The hardisk's files keep disappearing

[muitommy]

I'm just getting craz' with the problems of disappearing of file in those NTFS partition.

My configure, with 3 hardisk, the first hardisk with four partitons, xp©, mac(D), vista(E) , and one data drive(F), except the mac one for sure, the others are in NTFS. And the two following hardisk are also for saving data in NTFS. I indicate that to be G & H

When I log on into Mac OS X, sometimes, the drive G & H will gone disappear , or either one. SOmetimes i get pass the problems with booting twice, and everythings go fine again. The hardisk G & H do shown in the finder, but after sometimes, at least half and hour or less or more, it's varying. And the file in either one of the partiitons G & H will go disppear, the finder still show the available spaces. But such a kinds of thing never happen to my first hardisk, and the data drive F which is in ntfs. And somethimes i can get pass this by relauching the finders, but somethimes i can't be, and this force me to reboot ...

Anyone have a ideas of these annoying problems????

 

[McSkywalker]

Do you really need those data HD's to be NTFS? Because my solution to that situation would be formatting one or both of the HD's as Fat32. In my setup, I use the Fat32 partition as a bridge partition between Mac OS and XP. I store everyday data on it. (music, movies, etc.) I never experienced such instabilities that way.

 

PS: As an advantage, you'll have a single Itunes folder stored in one place and you'll get rid of mp3 clutter.

[MartaMarco]

A Question

 

Sorry but FAT 32 Supports Large Hard disks like 160gb or 250 gb?

 

Bye

[GBK.Xscape]

yea i have an external drive that is fat 32. only problem is that you cant have files 4gb or bigger on it. so it will hold 250gb but not files that are over 4 gb each. kinda sucks because NFTS supports te bigger files but a macosx cant write to that type. does any one know why it doesnt? did apple make it that way on purpose to stop apple and windows combination? even though they have bootcamp it doesnt make much sense to me.

[McSkywalker]

Well, I don't keep my fat files in the fat32 partition And I generally need them in windows.

[BuXb]

Sounds pretty much like a partiton map error.

 

Use the DOS version of Partiton Magic 8.05. e.g. booting from CD if you do not have a DOS boot partition on your HD(s). If it starts with an error Message "ExtendedX partition found" have it corrrect these errors until no errors occur anymore. If other error messages pop up post them here.

 

PS: please don't PM me for PM 805 .. and don't use any version before 8.05, they don't work with HFS partitions within the partiton table ..

[muitommy]

Thanks for all who helping me

 

BUt one question about PM805, when i'm installing mac and using pm805 to assign my partition, it's usually get ends with partition table error, it's fine when i'm using other utilty, like acronis disk. And so far, i just keep ignoring this error message, maybe it's the problems.

But I really don't where are these errors come from?

 

Now, i'm using external drive to copy files between XP and Mac, ya , it's quite trouble for me!

 

Recently, i want to save some movie disc and image files to my disk for backup, it's convenient to convert all partitions to ntfs, but this seem to be no way back, can i convert the partitions from ntfs back to fat32 without losing any files, because i have tried that before, many files have gone!!

 

And i've check my hardisk, there's no partition table error now, but another problem pop up for my G drive, running chkdisk , it said some file segment is unreadable, and can't fix it. Check it in pm8, and it said file record marked used/1608 , and bad file record sign ...8092-8095 /1507 , the problem seem not related to mac, and i just post this up if anyones know how to fix this. Chkdsk is not working!!!

[BuXb]

See, I knew you had partition errors, why didn't you indicate that in your opening posting?

 

BUt one question about PM805, when i'm installing mac and using pm805 to assign my partition, it's usually get ends with partition table error, it's fine when i'm using other utilty, like acronis disk.

they are not as thourough detecting partition errors.

 

And so far, i just keep ignoring this error message, maybe it's the problems.

 

Yes it most likely is.

 

But I really don't where are these errors come from?

 

Disk Utility is not meant to run on PC partition schemes. It is still OK to use it to format a partition to install Mac OS x86 to AS LONG AS THERE ARE NO PARTITIONS ABOVE IT, esp. no Extended partitions.

 

Back up all your data (Ghost; True Image) to another HD, have PM 805 repair ALL partition errors. If your partition scheme is not too exotic you will have good luck. If it is too much out of bound PM will repair your partition scheme to trash, but that's correct then, too. Then you will have to restore the backups you made, Mac OS x86 first, then run PM 805 etc. After each single partition restore run PM 805 DOS so you can narrow down the culprit.

 

- you cannot write to NTFS from Mac OS as you will know.

 

- NTFS is not meant to be reverted to FAT32. Very often that causes loss of data. The other way it is usually no problem.

 

To share a partition with full write support between Mac and Windows use Ext2 Installable File System For Windows.

 

And i've check my hardisk, there's no partition table error now, but another problem pop up for my G drive, running chkdisk , it said some file segment is unreadable, and can't fix it. Check it in pm8, and it said file record marked used/1608 , and bad file record sign ...8092-8095 /1507 , the problem seem not related to mac, and i just post this up if anyones know how to fix this. Chkdsk is not working!!!

 

it's really getting all the way off-topic here now, we're talking basics now .. Anyway, copy all data from G somewhere else (drive or partition), delete the G partition with whatever partition tool (best PM 805 DOS), remake it, FORMAT it (not quick but FULL format) with the desired filesystem. If formating goes through without error messages your HD isn't physically damaged --> fortunate. Depending on the amount of bad sectors (if there are any) you might need to consider to exchange your HD which contains the G drive..

 

Bugs.

[muitommy]

Thanks for your detailed replys

Just have a look if i can get pass this errors without formating the drive.

That's seem impossible as you say, so i have to format it now, it's a whole night job to copy 200G files . ^^

[ion]

It happened to me again. A lot of folders disappeared and they never came back. I have 3 disks, 1 for Win7, 1 for Leopard and 1 NTFS. I use Paragon NTFS. I was moving folders on the 3rd drive (NTFS) from one folder to another one with Forklift app. After a few minutes I realized that all the folders disappeared in the folder I was moving them to.

I checked in Finder but it didn't show anything.

Then I booted Windows 7 and the folders were not there. I tried 3 different file recovery programs in Windows but they found nothing from yesterday.

Usually I have backups but these folders were downloaded yesterday and it will be not easy to get them again because I don't remember all of them.

It's really hard to believe that they are gone without any trace. It's crazy. I think it's extremely dangerous to use Paragon in Mac OS.

[BuXb]

@ ion: http://macntfs-3g.blogspot.com - nothing else ..

[emarillo]

It happened to me again. A lot of folders disappeared and they never came back. I have 3 disks, 1 for Win7, 1 for Leopard and 1 NTFS. I use Paragon NTFS. I was moving folders on the 3rd drive (NTFS) from one folder to another one with Forklift app. After a few minutes I realized that all the folders disappeared in the folder I was moving them to.

I checked in Finder but it didn't show anything.

Then I booted Windows 7 and the folders were not there. I tried 3 different file recovery programs in Windows but they found nothing from yesterday.

Usually I have backups but these folders were downloaded yesterday and it will be not easy to get them again because I don't remember all of them.

It's really hard to believe that they are gone without any trace. It's crazy. I think it's extremely dangerous to use Paragon in Mac OS.

 

 

Hope it's not too late... same thing happened to a friend of mine, but I successfully recovered all of his files using Data Rescue's Deep Scan on the failing hard drive. You can download Data Rescue from Prosoft site and give it a try. And never, ever again use NTFS disks under Mac OS X!