Hard Drive HELP

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Hi knowledgeable folks.

I had a bit of a computer crash. Now my external hard drive that I tend to keep most of my photos on won't display or allow any copy/manipulation type actions. The problem seems to be in the security settings. I can go to any pic and alter ownership (which doesn't appear to exists now ) and then alter permissions later. After altering ownership I have to come out of the dialog box and go back in again to alter the permissions. I then get that pic back. However I have 1000's like this. My mouse (never mind my wrist) will be b*gg*red if I go the manual route. So is there an "automatic" way. I've tried to do it by folder and it really really won't let me.

All my other files (including the ones I keep in My Pictures - a windows one perhaps?) are perfectly accessible. I'd put my photos in a my own folder labeled My Photos .

I'm on Win 7 Home Premium.

Thanks for reading

 

[fossyant]

Daft question, have you unplugged the external drive and reconnected it. Power it off also if it's not USB powered.

 

[swee'pea99]

Daft question, have you unplugged the external drive and reconnected it. Power it off also if it's not USB powered.

Aye. First thing to do is turn everything off and go and have a cup of tea. Then turn everything on and see how the land lies. If still no joy, the first thing I'd do is try to find an alternative computer to plug your external drive into, and see if it's the same story.

 

[fossyant]

You should be able to apply permissions to the whole folder, hence the suggestions to remove/test on another computer - good idea @swee'pea99.

I had a few hours yesterday sorting my son's gaming machine. The video drivers kept crashing, and I had to download a tool to remove the lot in safe mode, then re-install the drivers.

 

[swee'pea99]

You should be able to apply permissions to the whole folder, hence the suggestions to remove/test on another computer - good idea @swee'pea99.

I had a few hours yesterday sorting my son's gaming machine. The video drivers kept crashing, and I had to download a tool to remove the lot in safe mode, then re-install the drivers.

OT, and FWIW, I had a lot of grief trying to locate drivers for a Canon scanner after upgrading to Windows 7, and ended up via many googlings downloading something called slimdrivers which was free and immediately effective, not only finding and installing the correct Canon driver, but updating several others while it was at it.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Hmmmph - well yes I've tried the power down and unplug and restart route but hadn't considered trying a second machine. Always worth stating the apparently obvious @swee'pea99 . However that hasn't worked either. It's as if I can change the permissions etc on the folder but it doesn't propagate that to the folder contents as one would expect @fossyant. That is what is expected when one Googles this problem too. But it won't do it. Is there a hidden switch somewhere that I can switch to allow the propagation of permissions etc through the folder?

 

[Markymark]

Can you copy the photos to your PC and if so does that alter anything?

 

[Sea of vapours]

If you copy one of the files to a different folder, do you have appropriate permissions on the copy? If you do, then you could just copy the entire folder structure to a new folder structure, i.e. one operation, then delete the original (having checked it's done what you need, obviously). This also assumes that you have space on the disk.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Sorry chaps - I'm not permitted (even as an all powerful administrator) to copy, move or owt under the current bolloxed regime.

I have a strong suspicion that the ownership of the files is the problem. To paraphrase it says "no owner" on all files and folders and so until that is altered I'm stuffed. I cannot propagate new ownership through a folder.

I've done a fair bit of Googling and I think I'll just have to bite the bullet and do it all long hand. I may be some time......

 

[Glenn]

Do a full malware and a virus scan on the drive, then try https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/mats/windows_file_and_folder_diag

 

[Rezillo]

It sounds as if the drive's file tables may be corrupted. You can fix this (right click drive, Properties/Tools/Error checking) but you may find that you lose some files in the process, although if so, they're likely to have been unreadable anyway.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

Thanks all. I spent a "happy" hour last night going through some of it by hand. The folder permissions can be propagated through once the files and folders have been given an owner. So far no files have been corrupted - they all have come back.

My mouse arm hurts ....

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

It sounds as if the drive's file tables may be corrupted. You can fix this (right click drive, Properties/Tools/Error checking) but you may find that you lose some files in the process, although if so, they're likely to have been unreadable anyway.

There's a way of changing file ownership in the Properties button and it works - but only for files and folders that are already owned

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

There's a way of changing file ownership in the Properties button and it works - but only for files and folders that are already owned

I was wrong - it seems to have sorted the problem . I think the error messages I got were from some other sort of files which are probably corrupted anyway. So thanks everyone for your assistance

 

[mybike]

I was wrong - it seems to have sorted the problem . I think the error messages I got were from some other sort of files which are probably corrupted anyway. So thanks everyone for your assistance

I'm wondering whether the problem was caused by the USB disconnecting incorrectly. I've found sometimes that a USB drive that could not be connected in Windows was corrected by being mounted/unmounted in Linux.