External USB drive not recognised on 2 computers after Acronis True Image hung and was killed in Windows Task Manager
To All,
While copy data using Windows Explorer to a USB 3.0 external hard drive, I also opened True Image 2019 to make a backup settings change and I was immediately prompted to update to True Image 2020. Both the update prompt window and the main True Image window became unresponsive so after a few minutes, I killed True Image in the Windows Task Manager. Now when I plug the USB external hard drive into 2 different computers, it is not recognized. How do I fix this ASAP?
Thanks,
Steve, did you respond to update ATI? If updating, sometime it can take a while and seem like it's hung.
Did the copy to the hard drive complete?
When updating ATI, it force restarts Windows Explorer which can mess up copy operations. Did you experience a restart of Windows Explorer?
Hi Bobbo,
Thanks for your reply. When plugged into the USB port both 2.0 and 3.0 the external HD does not show up in Disk Management on both computers. When trying to go to the former drive letter at the command prompt, I get:
C:\Users\Steve>e:
The system cannot find the drive specified.
Steve
Hi Bruno,
Thank you for your reply.
I never responded to the window to update to 2020. It was frozen along with True Image. That is why I killed True Image in the Task Manager.
When I killed the True Image process in the Task Manager, the copy in WIndows Explorer stopped abruptly and I got a message (which I did not write down) that the external HD was not reachable or something to that effect. This HD has my True Image backups in one directory, and other files in other directories.
Yes, I did reboot the computer and plug the external HD back in, and the computer did not recognize it so I tried on anther computer with the same results.
Does True Image lock the drive some how?
I'm going to venture a guess that the copy operation was keeping the USB disk very busy and ATI was in the process of initializing which also looks around available drives. If the Windows copy looked like it was still going, I'd venture to say that ATI was still OK. Once you killed it, not really sure what would have happened but it definitely affected the Windows access.
I'm surprised it didn't show up at all in Disk Management, even without a drive letter.
Might try MiniTool Partition Wizard Free. Steve Smith recommends it. Hopefully he'll chime in when the sun shines on his side of the planet. I do not have much of experience with it.
Do you know how to look in the Event Viewer to see what errors might be logged there?
Hi Bruno,
Thanks for your reply. Yes the Windows Explorer copy was very busy copying several GB of data. ATI was hung for several minutes. I left the room and came back and it was still hung. The external HD has my ATI backups on it which I cannot access now. It is an old 1st generation USB 3.0 WD drive. Now, I suspect that ATI was having trouble initializing because the Windows Explorer copy was so busy with the drive.
I just plugged the external HD back in and the computer gave the "plugged in to USB" sound but does not see it. Here is some more info from DISKPART and Disk Management. I tried pasting the DISKPART in but the columns got screwed up so it had to be a screen capture too. Note that my ATI backups and other non-ATI backups are on this external HD in separate directories.
Steve,
That does not look good. Being as it is showing as not initialized and needing to be, that usually means the file system is completely lost.
I can't imagine that the install would have anything to do with this, especially since there is no abrupt stop for file explorer in the installer, but likely due to the system hanging from the file copy and the installer freezing in the process and then being abruptly stopped. It might just be really bad timing, but it's possible your disk has been failing (bad sectors that have gone undetected), or even dumber luck that it failed in the perfect storm.
At this point, I believe your only option for recovering anything off the disk would be to use a file recovery tool. RECUVA might be able to get the job done and it's free. There are a couple of paid ones I can recommend too, but they're roughly $50 and whether you go the free or paid route, it is a long process and no guarantee to work.
If you want to try recovery, don't initialize the disk yet though - any changes to it at this point will guarantee that the previous data on it are gone for good. I would try the recovery (RECUVA) or and hope for the best. If that isnt' able to get the data back (you'll need another drive to recover to as well), then your next option would be to go to the vendor website and get their disk utility to check the drives health.
Bobbo,
Thanks for the reply.
I was looking at EaseUS when you replied to get an idea of how this process works. Yes, it sounds like risky business. This HD holds my current ATI backups and also my home directory and all subdirectories from when I had a BSOD in January 2017 which were already in Acronis Backup for PC backups that are now long gone. I can probably write this off as a benign learning experience but I will see what other responses I get to this post.
Steve, if you happen to try EasuUS Data Recovery Wizard Pro, I'd be interested to hear how that works out. It looks like perhaps the free trial will allow you to determine if it can recover (" * Free trial to scan and preview lost data ").
So when you came back in the room and it hung, was there any progress being shown for the Explorer copy? If not, it could be a hard failure occurred that affected both ATI and Explorer.
Have you been able to check the event logs?