Partition gets lost without a reason? Accidentally delete a partition? Don’t be panic. This article tells how to recover lost/deleted/formatted/missing partition in Windows 7/8/10 with simple ways.
Partition loss is a common disaster that occurs in daily life. Here are some cases of losing partition in Windows 7:
Case 1: Hi, all. I accidentally deleted my E drive which is used to store data while installing Windows OS. Now, the operating system has been installed smoothly. I was wondering if there is any way to recover that accidentally deleted partition, now in unallocated space, in Windows 7. Thanks.
Case 2: Help please. One of my hard drive partitions becomes a space with an asterisk in Disk Management this morning I turned on my Windows 7. It disappears from Windows File Explorer and I cannot access files on that partition. I can’t recall what has been done exactly because the last time I use it was a week ago. Can I recover the missing partition in Windows 7? Any help would be appreciated.”
Case 3: My Dell Recovery Partition missing on Windows 7, and I cannot restore it when disaster happens in the future. I have no idea about the causes. Please help.”
Usually, partitions will get lost owing to inappropriate operations like delete or format. However, sometimes, they get missing without a reason, at least not a reason you can aware of. Some possible reasons for a partition missing are listed in the next part. If you’re not interested, skip to the “How-to” part directly.
These reasonable causes for partition lost are widely discussed. Check if they are applying for your situation.
That information is just for reference, and what counts next is to find out how to recover the lost, deleted, missing, or formatted partition easily. In the first place, you need to bear these notes in mind.
A pretty easy way to perform partition recovery in Windows 7 will be firstly introduced. AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional is a powerful yet easy-to-use software that helps you recover deleted, formatted, lost, or missing partitions with clicks.
This software is able to recover the NTFS partition and works perfectly on GPT and MBR partition tables. It will find lost partition in Windows 7 with two search methods, fast search, and full search. Further, to avoid issues like software conflict or if your system fails to boot, you can create bootable media and do these operations without booting Windows 7.
What’s more, this software supports managing dynamic disk volume. For example, it helps a lot when you are unable to convert dynamic disk to basic without losing data.
1. Install and run AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. Click “Recover” on in the top toolbar, and choose “Partition Recovery”. In the pop-up window, select the disk where your lost partition locates and click Next.
2. Select a search mode, Fast Search (recommended) and Full Search, and click Next.
3. Wait for the search complete and select the lost partition from the given list. Click Proceed to start. Patience is required when the software is recovering the partition.
4. At the congratulations window, click Finish to exit this page. Back to Disk Management to check if your partition gets recovered.
Tip: To recover lost partition on Windows Server operating systems, please turn to AOMEI Partition Assistant Server Edition.
If your partition becomes a space with an asterisk in Disk Management, you can try this way to get it back, re-assign drive letter in CMD.
1. Click Start and type cmd in the search box. Right click cmd.exe from the results and select Run as administrator.
2. Type diskpart and press Enter. Then, input these commands successively and each command is along with an Enter.
• list disk • select disk n (where n is the disk number of the disk where your lost partition locates) • list volume • select volume # (where # is the volume number of the lost partition) • assign letter=g (you can replace g with any other letter that is not occupying)
3. Type exit twice to leave DiskPart and CMD.
Please note that all steps take effect immediately and you cannot step back in the command prompt. Therefore, make sure you’re selecting the right disk and partition, or other partitions will be affected.
For your information, DiskPart helps you manage hard drive partitions in Windows. You can type diskpart> help to learn more commands. For example, you can use DiskPart to make a bootable USB drive.
Two ways how to recover lost, deleted, formatted or missing partitions in Windows 7 are introduced above. Choose the way that you prefer. Actually, they also apply to Windows 10, 8, 8.1, XP, and Vista. Hard drive failure and partition issues occur quite often, so it is suggested to create a regular backup for important files.
Apart from recovering lost partition, AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional also supports migrating OS to SSD from HDD while keeping files on HDD, converting disk between MBR and GPT without data loss, resizing system partition, securely erasing SSD before selling and without hurting its lifespan, etc. It is suggested to keep it installed to help manage the hard drive efficiently.