@Adrynalyne Editing NTFS Partition Tables

Adrynalyne, I have encountered this issue a couple of times. User gets unmountable boot volume error or similar error message; fixmbr is the obvious fix. However, the MBR is not the problem, the partition table is corrupt. Partition software such a Partition magic give 'Unrecoverable Error'; however, I can read the partition with Knoppix, so I know the partition is there and accessible. The question I have is how would I use a 'DOS' based disk editor to read and edit the partition table; so I can make it bootable again?

 

ran across this
http://www.partitionsupport.com/utilities.htm

google for "DOS EDIT PARTITION TABLE"

 

Thanks, Kodo. I've been researching this, and have a couple of different disk editors. The normal response for fatal partition errors is a clean install of XP. You guessed it, I don't like that response, if the partition is readable with Knoppix; then there has to be a way to recover/repair the partition; albeit it is using a disk editor or partitioning software.

The system, I used for testing is down; bad PSU . Obviously don't want to test solutions on this PC.

 

Sorry SPD, I' m not knowledgeable enough to really give an answer here. The only partition editting I've really even messed with is fixing type 44 goback partition tables.

 

Thanks any way, I keeping researching. If there is a way I'll find it eventually. When I get the other system back online; I'll do some experimentation.

 

Update, I am absolutely convinced it can be done. I have the tools, now it is acquiring the requisite knowledge to do it. This is what I have figured out so far:

The partition table is part of the MBR. The partition table itself is located at the offset 1BEh of the first sector of the hard disk. There are four 16-byte entries in the table, each of them being a placeholder for the description of a partition on the hard disk.

Now all I have to do, is figure out what those 4 16-byte words point to on the hard drive.