Recovering a raw disk. What is the RAW file system and how to work with it. If Windows is loading and it is important not to lose data from the RAW disk

Raw file system and how to return ntfs

Today we’ll look at how the raw format of hdd disks appears, what the RAW file system is, why it is needed, and what to do if one of your disks is determined to be invalid, not marked up, not formatted, or damaged. We will also consider what to do if it says that “chkdsk is not valid for RAW disks” when trying to correct the situation using the operating system.

The RAW file system is implicitly present in NT operating systems from Windows Corporation. It was created with a single purpose - to provide applications and operating systems with data about the size of the current volume and the name of the file system (FS) used on it. If you received a RAW partition on a hard or solid-state drive (flash drive, SSD), this means that the file system of this volume or drive was not recognized by any file system driver installed in the environment used by Windows. That is, the file placement structure is clearly different from NTFS and FAT/FAT32. The consequence of this is errors such as:

a message that the drive/partition is not formatted in a known file system;
there is no possibility of normal access to the device/partition;
The disk file system has been damaged.

If one of the above-described alerts appears, further work with the volume is impossible either in read mode or, especially, in write mode.

Sources of the problem

Most often, such an error appears on a flash drive due to improper handling or wear of the device, but also for hard drives, especially removable ones, the problem is very relevant. Its sources in most cases are:

malicious applications that interfere with the file table or volume structure;
partial damage to the boot sector or volume file table;
damage to the file table, which contains information about all stored data;
physical damage to sectors of a volume causes a type of file system called RAW to appear;
Incorrect removal of the flash drive or abnormal operating modes of the device (voltage surges, loss of electricity, or improper shutdown of the PC).

Disk or partition treatment options

Depending on the reasons why the RAW format appeared instead of FAT/NTFS, there are many methods to gain access to the information stored on the device.

Checking the volume for bad sectors and errors

The first step that should be taken if the file system of a disk or flash drive is detected as RAW is to check for damage on the drive or its logical partition. For the case where the system volume is not detected, this recommendation will not work, but in other situations you should start with it.
We call the command line on behalf of an account that has system administrator privileges through WinX or the search bar.

In the black window, execute a command like: “chkdsk x: /f /r”.
In this case:
x: - target volume;
/f – flag responsible for error correction;
/r – the argument will allow you to find and fix bad sectors.

We wait for the operation to complete and try to open the problematic volume.
If the error “chkdsk is not valid for RAW disks” appears as in the screenshot, it means that the target volume is the system volume, and to check it we do the following.
Starting a PC from Windows installation media of the same edition and bit depth.
On the language selection screen, click “Next”.

Go to the diagnostics section and open the list of advanced parameters.

Launch the command line.

Let's select "diskpart".
Using the “listvolume” command we find out the letter of the problematic volume.
Exit diskpart by entering “exit” and confirming its execution with the “Enter” button.
Execute a command like “chkdsk x: /f /r”.

This way, you can regain control of the disk without losing any data.

In this case, the message “chkdsk is not valid for RAW disks” should not appear; if this happens again, move on to the next subsection of the article.

Checking the integrity of files in the OS itself

Often, to convert RAW to NTFS, you just need to resuscitate system files. This is no more difficult than searching for damaged drive partitions.
Call the “Run” window using the Win + R combination.
Execute “cmd” to launch the command line.
Run “sfc /scannow” to launch a utility that will find and fix errors in the operating system.

We format a section if there is no important information on it

A RAW disk or flash drive that does not have any files on it (let’s say you just purchased the device), is missing important data, or is duplicated, can be easily converted from RAW to NTFS using Windows.
Open the “Run” window using the Win+R key combination.
Execute the line “diskmgmt.msc” to launch the disk management utility.
Using the context menu of the problem section, call the “Format” command.

We set the desired label and decide on the file system (it is better to choose NTFS), then click “OK”.
If a removable hard drive (its partition or flash drive) is not formatted, try disconnecting the removable device, if it is one, and then connecting it and trying again. In the case of an HDD, restart your PC and be sure to end all programs that may be using the problematic volume.
Now you know how to fix the RAW format of HDD and flash drives, but the formatted storage medium will not contain the original data. If the option to format a drive or disk is not suitable, move on.

HDD RAW Copy Tool

The HDD RAW Copy Tool utility is designed for sector-by-sector copying of media and allows you to extract all data from the problematic device without data loss.
Download the utility from the official application support resource.
Install and launch the HDD RAW Copy Tool and wait until the partitions detected on the PC appear in the main frame.
We select the problematic device from which we will subsequently recover information (a file system defined as RAW has appeared on it).

