Copy files from external drive problem

[paul weston]

Iam having a problem copying files from a lacie rugged drive to my PC. I receive this message. Windows-delayed write failed. Windows was unable to save all the data for the file G:\$bitmap. The data has been lost.This error may be caused by a failure of your computer hardware or network connection. Try to save elseware. Ive tryed opening a file directly from the lacie but the thumbs wont open,cant safely remove the drive from my system either.

Thankfully I do have a copy of the files on a second drive(another lacie ) but would like to no if there is any chance of retrieving the files off of this drive.

Thanks,

paul.

[E.J. Peiker]

What happened here is that at some point in the recent past you either turned off the drive or unplugged it without ejecting it. Windows will often delay writes or some drive housekeeping to a device until a later time. By ejecting the drive you force it to finish that before unplugging it. This is the same reason why you must exit windows in an orderly fashion and not just power off the computer while still in Windows. This means you have corrupted at least some of the drive and worst case corrupted the FAT. If the files ever went to the drive, they should be recoverable with a recovery program but if they never got there, then they simply aren't on the drive.

Never ever just turn off an external drive or just unplug it from the computer. You have to safely eject it first using the little green icon in the lower right. The same goes for Macs, always right click on the drive and eject it.

[paul weston]

Your right, a few days ago i tryed to safely eject the drive and it wouldnt.My patience ran out and i unplugged it......stupid move. I suspect that after formating this drive it will again be usable?

Thanks for the immediate response.

paul.

[E.J. Peiker]

Yes, there is nothing physically wrong with drive itself. It's just that the FAT is probably hosed. A reformat and it will be good as new. It's good you have another backup. While the data on this one is salvageable, it is a very long process.

In the future, if you are sure that all apps are closed that might see the drive, simply log-off and log back on which doesn't take long and the drive will then be removable. Usually what prevents it from ejecting is that there is something running that is looking at the drive. If all of your programs are shut down, sometimes it's as simple as having a My Computer window open or Windows Explorer open. Anything that sees the drive will prevent it from ejecting.

[paul weston]

Lesson learned,thanks so much for your time.

paul.

[foxbat]

$bitmap is a device system file (not a filename accessible to users) that, put simply, describes which parts of the disk are allocated and which parts are free. A write failure to this area is definitely very bad but, assuming no more corruption, you should be able to retrieve what was on the disk before by running a chkdsk /f on that partition. Also, $bitmap is an NTFS structure, not FAT.

[paul weston]

Thanks for the additional info, appreciated.