Boot sector corruption can be troublesome if the hard drive consists of very crucial data files. User needs to recover lost Windows partition data in order to fetch back all the important data files. Let us see how this boot sector corruption occurs and how to tackle its consequences.
What Happens When You Start Your PC?
As the PC starts, system BIOS code identifies startup disk and henceforth reads the MBR. MBR has a code which searches for primary partition which is active on the hard disk if it does not contains any active partition or in another case when this code becomes unable to locate boot sector in order to start OS it shows multiple type of errors like;
“Missing Operating System”
These can be a minor start up issue or can also be some major boot sector corruption issue however it completely makes your hard disk inaccessible and thus files are at risk of getting permanently lost. But there is one solution to make your computer accessible again.
Try Recovery Environment (Windows RE)
As soon as you start facing the troubleshoot startup issues, immediately go for Startup Repair option which is present in System Recovery Options dialog box. If this does not work or you have some more problems, then try the “Bootrec.exe tool”. This inbuilt utility can resolve MBR (Master Boot Record), Boot Sector, and BCD (Boot Configuration Data) issues:
Execution of Bootrec.exe tool
- Start the Windows RE.
- Move the Windows media in the DVD drive.
- Now start the computer.
- It will prompt you to press a key.
- Select a time, language, keyboard, currency, or input method and click Next.
- Now go to Repair your computer.
- Select OS and click Next.
- System Recovery Options dialog box will open.
- Now click Command Prompt.
- Type Bootrec.exe and Enter.
Here you get many options amongst which you can select the apt option which is /FixBoot in this case. This option will write a completely new boot sector to the system partition using boot sector compatible with Windows Vista or 7. This option can be considered if the boot sector is damaged.
Things to Remember:
- This method is only for Windows Vista and Windows 7 users.
- PC must be configured already to start from DVD drive.
- You must have backup of data files in case of method failure or data deletion via this method.
There are still chances of losing data files using this method and various other corruption issues in MBR or MFT can occur in your hard disk. For such unknown reasons and accidental deletion reasons you can opt for professional software like Hard Drive Data Recovery which can also recover formatted partitions and deleted data files in order to recover lost Windows partition.
For More Detail – http://www.windowsfilerecovery.com/recover-windows-partition.html