Click “Continue”.
We specify the file type as *.img to create an image of the recoverable disk.
Here it should be taken into account that when specifying the image storage path where all the files from the RAW disk will fit, there must be more free space than the volume/drive itself that we will copy.

We return to the HDD RAW Copy Tool interface, where we click “Continue” again.

After this, you can safely open the generated image through a data recovery program that supports working with images, for example, R-Studio, and begin restoring the necessary data, and format the just copied media to NTFS.
We will not describe how to recover data from an image due to the large amount of information, which will be enough for another similar article.
On this HDD RAW Copy Tool you can close it.

DMDE

Although the previous method is highly reliable, working with the original source is much safer and more reliable. Let's look at how to resuscitate important files if a RAW format appears for one of the HDDs. Here we will do without formatting, so if some disk has become RAW, using the method described below you can easily access all its files.
Go to dmde.ru and download the DMDE utility, which allows you to read a disk in a format such as RAW and restore it.
Working with the program consists of the following sequence of steps.
Select the physical disk where the partition with the raw file system is located, checking the “Physical” option. devices."

When we find the required partition, select it and click “Open Volume”.
If this does not happen, we scan the media, the file system of one of the partitions of which has become defined as RAW.

We open the volume and look at its contents to see if the files are on it.

If everything is correct, click “Restore” and confirm the restoration of the boot sector.

If everything happens properly, after a short time the DMDE program will recover the lost partition without making any changes and return it to the previous file system.

Attention! If the system volume was problematic and recovery was performed by booting from another disk or after installing the media on another computer, you will additionally have to resuscitate the bootloader.

TestDisk

The TestDisk program is the most difficult to use, but it also performs the best recovery of volumes with RAW file system. Having launched the installed application, perform the following steps:

Click “Create”, then select the target partition.

We decide on the partition type, if this does not happen automatically (MBR or progressive GPT).
Click on “Analyze” and press “Enter”.
On the next screen, press “Enter” again, selecting “Quick Search”.
Find a partition for data recovery from a disk with the RAW file system.
To view the files stored on it, press the Latin “P”, exit the preview mode by pressing the “Q” button. If the partition is marked P, it can be restored; volumes marked D will not be restored.

Make sure that the table shown on the screen, which she will be after resuscitation, is correct.
Here you should be confident in the correctness of your choice, but you shouldn’t become a coward and do nothing either.
Select “Write” and confirm the action by clicking “Y” in order to perform RAW recovery.

The change will take effect after restarting Windows.

At this point, the topic “how to change the file system if the disk is in RAW format” can be considered fully covered. As you can see, there are absolutely no difficulties in solving the problem.

Most often, the disk file system changes to RAW after the computer was turned off incorrectly, when the lights were turned off, or the user saved time and pulled out the power cord of the system unit from the outlet. Another reason is viruses that change the NTFS to RAW format of HDD drives. How to fix this problem, read this article.

RAW file system - what is it?

If the disk is in RAW format, Windows will display it among other hard drive partitions. But when you try to open it, the computer will give you an error and ask you to format it. In addition, any actions with this volume will be unavailable: checking for errors, defragmenting, etc. (it is useful to read “How to check the integrity of Windows 10 system files and restore them?”).

There is no RAW file system as such. If the disk receives this formatting, it means that the computer drivers are not able to determine the type of its file system - NTFS, FAT or FAT32. In practice, this happens in several cases:

the file system structure is damaged;
The partition has not been formatted;
There is no correct access to the contents of the volume.

If the OS volume is damaged, the “Reboot and select proper boot device” or “Operating System not found” warnings will appear when the computer boots.

How to change the RAW file system to NTFS

If the problem occurs on a non-system drive, but it contains important information that will be lost when formatted, use standard Windows tools or third-party programs to fix the error.

Windows tools

Basically, the standard chkdsk utility helps fix problems with formatting in RAW.

After checking, the computer will repair damaged sectors and the NTFS file system on the problematic volume.

Important! This method is effective if the flash drive or hard drive has been formatted in NTFS.

The chkdsk utility will also help when the system disk is damaged. But for this you will need a boot disk or flash drive.

Start the computer from a bootable USB flash drive or disk → Select “System Restore”.
Advanced options -> command line -> enter chkdsk drive_letter: /f.

In the recovery environment, the partition letters are different from the names of the logical drives. To avoid mistakes, open the list of computer partitions in the command line.

Enter diskpart → list volume → the list will indicate which disk is the system one.

Third party programs

There are third-party programs that help restore the NTFS file system if for some reason it was reformatted to RAW. They do not damage the user’s information stored on the volume, unlike the chkdsk utility, which can “affect” them during the recovery process.

MiniTool Power Data Recovery

Important! This method is most effective if the RAW file system appears on a flash drive.

