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View Full Version : Fixing a messed-up partition table...

Charles Capps
03-27-1999, 07:30 PM
...is a very difficult thing to do.

It's apparently impossible, in fact.

To make a long story short, I created more than 4 partitions in my "extended" partition, then had to run an FDISK /MBR to fix something else I screwed up. Well, I am one of the few who have been the victim of a bug in FDISK that has now eaten my partition table! I can access my primary (Windows) partition fine, but can't access, modify, delete, add to, or even FIND anything in my extended partition(s), which hold Linux. Norton doesn't see any problems, either does Scandisk. FDISK shows something in the Extended partition, but won't let me change it. Partition Magic refuses to even read the table at all!

Does ANYONE know of a utility that will let you MANUALLY change the partition table? I dont' care if I have to hex-edit, I have to get the table fixed... Loosing data on my Windows partition is NOT a possibility, otherwise I would have blown everything away long ago.

Ideas? http://www.aota.net/ubb/frown.gif

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"Okay, so I'm not "SANE" so to speak, but uh... I'm the lovable kind of psycho"
http://solareclipse.net/
Del
03-28-1999, 01:20 AM
Charles

You may want to look for a program called 'fips' (a DOS utility). I got it off the RedHat distribution CD, but I imagine it's available elsewhere. In theory it's supposed to do non-destructive partitioning. I've used it once, and it seemed to do just fine (pushing Win98 into a 3gig partition from a 6gig partition). I don't know if it works well for fixing broken partitions or not, but it might be worth checking out.

Del
Charles Capps
03-28-1999, 02:58 AM
As long as it will read and modify the partition table, that's all I need... Thanks! http://www.aota.net/ubb/biggrin.gif

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"Okay, so I'm not "SANE" so to speak, but uh... I'm the lovable kind of psycho"
http://solareclipse.net/
Charles Capps
03-28-1999, 05:30 AM
Well, fips didn't quite turn out to be what I thought it was, thought it got me thinking - what else could possibly edit a partition table? I had already eliminated the Norton Utilities, but I forgot that the DOS version had different features... Like DISKEDIT. :-D

One partition table fixed. *LOL*

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"Okay, so I'm not "SANE" so to speak, but uh... I'm the lovable kind of psycho"
http://solareclipse.net/
Del
03-28-1999, 05:42 AM
Sorry the fips thing didn't do it for ya. Glad you got it fixed though http://www.aota.net/ubb/smile.gif

Del
Charles Capps
03-28-1999, 02:14 PM
Fixed? Yuppers.

Done? Nope. The last time I used Partition Magic on my HDD, it went quite quickly, I thought... Well, that was when I was using a 1.2 gig HDD that was only a quarter full.
It's been working all night on resizing the 4 gig partition (3.8 of which is full) to take up the whole HDD, and it's only 60% done! Pleh! I need that compy, the keyboard on this notebook plays tricks on my fingers! :P

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"Okay, so I'm not "SANE" so to speak, but uh... I'm the lovable kind of psycho"
http://solareclipse.net/
Charles Capps
03-28-1999, 08:36 PM
Tradegy has struck.

Apparently Partition Magic doesn't like my HDD.

It ate it.

Everything was lost.

*GRUMBLES*

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"Okay, so I'm not "SANE" so to speak, but uh... I'm the lovable kind of psycho"
http://solareclipse.net/