PC running, no display

[mxk]

Heyo,

^{_{Yes I'm reposting, but no one responded and I can't find anything online.}}

I left my PC on while I was making an image of a disk to a SATA HDD I had just plugged into my PC, and when I came back, my PC isn't displaying anything to my two monitors, but it looks like my PC is still running, and the two hard drives are spinning. I'm not sure about just turning off the PC, since I don't want to mess anything up while the disk is being imaged. 

 

I'm very unsure what to do, would I be able to turn off my PC with nothing happening to the drives? I'm really stressed about this and appreciate any help. My specs are the first PC in the signature, with a 1.5TB HDD added in. I appreciate any help greatly, thank you!

[Slottr]

Try changing display output or display cable?

[mxk]

3 minutes ago, Slottr said:

Try changing display output or display cable?

No, I guess I didn't think to do that. I'll go try a different displayport cable or HDMI cable.

[mxk]

11 minutes ago, Slottr said:

Try changing display output or display cable?

It didn't seem to work. I changed the display port cable and verified that the monitor's HDMI is at least working with my laptop. I made sure my GPU was fully in it's PCIe slot, too.

[TrigrH]

19 minutes ago, mxk. said:

Heyo,

^{_{Yes I'm reposting, but no one responded and I can't find anything online.}}

I left my PC on while I was making an image of a disk to a SATA HDD I had just plugged into my PC, and when I came back, my PC isn't displaying anything to my two monitors, but it looks like my PC is still running, and the two hard drives are spinning. I'm not sure about just turning off the PC, since I don't want to mess anything up while the disk is being imaged. 

 

I'm very unsure what to do, would I be able to turn off my PC with nothing happening to the drives? I'm really stressed about this and appreciate any help. My specs are the first PC in the signature, with a 1.5TB HDD added in. I appreciate any help greatly, thank you!

What software did you use? and was it used in or outside of windows?

[mxk]

1 minute ago, TrigrH said:

What software did you use? and was it used in or outside of windows?

ummm fuck I don't remember the software name..... fuckkk 

 

it was in windows, though. Not outside.

 

I checked my hard drive that I was imaging and it isn't spinning anymore, but the one that I was writing too is spinning. Should I shut my PC off and remove the CMOS battery?

[TrigrH]

4 minutes ago, mxk. said:

ummm fuck I don't remember the software name..... fuckkk 

 

it was in windows, though. Not outside.

 

I checked my hard drive that I was imaging and it isn't spinning anymore, but the one that I was writing too is spinning. Should I shut my PC off and remove the CMOS battery?

just shut down the pc and turn it back on, nothing is going to happen, you will need to start the clone software again as the destination drive will not have finished.

[mxk]

5 minutes ago, TrigrH said:

just shut down the pc and turn it back on, nothing is going to happen, you will need to start the clone software again as the destination drive will not have finished.

It took a good minute to boot for some reason. I'm not really sure why, my new SSD usually boots in ~10 seconds but I'm logging in.

 

The software I used was driveimage XML, should I run an avast scan?

[TrigrH]

6 minutes ago, mxk. said:

It took a good minute to boot for some reason. I'm not really sure why, my new SSD usually boots in ~10 seconds but I'm logging in.

 

The software I used was driveimage XML, should I run an avast scan?

i mean if you think its some shady software you downloaded then yes, id use the hard disk copy function in paragon hard disk manager.

[mxk]

Just now, TrigrH said:

i mean if you think its some shady software you downloaded then yes, id use the hard disk copy function in paragon hard disk manager.

So I should copy the external drive to the SATA HDD, then I can carry on with doing data recovery?

[TrigrH]

2 minutes ago, mxk. said:

So I should copy the external drive to the SATA HDD, then I can carry on with doing data recovery?

i dont know what you are doing exactly so going to need more info.

[mxk]

Just now, TrigrH said:

i dont know what you are doing exactly so going to need more info.

Sorry, I didn't list much since I thought my last post was too long.

 

I accidentally deleted a folder on my external seagate USB HDD, and I want to try to recover the data since I know it's really just marked as non-existent to be written over.

 

I was trying to make an image of the drive to a WD Green 1.5TB (I don't know the RPM), and then I ran into this issue that I was asking about.

[TrigrH]

3 minutes ago, mxk. said:

Sorry, I didn't list much since I thought my last post was too long.

 

I accidentally deleted a folder on my external seagate USB HDD, and I want to try to recover the data since I know it's really just marked as non-existent to be written over.

 

I was trying to make an image of the drive to a WD Green 1.5TB (I don't know the RPM), and then I ran into this issue that I was asking about.

whats the benefit of imaging the drive first? generally you dont wanna mess with that stuff?

