NTFS backup drive in a USB enclosure, mostly used with Windows by a colleague of mine. Would not show up when plugged into their Windows computer, so could not run CHKDSK or similar. Did not even show up in the DISKMGMT.MSC dialog on Windows as an unformatted volume. In short, trouble.
Plugged it into my Linux box. Would not mount on Linux. Showed up on Linux as a device — /dev/sdf — but would not mount. Could use TestDisk to pull off a few key files, and then used TestDisk to resurrect it completely; so plugged it into my Linux box and:
$ sudo testdisk /dev/sdf
Then (see https://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk_doc/repairing_filesystem.html):
- selected the device
- TestDisk identified the partitioning type, so I accepted what it suggested
- Advanced menu
- There was only 1 partition, so I selected it and chose Boot
- TestDisk said the boot sector and its backup were all OK, but had also given some error messages about mismatches between the real and apparent sector counts, or something
- chose to rebuild the boot sector (these drives need a good boot sector even if not a booted drive — needed even for a storage drive)
- and now it can be opened in Windows File Explorer!
DSPACE 