Missing Local Drive

Here's the thing, my computer has 3 drives in it. When I was downloading something in that particular drive, my computer makes some weird sound (sounds like when I'm starting my computer). Then their is an error saying that the file I'm downloading cannot be saved or something. After that I shut down my computer and the drive that I'm trying to download something to is missing now and my CPU is making weird noise. What should I do? :cry

 

Is it just that drive that doesn't work? Or is it just your whole computer won't start up? The weird sounds might be your hard drive head crashing. I can't hear it so I can't exactly be sure. I'd back up whatever is on that hard drive first just to be safe, though.

 

My drive doesn't work. Because I have 3 you see... The C: is working just fine and the other one too (F but the E: is missing from My Computer

 

So is it e: that's making the funny noises?

 

Probably... I can't tell for sure because everything is inside my CPU you see.

 

By the way, how can I back up it when I can't see it or have any access to it?

 

One way to test whether or not it is a particular drive that is making the sound is to unplug all of your hard drives except for the one and just start up the computer. If it is the one making the weird sounds, that's what you'll hear. I'll try to explain better if you don't understand.


This link has those sounds.

As for the backing up, I'm not too sure how you would do that. First I'd think about whether or not it is worth backing up or not. If it's just music or something I wouldn't spend $500 recovering it. If it's not those sounds I don't know what to do.

 

It's hard to remove those drive. Is there any procedures that you know to check if the drive is still there but isn't detected by the computer?

 

I think that my drive was switch off... What should I do?!

 

Wah! Please help me! Is there a possibility that I can restore all the programs in that disk?! Can anyone please help me?! Please...









Sorry for the spam.

 

I've done the Computer Management but when I was looking for Disk E: its gone from the list. I also tried opening it thru MS-DOS but it is also missing. Also, the weird sound that I was talking about earlier is gone too. What should I do? What does it mean?

 

unplugging the drive shouldn't be that hard. all you have to do is unplug power cable from it. the thing with the white plug and the multi coloured wires. I don't know how to check if it is still there. How old is the drive by the way?

 

Is the cable can be seen outside or do I need to open it? How old? My computer is Pentium III.

 

I have a question too! Does unplugging the driver will have any effect on the files in it?

 

Also, can you make a step by step procedure on how to unplug the power supply in CPU?

 

you have to open the case to get to your hard drives. before we get to that, i forgot to ask whether your hard drives are actual hard drives, or f they are partitions. because if they are partitions, I don't know how to fix them. I won't be able to fix it even now, but I can probably find out what the problem is.

Unplugging your drive will have no effect on the files on it.


For unplugging the drive, you open up the computer case.
In the front, there will be all of the drives near the top.
Your hard drive should be the one under the CD drives.
If your drives are not actually partitions, you will see more than 1 hard drive.



That is a picture of the hard drive.
If there is only one hard drive, you have a problem with the partitions. I would suggest running chkdsk on it.

To run a chkdsk, click start, go to run, and type chkdsk /f

If there is more than one drive, unplug them all except for one. You pull the cable with the white pluggy thing with multicoloured wires.

unplug the hard drives until there is one left and turn on your computer and listen for funny sounds. Repeat this for all the drives.

 

In the chkdsk /f... It said..

Chkdsk cannot run because the volume is in use by another process.


Can I also ask where are the pictures?

 

huh i don't know why it didn't post.

http://geekspeak.org/articles/maxtor_3000dv_firewire_hard_drive/maxtor3_drive_top_320x203.jpg

well there is the picture.

so have you opened up your case and only found one hard drive?

I came across a computer with a hard drive on top of the power supply (the big fan in the back) so you can check there too.

When you run chkdsk, it should ask you to restart before it all runs, so it can fix your disk at the same time.

 

The link said...

Forbidden

You don't have permission to access /articles/maxtor_3000dv_firewire_hard_drive/maxtor3_drive_top_320x203.jpg on this server.

 

ok, but do you know what a hard drive looks like? just google it if you're not sure

 

I have open up the CPU. There are 3 drives in it. What should I do?

 

leave only the e drive plugged in and see if it's making any sounds when you turn on your computer. if it doesn't it means it's broken. test that by unplugging all of your drives except for the e:

 

Question! How do I unplug it? I can see the white plug with colorful wires in it but... Do I have to pull it out?

 

Oh by the way, the sound is already gone.

 

Also, is the power source the one plugged in the drive?

 

The missing drive showed up again. Thanks for the help.

 

ok no problem