[mxk]

3 minutes ago, TrigrH said:

whats the benefit of imaging the drive first? generally you dont wanna mess with that stuff?

The image is basically a copy of my drive that can be restored if something gets messed up when I'm trying to recover data. @Electronics Wizardy and someone else told me to do it just in case. It seems to be a pretty standard thing to do and makes sense.

[Electronics Wizardy]

8 minutes ago, TrigrH said:

whats the benefit of imaging the drive first? generally you dont wanna mess with that stuff?

having an image reduces the change or error in recovery. It also lets you do things like changing the partition table in a nondestructive way. Generally a very good idea for data revoery.

 

29 minutes ago, mxk. said:

ummm fuck I don't remember the software name..... fuckkk 

 

it was in windows, though. Not outside.

 

I checked my hard drive that I was imaging and it isn't spinning anymore, but the one that I was writing too is spinning. Should I shut my PC off and remove the CMOS battery?

If your just making an image you can reset the pc, probably crashed for some random reason. Just make the image again

[TrigrH]

5 minutes ago, mxk. said:

The image is basically a copy of my drive that can be restored if something gets messed up when I'm trying to recover data. @Electronics Wizardy and someone else told me to do it just in case. It seems to be a pretty standard thing to do and makes sense.

then u should not be using windows software that may write to the source drive, for "dumb" copies i recommend norton ghost.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, TrigrH said:

then u should not be using windows software that may write to the source drive, for "dumb" copies i recommend norton ghost.

Thats really not an issue unless your doing forensic work.

 

Why use norton ghost when there are lots of other free tools that do the same thing.

[TrigrH]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Thats really not an issue unless your doing forensic work.

 

Why use norton ghost when there are lots of other free tools that do the same thing.

are you implying ghost isn't free? a lot of windows hard disk software likes to do checks on the source drive and write to it, not worth risking, also we don't know how much free space the OP has on the drive.

[mxk]

5 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Thats really not an issue unless your doing forensic work.

 

Why use norton ghost when there are lots of other free tools that do the same thing.

I'm trying out the paragon hard disk manager right now. It's loading in.

 

 

EDit: Ugh, it's a paid service. Is there a software you recommend?

[Electronics Wizardy]

1 minute ago, TrigrH said:

are you implying ghost isn't free? a lot of windows hard disk software likes to do checks on the source drive and write to it, not worth risking, also we don't know how much free space the OP has on the drive.

how would free space on the drive matter? Your just doing a bit for bit copy?

 

Ghost seems to be dead. https://support.norton.com/sp/en/us/home/current/solutions/v86337130_EndUserProfile_en_us

 

the replacement isn't free https://www.symantec.com/products/ghost-solutions-suite

 

 

2 minutes ago, mxk. said:

I'm trying out the paragon hard disk manager right now. It's loading in.

linux really makes this easier, but if you don't want to do that, something like hdd raw copy is free and works well here and is simple.

[mxk]

Just now, Electronics Wizardy said:

linux really makes this easier, but if you don't want to do that, something like hdd raw copy is free and works well here and is simple.

I'm going to probably install linux later this month on my old 128GB SSD, so I can just switch out what SSD I want to boot with.

 

I'll try that software.

[mxk]

4 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

 

I don't see support for windows 10 on HDD raw copy, am I looking in the wrong spot? HDDGURU says that they support up to w8.

[TrigrH]

3 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

how would free space on the drive matter? Your just doing a bit for bit copy?

OP needs to recover data on a drive, therefore any writing to the drive before the data is recovered is not ideal. (thats why id stay out of windows)

If there is low free space on the drive windows could corrupt the deleted files.

Old software like ghost is basic as all hell and should be a simple way to clone.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, TrigrH said:

OP needs to recover data on a drive, therefore any writing to the drive before the data is recovered is not ideal. (thats why id stay out of windows)

If there is low free space on the drive windows could corrupt the deleted files.

Old software like ghost is basic as all hell and should be a simple way to clone.

Yea, you don't want to mount the drive, thats a bad idea. Turn off auto mount first.

 

 

[mxk]

Just now, TrigrH said:

OP needs to recover data on a drive, therefore any writing to the drive before the data is recovered is not ideal. (thats why id stay out of windows)

If there is low free space on the drive windows could corrupt the deleted files.

Old software like ghost is basic as all hell and should be a simple way to clone.

I doubt any data is being written to the drive. It only gets used when I save a shadowplay clip. It doesn't get used any other time, but I do understand where you're coming from and agree.

 

I think it'll be fine since the drive isn't used any other time.