*** HELP!!! *** - I messed up all of my partitions on an external HDD :-(

[danielbriggs]

Hi!

I've had an external HDD (Western Digital MyBook Pro 500GB) for few weeks. I split it into 4 partitions.

1.) Time Machine - (ready for leopard)
2.) Movies - My movies from my iTunes library stay on this one
3.) Data - Everything else I need, but don't need to store on the internal MacBook Pro 17" 160GB HDD
4.) Backup Partition

OK, got Vista home premium yesterday, and installed it via bootcamp. Great!
Then I thought, hmmm... I'd like a place to transfer files between the two, as each OS couldn't write to each others native file system (and FAT wasn't in Vista)

So, I thought I'd convert my Data partition (2.) into a FAT partition, so they could both see it. The other 3 partitions can stay as Journaled or whatever, as Windows dosen't need to see those.

I went into disk utility, clicked on data partition, clicked Erase to MS-DOS, and it whirred up, started and gave an error 11 or something. Now ALL partitions have dissapeared. I'd emptied the data partition, but I NEED the others. Partion 2 is my main concern, but 4 would be nice as well.

Is there ANY way to get the partition table back, and get it working?
Please, please, please!!!! I will be forever in debt to anyone who can help me sort out this mess!


Cheers!


Dan

 

[NuDarwin]

your best shot is Alsoft Diskwarrior. It has saved so many people's asses. Read the user documentation and use scavenge mode if necessary. stay in touch and we will get through this.

 

[danielbriggs]

your best shot is Alsoft Diskwarrior. It has saved so many people's asses. Read the user documentation and use scavenge mode if necessary. stay in touch and we will get through this.

Thanks for that.
Dos anyone know of any freeware Mac apps, as I don't exactly have £60 knocking around atm.

It looks good, but I really can't afford it.

Many Thanks!


Dan