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Time4Tea
Asked: 2014-01-20 14:00:31 +0800 CST

Can't view files on Windows 8 partition

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I seem to be having a problem with Windows 8 on my desktop PC (not able to boot), so I created a bootable USB stick with Ubuntu to see if I can use it to access my hard disk and hopefully recover at least some of my data.

Upon booting into Ubuntu (from the USB), the partitions on the Windows hard disk seem to be mounted; however most of the files do not appear in the browser. The top-level folders are there (Users, Windows, Program Files, etc.), but they seem empty. Does anyone know if this is some sort of compatibility issue between Linux and Windows?

The thing is, I also tried checking the files using the Windows command prompt (from the builtin diagnostic tool) and the folders look similarly empty there, which probably isn't looking good.

The machine is a Dell Inspiron 660 desktop with Windows 8, which I bought just over a year ago. It has an Intel Core i5 processor and about 8GB RAM. I confess that I didn't get round to creating a recovery disk or make any system backups (I know, my bad ...). I know there is an option in the Windows diagnostics to reset the system back to 'factory settings'; however, I haven't tried that yet as I'm still hopeful of being able to recover my files.

If anyone has any ideas or suggestions, I'd be very grateful. Btw, I'm quite enjoying this little taste of Ubuntu and I'm seriously considering switching permanently (getting a bit fed up with this Windows 8 trash ...) :-)

boot

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    I did figure out what the problem was in the end and I posted some updates on the Windows 8 forums in this thread here:

    http://www.eightforums.com/general-support/39343-windows-8-automatic-repair-loop-issue.html

    This was the solution that I gave in that thread:

    Ok, so I've marked the problem as 'solved', because I've figured out what was going on. Basically, almost ALL the files on my HDD (including the Windows system files) had been crammed into a found.000 folder on the top level, so it's no wonder the OS couldn't boot up! What seems to have happened is that the HDD was damaged during the sudden power down and it must have unfortunately hit just the right part of the disk to wreck the filesystem. Then, scandisk found all the 'orphaned' files and put them into found.000.

    It took me a while to figure out where all the files had gone, but it's all ok now and I've recovered 95% of my data, which is a relief! I've also re-installed Windows from the disk that Dell gave me - it was pretty straightforward.

    Thanks very much to everyone who posted with advice - I really appreciate your help. Also, that HIRENs boot disk is an amazing tool - I highly recommend it for PC maintenance. I'll definitely learn my lesson and create backups and restore points from now on. :-)

    Since then I've been running Ubuntu & Windows 8 dual-boot on my machine with some success, although I have the occasional issue with WIndows overwriting my bootloader :-( .

    So, what exactly is the problem you are having?

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