NO MOUNT POINTS ***
----------------------------------------------------------------------
and then i run:
chkdsk "\\?\Volume{bf63a17f-0000-0000-0000-905474000000}"
and i get this

---------------------------------------------------------------------
The type of the file system is NTFS.

WARNING! /F parameter not specified.
Running CHKDSK in read-only mode.

Stage 1: Examining basic file system structure ...
256 file records processed.
File verification completed.
Phase duration (File record verification): 4.71 milliseconds.
0 large file records processed.
Phase duration (Orphan file record recovery): 0.93 milliseconds.
0 bad file records processed.
Phase duration (Bad file record checking): 1.11 milliseconds.

Stage 2: Examining file name linkage ...
282 index entries processed.
Index verification completed.
Phase duration (Index verification): 2.42 milliseconds.
0 unindexed files scanned.
Phase duration (Orphan reconnection): 1.14 milliseconds.
0 unindexed files recovered to lost and found.
Phase duration (Orphan recovery to lost and found): 1.21 milliseconds.
0 reparse records processed.
0 reparse records processed.
Phase duration (Reparse point and Object ID verification): 3.45 milliseconds.

Stage 3: Examining security descriptors ...
Security descriptor verification completed.
Phase duration (Security descriptor verification): 27.38 milliseconds.
14 data files processed.
Phase duration (Data attribute verification): 1.21 milliseconds.
CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal...
2112 USN bytes processed.
Usn Journal verification completed.
Phase duration (USN journal verification): 1.91 milliseconds.

Windows has scanned the file system and found no problems.
No further action is required.

460799 KB total disk space.
342140 KB in 9 files.
76 KB in 15 indexes.
0 KB in bad sectors.
5103 KB in use by the system.
4160 KB occupied by the log file.
113480 KB available on disk.

4096 bytes in each allocation unit.
115199 total allocation units on disk.
28370 allocation units available on disk.
Total duration: 46.13 milliseconds (46 ms).
-----------------------------------------------------------

Can we make this hdd work?
Is there something i am doing wrong?
Thank you for your time.
 
#2
to confirm, is the HD locked or the BIOS?
the first stops you using the drive, the second stops you entering BIOS but still allows use of the PC.

you are accessing the old drive from that old PC, and it's the only drive in the PC?

a low level format of a 160GB drive should take around 2-4 hours. if it took 5 days then I'm thinking it was finding a crap tonne of bad sectors.

any reason why this drive is important - family pics, tax records, or such?
 
#3
Bruce said:
to confirm, is the HD locked or the BIOS?
the first stops you using the drive, the second stops you entering BIOS but still allows use of the PC.

you are accessing the old drive from that old PC, and it's the only drive in the PC?

a low level format of a 160GB drive should take around 2-4 hours. if it took 5 days then I'm thinking it was finding a crap tonne of bad sectors.

any reason why this drive is important - family pics, tax records, or such?
Click to expand...
The HD was locked. I am trying to make it work from a new pc and it is not the only hard drive. I have a working hdd which is the c in the post above and the non working one (the point of the post) which has no letter assigned to it. As i said Aomei scan says the disk is full of bad sectors. I am certain it is not because i was using it years ago and it had no problem. The drive is not important, as far as i can remember. I had stored in a map that i had drawn the location of a big big treasure but meh... i don't need it
 
#4
Diskpart, Disk Management and AOMEI all say the drive is bad - I'm not sure why you don't believe them! :)

yes, sitting idle in a cardboard for an extended period, in itself, should not account for the drive going pear shaped, but what other factors may be at play - the old PC was moved and knocked too harshly, dust, critters, moisture, magnetism, and who knows what else.

I think you are wasting your time on a small, old, slow, unreliable drive that at best would only be of use as a backup drive and even them, not a trusted one.

1TB 2.5" drives are $AUD45. (y)

edit: sorry, that shoud read 3.5" drive.
 