TestDisk

This is a multifunctional free utility that works with hard drive partitions using a large number of options. The program is presented in a portable version, so it does not require installation. The main disadvantage of TestDisk is that it does not have a Russified interface.

Download the archive with the program → run the file testdisk_win.exe as administrator → select “create” → enter.
Use the up/down arrows to select the desired drive → enter.
Specify the desired type of partition table (the utility will do this automatically) → enter.
To search for “lost” partitions, select “Analyze” → enter → Quick Search → enter.
The utility will find “lost” volumes → press “p” to view the list of files.
Good to know! TestDisk does not work with Russian titles, so they will not be displayed correctly.
Select “Write” to save the partition structure.
If the partition is not found the first time, use the “Deeper Search” command and repeat all the above steps.

An alternative way to restore NTFS formatting of a partition is presented in the video.

All kinds of USB drives, be they regular flash drives or removable memory cards, are prone to errors due to many reasons. Let's say a user needs to use a USB device to install or restore an operating system, and the file system of the flash drive is RAW. How to install Windows 7 or another modification, because this format is not recognized? First, the file system needs to be fixed. The following are several basic techniques that will be useful in any other cases when, for some reason, such a failure occurs.

Why does RAW format appear on a USB device?

The RAW format itself is a kind of “raw” structure, which, due to a failure or error, replaced FAT32 or NTFS.

The most common situations are related to exposure to viruses, power surges, incorrect removal of the device, software failures of the microcontroller and physical damage to the media. As a result, the file system on the drive changes spontaneously, however, issues related to how to remove the RAW file system from a flash drive and restore the information stored on it can be resolved quite simply. First, let's look at the native tools of Windows systems.

How to fix the RAW file system on a flash drive: preliminary steps

If errors occur, it is impossible to write or read information from the drive, although the flash drive itself can be visible in Explorer, in the section and in Device Manager.

Before you begin to decide how to fix the RAW file system on a flash drive, it is recommended that you first check it with a standard system tool in the form of the CHKDSK disk checker.

To start diagnostics, launch the command console (cmd in the “Run” menu), after which the line chkdsk F: /f is written in it, in which the first letter (“F”) is the letter of the USB drive (it can be seen in “Explorer”) . This command is good because at the end of the check, if the failures on the device were not critical, you will be able to see your flash drive in the standard NTFS format.

You can also run the check when booting from a recovery disk, using the same command console, in which, before entering the above command, you need to enter the lines volume (to find out the device type) and exit, and then use the standard tool.

However, if the damage is severe, the system may display a message indicating that this tool is not suitable for use on RAW discs. How to fix the RAW file system on a flash drive in this case? The easiest way out is formatting.

on a flash drive: how to fix the situation using Windows?

To begin with, you can try formatting by calling up the right-click menu in Explorer and selecting the line to perform this operation.

When specifying additional parameters, you should use full formatting rather than quick formatting with TOC clearing only, and specify the required file system-specific type parameters. Next, all you have to do is click the button to start the process and wait for it to finish.

In the case where formatting in this way turns out to be impossible, the problem of how to fix the RAW file system on a flash drive can be solved using the disk management section, which is most easily accessed with the command diskmgmt.msc in the Run console. Right-clicking on the disk brings up a context menu, where you select the formatting line. If the disk is currently inactive, the initialization command is first used, and then formatted.

Fixing the problem using low-level formatting programs

If this does not give any effect, RAW flash drives can be produced using special utilities.

One of the most powerful is the small HDD Low Level Format program, which is shareware, but in test mode it can perform the formatting operation without problems. When you start the application, click the Continue for free button. In this mode, the only limitation will be the speed of the operation, so you will have to be patient.

Next, you need to select your drive, click the continue button and confirm formatting, agreeing with the program warning. At the end of the process, a message indicating 100 percent completion of the operation will be displayed, and after that all that remains is to perform a quick format using Windows.

Data recovery programs

As for data recovery, it is best to use software products like R.Saver, RS FAT Recovery and others.

Depending on the storage capacity, it may take quite a lot of time. But recovery is one hundred percent guaranteed. Sometimes you can even see data that was deleted from the device a very long time ago.

What else do you need to know?

If for some reason the methods described above do not help, it is very likely that the problem is a malfunction of the microcontroller. You can try to reflash it by using the VEN and DEV identifiers from the “Hardware ID” section in the “Device Manager” properties menu and downloading the appropriate firmware from the equipment manufacturer’s resource. If errors occur due to physical damage, the problematic device can in most cases be thrown away.

Finally, it remains to add that the issues of virus exposure, which can also lead to such failures, were not considered here, since each user must take care of protecting their system independently and without reminders. And before restoring a USB drive, it is advisable to check for viruses without fail.

