Partition Recovery In Dual-boot Windows Computer

Dual-booting or multi-booting is a method of installing two or more operating systems on a single computer. Using this method, you can install two or more versions of Windows operating system with the same or different file systems. It benefits you with the features of various operating systems, but sometimes can also create problems. A file system may damage the partitions of another file system by running disk checks (as of chkdsk) and making corrections which can cause complete data loss from the partition. In such cases, you need to carry out Partition Recovery to get your lost data back.
As a practical scenario, if you start Microsoft Windows XP in dual-boot environment with Microsoft Windows 98 or 95, use fdisk utility for deleting a partition of FAT (File Allocation Table) file system and then restart, you might no longer view or access the hard drive partitions. The partitions may not be visible even in Disk Management. This problem can occur when you take the following steps:

You make your system dual-boot between Microsoft Windows XP and Microsoft Windows 95 with the primary FAT partition as drive C.

In Microsoft Windows XP, you create two partitions:
- Partition D using NTFS (New Technology File System) file system
- Partition E using FAT file system

When you use the fdisk tool, you can see only the hard drive partitions which are using the FAT file system (that is labeled D by fdisk but it is E in XP).

When you try to delete the D partition, you remove the NTFS partition instead.

In this process your NTFS partition gets deleted and your critical data stored on it gets lost.

Grounds of the issue

This problem occurs because fdisk utility can not recognize the NTFS partition and thus removes it if it exists before the logical drive which is using FAT file system. In such situations, Partition Recovery becomes essential to recover deleted partitions and salvage data from them.
It is best possible with the help of powerful and advanced third party Partition Recovery Software. This software deploys efficient scanning mechanisms to thoroughly scan the whole hard drive, locate the lost partitions and then recover them.

Most of the Partition Recovery Software come equipped with simple and user-friendly graphical user interface that does not require sound technical skills to achieve successful recovery. With read-only and non-destructive design, this software can safely recover the lost data.

Stellar Phoenix Windows Data Recovery is a powerful Partition Recovery tool to extract data from lost, missing, deleted or formatted hard drive partitions. It supports FAT16, FAT32, VFAT, NTFS and NFTS5 file systems based partitions and volumes. The software is compatible with Microsoft Windows 7, Vista, XP, 2003 and 2000.

By: mnkstllr

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Author is sharing her particle experience of Dual-Boot Windows Computer partition data loss condition. For partition recovery she has tried partition recovery software and get valuable data back.