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#5
Bruce said:
Diskpart, Disk Management and AOMEI all say the drive is bad - I'm not sure why you don't believe them! :)

yes, sitting idle in a cardboard for an extended period, in itself, should not account for the drive going pear shaped, but what other factors may be at play - the old PC was moved and knocked too harshly, dust, critters, moisture, magnetism, and who knows what else.

I think you are wasting your time on a small, old, slow, unreliable drive that at best would only be of use as a backup drive and even them, not a trusted one.

1TB 2.5" drives are $AUD45. (y)
Click to expand...
Does the info i provided with ckdsk indicates that the drive is broken?
If yes, sorry for wasting everybodys time and please tell me what part exactly states that (because i thought that chcdsk said the disk was fine).
I am using this to learn about disk management, and maybe get the disk to work if possible.
 
#6
when using the CHKDSK command, you provided no parameters, so only a very basic check was done, supported by the fact it only took 46 milliseconds to complete.
that duration could be explained by the disk being empty, completely unreadable or by it only finding 460799 KB total disk space.
it should have found something like 160000000 KB.

and volume {bf63a17f-0000-0000-0000-905474000000} may be the only readable partition on that drive.
most drives get about three partitions created when Windows is installed. and prebuilt ones can have OEM and Recovery partitions as well.

is the 160GB drive IDE or SATA?
if IDE, the jumpers on the front of it may need changing to make it a slave drive in the new PC.
 
#7
Bruce said:
when using the CHKDSK command, you provided no parameters, so only a very basic check was done, supported by the fact it only took 46 milliseconds to complete.
that duration could be explained by the disk being empty, completely unreadable or by it only finding 460799 KB total disk space.
it should have found something like 160000000 KB.

and volume {bf63a17f-0000-0000-0000-905474000000} may be the only readable partition on that drive.
most drives get about three partitions created when Windows is installed. and prebuilt ones can have OEM and Recovery partitions as well.

is the 160GB drive IDE or SATA?
if IDE, the jumpers on the front of it may need changing to make it a slave drive in the new PC.
Click to expand...
I have done chkdsk with /f, /r but nothing usefull showed there so i didn't paste it here. Seeing you saying that about the disk space got me thinking. My current windows recovery partition on the healthy disk is 450mb and i was wondering if this is what we are seeing here.(A recovery partition of the bad hard drive).
It is SATA.
 
#8
hmmm... good pickup.
volume ID's are only given to partitions the OS can see, that {bf63a17f-0000-0000-0000-905474000000} is for another partition on the C:\ of the good PC.
so yes, the incorrect Volume ID was used from the get-go.

if you are deeply into this, next I would try plugging the dead drive into a Linux OS and seeing if it has better luck - highly doubtful though.
you could create a Mint or Puppy distro on a bootable USB stick and boot the PC using that stick.

but I have to say again, I think you are chasing your tail down a rabbit hole. :cool:
 
#10
Bruce said:
@cpptrialanderror - any updates?
Click to expand...
First of all i am new to linux but i think i did things properly.
I ve tried booting with linux debian but on the partitioning steps i had problems. "fsyncing/closing /dev/sda input/output error" which seems to indicate that the hard drive is dead. So propably this is a waste of time. The only thing that is left is to find out what the hell was aomei wiping out for 5 days.

I am actually very annoyed about that. If the disk is broken and you have input output problems (reading and writing to the disk) what was aomei wiping?

Because i know that wiping a disk involves reading and writing. Please correct me if i am wrong. :confused:
 
Last edited by a moderator:
#11
Ok, I think we are now at the stage where we can say that 160GB is dead.
let's bury it in a very deep hole and move on! :)

as to what took 5 days - who can say. maybe it was accessing some other partition (we do have skin in the game for getting confused on this front), or maybe you had it pointing to the right drive, but again, being dead, it just couldn't progress through the tracks, sectors... who knows.
and depending on what was actually bad about the disk, and how the programmers of aomei thought to cater for such a condition - again, who can say.
 
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