Reading this text you will find a great deal of data about hard drive recovery and other procedures performed to save data. That is really big problem today as the amount of data saved on disks is constantly growing and it is hard to control all the information properly.
If you are a well-skilled client you should understand that HDD is not believed to be a reliable place to store some very important information. Most users choose some other kinds of data carriers as CDs and other magnetic devices specially to save really important information. But not just the mechanical failures may be the cause of such complexities as there are also electronic failures.
The programmers that tried to work out any HDD problems with Windows 98 or earlier systems resorted to use of fdisk software and some other primitive systems. Nowadays that is used just in rare cases and just by real professionals because amateur can make harm to data with it.
File systems
The method of storing and spreading the data on the HDD is usually determined by a file system. Every HDD is separated on some sectors. These sections are named partitions. Windows can operate with different file systems that are called NTFS (NT File System) and FAT (File Allocation Table). Windows OS of the old generation and DOS used FAT-16. Modern Windows work with FAT-32. FAT-32 was developed on the principles of operating of FAT-16 but it may serve more information. FAT-16 may operate with disks sizes not more than 2 GB. Developers of Windows of the newest versions brought the possibility for the clients to work with both FAT and NTFS systems.
Windows NT, XP and 2000 utilize NTFS system as it offers significantly higher level of safety of info storage. Another considerable benefit is that operator may set personal access rights for any file. Every initial sector of every disk includes data which is named disk partition table and boot record that is considered to be service data. Read the rest of this entry »