Have you ever come across the problem of the damaged file system? As we know, if the file system is damaged, we cannot access this drive as well as its data. Some users will worry about this since they don’t know how to recover data from drive with damaged file system. In general, if your drive file system has been damaged due to a hard drive crash or other reasons, don’t worry. MiniTool Power Data Recovery, a piece of green, simple, and professional data recovery software, can help you recover data from damaged disk without damaging the original data.
Here, before recovering data from inaccessible disk, we are going to show you what the file system is.
What Is the File System
As we know, the file system is used to control how data is stored and retrieved. And, file systems can be used on numerous types of storage devices that use different kinds of media. Here, you can read this post A Brief Introduction to File System to know more details.
If the file system is damaged, we cannot access this drive as well as its data. A true example is shown here.
External HDD corrupt file system. Hi! I really need some help. My External HDD file system has become corrupt, and I need to recover all data as it has my college work on it. Already run CHKDSK and it is still corrupt. Please help, many thanks in advance. I think the file system is NTFS.tomshardware.com
Symptoms of a Damaged File System
You may receive the following typical symptoms if you try to access the drive with a damaged file system in Windows Explorer:
- The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable.
- The disk structure is corrupted and unreadable.
- This volume does not contain a recognized file system. Please make sure that all required file system drivers are loaded and that the volume is not corrupted.
- You need to format the disk before you can use it. Do you want to format it now?
Here is a video tutorial on how to fix the disk not formatting error:
What is more serious is that you may not access or see this drive in Windows Explorer since the Windows computer is unable to recognize the file system or this drive becomes unallocated. To be specific, you formatted the drive with the ext2/3/4 file system, but you can’t access this drive since Windows can’t read these file systems; if your drive becomes unallocated because of a damaged file system, you cannot see it.
Next, let’s see how to easily and quickly recover data from drive with damaged file system via MiniTool Power Data Recovery.
Chapter 1. Recover Lost Data With MiniTool Power Data Recovery
MiniTool Power Data Recovery is designed to recover data from logically damaged partitions, formatted partitions, RAW partitions, lost partitions, and so on. No matter whether the original partition exists, this file restore tool can help scan for lost or inaccessible data.
Moreover, the software supports file recovery from various data storage media, from the computer’s internal hard drive to other removable drives including external hard drives, USB flash drives, SD cards, etc. In addition to file system corruption, this free file recovery software also works for a variety of other data loss situations, such as accidental deletion, wrong formatting, virus infection, partition loss, and so on.
Before trying to recover data from drive with damaged file system, you have to download and install MiniTool Power Data Recovery. Here, you can download the free edition of this tool to recover 1 GB of data without any cost.
MiniTool Power Data Recovery FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
Now, follow the steps below to recover data from damaged file system.
Step 1. Launch MiniTool Power Data Recovery, and then select the hard drive to scan.
On the home page of this file restore tool, you will see a list of partitions (including lost partitions and unallocated space) found on all your hard disks or external devices. For each one listed here, MiniTool Power Data Recovery displays some basic disk information, including the drive letter, the file system, the capacity, and more.
You are supposed to move your cursor to the target partition with a damaged file system, and then click the Scan button.
Step 2. Use multiple useful features to find the needed items.
Once the scan is completed, it is time to locate the items you want to recover. This secure data recovery software is equipped with abundant features to help you make the file discovery process easier. Here are the major features you can use.
- Path: By default, all the found files on the scanned hard drive are displayed here in a tree structure. You can unfold each folder and subfolder to locate the wanted files.
- Type: This is a category list where you can find all files classified by file type. You can expand the All File Types category and then find the files you want according to file type.
- Filter: This feature is designed to help you filter out unwanted files by file size, file type, file modification date, and file category. Once you set the filter criteria, only the files that match the filter rule will be displayed on the screen.
- Search: There is a search box on the search result page. You can type the keyword of the file name in the search box and press Enter to search for a certain file.
Step 3. Preview the target files and then store selected files to a safe location.
More exciting still, this software enables you to preview found files to avoid recovering unwanted files. You can double-click on a file to preview it. Alternatively, you can select the target file and then click the Preview button to preview it. Note that this software only supports previewing files that are 2 GB or less in size.
Once you confirm that the previewed file is the one you want, you can directly click the Save button and choose a safe location to store it. Or, you can tick the checkbox next to the file name first until you select all needed files, and then click Save to store them all.
Related Post: How to Recover Unallocated Partition With Data on It
Chapter 2. Other Useful Ways to Recover Data From Damaged File System
Here, some users might wonder if there is any other way to recover data from inaccessible disk. Of course, the answer is yes.
1. If you don’t want to spend time recovering lost data by yourself, you can turn to data recovery companies to recover data from drive with damaged file system. It is indeed an effective solution for lost data recovery. However, you have to pay high recovery fees. Besides, you have to bear the risk of leaking privacy in the process of file recovery.
So, if you don’t want to take this risk, you can use MiniTool Power Data Recovery, the green, professional, and easy-to-use data recovery software equipped with high security to perform secure data recovery.
MiniTool Power Data Recovery FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
2. If you have made a backup file, you can directly recover files from your backups without turning to data recovery companies or any data recovery software.
Recovering data from backup files might be the best choice for everyone. However, you have to back up all needed files in advance. And, if you don’t know how to effectively back up files, you can try MiniTool ShadowMaker, an all-in-one backup tool for Windows OS. It allows you to back up files, disks, and systems for free within 30 days.
MiniTool ShadowMaker TrialClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
In a word, once the file system is damaged, you have 3 options to recover lost data: data recovery software, data recovery companies, and backup files. You can select a suitable one according to your actual needs to recover files from damaged disk.
How to Fix Drive With Damaged File System
After recovering lost data from a damaged file system, you can try the following solutions to fix this drive to reuse it (here we take Windows 10 for example).
1) Formatting the Disk
You can format the drive to the NTFS/FAT32 file system.
Right-click the Start button and choose Disk Management. Right-click the drive whose file system is damaged, and then choose Format from the drop-down list. Next, specify the volume label, file system as well as allocation unit size, tick Perform a quick format, and then click the OK button to start the format process.
2) Running CHKDSK Scan
CHKDSK is a disk detection and repair tool that scans file system integrity and repairs logical file system errors. You can use it to repair the damaged disk.
- Press the Windows + R key combination to bring up the Run window.
- Type cmd to the open box and hit the Enter key, then you’ll get the Command Prompt.
- In the command prompt box, type chkdsk /f [Drive Letter] and press Enter.Replace [Drive Letter] with the actual drive letter.
- Type exit and press Enter.
3) Creating a New Partition
If your hard drive becomes unallocated since its file system is damaged, you need to recover lost data at first, and then create a new one on this unallocated space.
You can create a partition by using Disk Management or the free partition manager, MiniTool Partition Wizard. See How to Create Partition.
MiniTool Partition Wizard FreeClick to Download100%Clean & Safe
Conclusion
If your file system is damaged, you can easily and quickly get lost data back from backup files. If there is no backup file, you can try MiniTool Power Data Recovery. By using this tool, you can effectively recover data from drive with damaged file system without affecting the original data.
If you have any questions while using MiniTool software, please contact the support team via [email protected].
About The Author
Position: Columnist
Shirley graduated from English major and is currently an editor of MiniTool Team. She likes browsing and writing IT-related articles, and is committed to becoming a professional IT problem solver. The topic of her articles are generally about data recovery, data backup, and computer disk management, as well as other IT issues. In spare time, she likes watching movies, hiking and fishing.