plasmid.co.uk » USB http://plasmid.co.uk because life is faster in reverse ... Thu, 20 May 2010 23:07:11 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 http://plasmid.co.uk http://plasmid.co.uk/wp/favicon.ico plasmid.co.uk Repairing broken USB partition tables http://plasmid.co.uk/2008/12/04/repairing-broken-usb-partition-tables/ http://plasmid.co.uk/2008/12/04/repairing-broken-usb-partition-tables/#comments Thu, 04 Dec 2008 02:47:12 +0000 plasmid http://plasmid.co.uk/?p=101 While trying to use my 16GB USB flash drive as a raw-disk for VMware, I managed to corrupt the partition table. This rendered the drive useless for data storage. As none of the information contained on the drive was useful, it seemed that the best solution was a straightforward partition table wipe and rebuild. This can be difficult on Windows as Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Disk Management does not allow the deletion of the primary partition.

Many Googl'd solutions involved rebooting with one repair/installation disk or another, however I've found a quicker way...

The Fix

  1. Download MbrFix. [Working mirror at time of writing.]
  2. Use mbrfix /drive <num> driveinfo to identify the USB flash drive. The <num> refers to the physical identifier. Start at zero and increment until one of them gives a size reading that matches; this is probably the correct drive.
  3. Use mbrfix /drive <num> clean and enter "y" to confirm partition deletion. WARNING: IF YOU DO THIS, DATA RECOVERY FROM THE DRIVE IS DIFFICULT, BE SURE YOU HAVE CHOSEN THE CORRECT DRIVE!
  4. Go to Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Disk Management and right-click on the unallocated space. Select create new partition and fill in the details.

    5. This has reset the drive with a healthy partition, you should find it has regained functionality!

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