Imagine inserting a flash drive into your computer and seeing a message: “To use the drive in drive F:, first format it. Do you want to format it? If it's a new flash drive, no questions asked, but what if there was data on it? Then don’t rush to agree to formatting - perhaps there is a chance to save them.

First of all, you can try to take a chance and fix errors using Windows. To do this, open the console as administrator and write:

Chkdsk f: /f

Naturally, f: will need to be replaced with the current disk name. The /f option means error correction during scanning.

If the operation was successful, you can try opening files. But it may also happen that you will see the error “Chkdsk is not valid for RAW disks.” Don't despair, we have a couple more options in stock. Let's use a special program DMDE.

DMDE is a very cool program that is useful for searching, editing and restoring data on disks. The developer reports that it uses clever algorithms, thanks to which it can restore directory structures and files in difficult cases when other programs do not give the desired result.

DMDE has a disk editor, a simple partition manager, the ability to image and clone disks, rebuild RAID arrays, and so on. Paid editions support the recovery of files and directories without restrictions, but the free version is also very good and helps just as well in many situations.

After starting the program, select our media.

A partition window opens, where we double-click to select a full scan.

After a quick scan, you need to go one level higher to the “Found” folder and click “All found + reconstruction.” A dialog will open where we select “Rescan current file system” and wait for the end of the operation.

After scanning, DMDE will show a list of found files. We look through the folders and choose what to restore. Unfortunately, you cannot restore entire folders in the free version. To restore one file at a time, right-click and select “Restore object”, then indicate where to restore and click OK.

It is worth noting that file names are generated automatically and often do not correspond to the original ones. Don't be surprised if some files come out broken or artifacts appear in your photos. By the way, images can sometimes be restored using one of the special utilities. For example, Recuva, R-Studio and “PhotoDOCTOR”. To my great surprise, the latest program restored almost dead photographs in very good quality and with a minimum of artifacts - many of its competitors could not cope with this.

In general, good luck in your recovery! But it’s better, of course, to immediately rewrite all data from temporary media and make backups.

As you know, if the structure of the file system of a logical disk is damaged in any way, the operating system and all programs that are accustomed to a clear and harmonious structuring begin to experience difficulties in determining the type of file system of the damaged partitions. In such cases, a meaningful entry appears in the “logical disk properties” line: RAW. Here are just a few possible reasons for its occurrence: hardware failure, software failure, virus invasion.

For one reason or another, incorrect values for a logical disk appear in the partition table (for example, MBR), and damage occurs in the system boot sector or in the MFT area (main file table in the NTFS system). You can try to correct minor errors in system data; if things are really bad, you can at least restore the necessary files.

Correct mistakes? Maybe!

At its core, RAW is not a separate file system type. Your disk was and remains formatted in FAT or NTFS. However, it will no longer be possible to work with it according to the standard scheme - the disk simply will not open or will require formatting. And if you intend to save as much information as possible stored on a broken disk (yes, it hasn’t disappeared anywhere yet!), we strongly do not recommend agreeing with the latter. It may not be possible to return the “FAT” or “NTFS” entry to the disk properties. But it’s easy to recover all the necessary information from it!

So, first, let's find out whether our file system is actually RAW. We check the “properties” of the disk through the context menu in the “My Computer” tab. If the “type” line says “local disk” and the “file system” line says “RAW”, it’s time to start the data recovery process. By the way, for this it is better to choose a proven and effective recovery program. If your data is really important to you, it is better not to be seduced by dubious offers with promises of all kinds of “bonuses”.

Second life of the system...

RS Partition Recovery is a reliable tool for recovering data from inaccessible, formatted, broken disks. In most cases, the program is capable of recovering partition data even after severe damage, reconstructing a logical drive, and resuming system operation literally from scratch!

Even if you managed to format a disk with a damaged structure, it is possible to save your data! The “deep analysis” function used by RS Partition Recovery will scan and analyze all pieces of data saved on the disk, and based on them, it will recreate the partition structure and return the disappeared files in a form completely suitable for further use.

How to do it?

A smart program can bypass the blocking of access to the partition structure, which is activated after the system is converted to RAW. Moreover, if you did not have time to format the disk, recovery will be really quick and painless. If the goal is to get your data back after formatting, just be patient. The results of RS Partition Recovery are worth it!

Just download and install the program (on any disk or other media except the one being restored), start scanning the required disks. In a new program window you will see all files available for recovery. Save them - also on any disk other than the one being restored.

The “Preview” functions and sorting files according to various parameters will make working with recovered information faster and more convenient. Use a competent program - and forever forget about all the unpleasant emotions associated with the word “RAW”!