Hello,
short story:
Disk have 3 partitions, all bootable, first is windows 7. After nvidia drivers (chipset+graphics) uninstall, get disk read error and partitions are now flagged as RAW but disk is ok and files can be access via gparted, parted magic, testdisk, what you want except windows (neither other win7 disk nor dvd). Problem is to restore disk's boot without formatting, have backup of MBR and BCD but how to restore? I have limited knowledge, tried to follow some howto but I'm a bit lost.
long story:
The computer is a Compaq, a bit outdated but still usefull, with Nvidia plateform (GeForce 6150SE nForce 430).
The hard drive has 3 partitions, all bootable: I kept original Vista to update bios if needed, as the HP recovery partition, in case, and added windows 7.
Recently some new event appeared (Event id: 129 Reset to device, \Device\RaidPort0, was issued) and after some readings about this nvidia 'bug' I decided to uninstall the drivers (chipset and graphic), and since then I get disk read error on boot and looking at the disk shows partitions are now flaged as RAW. Trying to access with win7 repair disk it says CRC error (cyclic redunduncy).
Drive is not dead and I can access files! (Plus, HDTune find the drive is healthy) But my problem is to restore the drive with it's mbr, boot sector and bcd, and, I have backup of them too! but how? (when install was ok, I made backup of MBR (512o) and PBR (8ko) using MBRbackup and bootice, and BCD file using easyBCD.
From what I have read, chkdsk could help but is to use in a last attempt since it may rewrite mbr and/or bcd.. Anyway, for now it fails on RAW partitions.
In fact, I think I would need to know first what is causing problem (mbr,bcq,bs?). I think the PBR is still untouched since mbrbackup shows the same as the backup I made before and other tools like gparted, parted magic, paragon, correctly find the partitions and access the files too. But for the MBR, Testdisk shows a file full of zeros while not the case with MBRbackup. Looking at the files with parted magic, it seems BCD file has gone!.. As for the boot sector, I don't know.
Also, there is (too) many sites showing some bootrec, bootedit, bootbcd, bootsect, diskpart commands... often different and/or in different order, I lost my self. Besides, if I boot with another drive (win7 too), the system is C: and defectuous partitions of the other drive become e: and f: making myself even more lost when trying to use these commands.
Hopefully, some times ago I made a multiboot usb flash drive with some tools (system rescue, ubuntu repair disk, hiren, malekal live cd, win7 repair disk, dart 8.1, even win98 bootdisk and dos6.22 and some other tools and light linux distros like antix, deuterium); while it was interessting to build it, it would be even more usefull to know how to use it now! too many tools here too
I also tried with win7 CD, nothing more, except trying to re-install it on the win7 partition, it says unable to write to partition (kind of hopefully! since I don't want to format)
Should I rebuild some basic mbr,bcd just to access disk in a first time, then restore the backed up version, but this might modify partition table, or should I rewrite mbr with dd, dsfo, but how, from where? same with bcd, any try with a windows doesn't allow to access disk, so I cant use tools like easybcd. .
So I come to ask you so I don't mess the drive more, tell me if any other info or files are needed,
Thank you