Unmountable boot error

[Oexmelin]

I am not terribly concerned about this problem - I had planned to change laptop anyway, but is there a way to get my data back ?

Thanks!

[Grey Fox]

Did you change anything in the BIOS recently? If yes, change it back.

If not, it's probably File system error. Run a check disk.

[Oexmelin]

chkdsk /p and /r already run. It stopped at 45%, then got "the disk has unrecoverable errors". It is also making some disquieting noise, so I figure the HD is toast, or about to be soon. Which is why I stopped fiddling with it until I could recover the data.

[Vricklund]

Boot with something like SystemRescueCd. Try to mount the ntfs volumes and copy the files you want. Once they're secure go ahead and run TestDisk and try to restore the boot sector.

[grumbler]

Boot with something like SystemRescueCd. Try to mount the ntfs volumes and copy the files you want. Once they're secure go ahead and run TestDisk and try to restore the boot sector.

Do this.  Sometimes noises are not caused by physical failures, but by the drive trying to read the same sector repeatedly.

[Ed Anger]

I had a unmountable boot error once, and I was able to save the data by using a Linux Live Cd. It saw the HD and the data a couple of times and I was able to get my stuff.

[Darth Wagtaros]

Boot from a BartPE disk or something, hook up an external drive and see if you can grab stuff then, assuming what Vricks said fails.

You could pay a few grand for a recovery service to get the stuff if it really is that important.

[Oexmelin]

Boot with something like SystemRescueCd. Try to mount the ntfs volumes and copy the files you want. Once they're secure go ahead and run TestDisk and try to restore the boot sector.

Okay, I am barely computer-litterate, so you will have to explain this as if to a child. 

[Vricklund]

Maybe you would be better off just booting from an Ubuntu disk. It does most of what I'll cover below automaticly. But then you wouldn't learn anything, would you?

So...

Burn SystemRescueCd. Boot from it. It will tell you what to do (ENTER, fr, startx).

Now, hdd's are named somewhat differently to what you might be used to as a windows user. First disk is /dev/sda, second disk /dev/sdb and so on. If you have multiple partions on your disk they're /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2 and so on. Get it?

For the disks to be accessible they must be mounted. Assuming the disk is formated with NTFS, type ntfs-3g /dev/sda1 /mnt/windows in the terminal and the first partion on the first disk will be available at /mnt/windows.

From here you can either burn the files onto a cd/dvd or move them to another disk (you'll have to mount the new disk, ntfs-3g /dev/sdb1 /mnt/somethingcompletelydifferent, again assuming it's a disk with NTFS).