Windows gives the same “opening” message for a variety of fault types, but the subsequent messages detail the actual error. Customers reading these correctly save themselves the inconvenience of formatting a drive when they do not need to. A worked example: a student’s USB stick that demanded formatting.
“Access is denied” is a permission issue. “The parameter is incorrect” is a problem with your file system. “Not formatted” means you’ve lost the partition table. Only one of these issues is related to permissions, and none of them require you to format the disk.
With this variant, damage is rare but permissions are common. Problems such as this are most commonly seen after moving drives from one machine to another or from computers that have been rebuilt. A file’s security descriptor references an account that does not exist on this particular machine.
Usually the fix is to take ownership: right click the drive > Properties > Security > Advanced > Change Owner > Apply to Subdirectories. There is no risk to the data. Nothing is being repaired; you’re just telling Windows that the files belong to you. If taking ownership fixes the issue then you can stop here.
This ending indicates damaged file structure (typically boot sector, file allocation table (FAT/exFAT), master file table (NTFS)), frequently due to an external drive being unplugged during a write operation or a power outage.
The drive is normally good with the data intact. Chkdsk is typically recommended; however, chkdsk repairs damaged areas of the drive by simply removing the unreconciled items, therefore, when possible, copy off the readable data prior to running chkdsk.
“The disk in drive X is not formatted” or “the volume does not contain a recognised file system” implies that Windows has been unable to locate a valid file system within an area where it was expecting to see one. Normally this occurs as a result of either damage to the partition table or the boot sector, which is why you are prompted with “Format”. Windows truly believes that nothing exists there.
Usually there are. If the partition structure has been corrupted, you may still be able to rebuild the structure of your partitions and mount them, but in some cases, this is impossible. In those cases we may need to carve your data from the disk. This is where accepting the prompt does the most damage, as when you choose to format, it overwrites the exact space that the recovery process needs.
Look at the entire error message and check how it ends. Test using an alternative cable (and/or) port (and/or) computer: when you use an external hard drive with a bad logic board/bridge this will give you multiple of these same issues on a working disk. When the hard drive does show up in Disk Management, look and see if it shows as RAW, unallocated or healthy, as this tells a partition issue apart from a permission issue. You need to copy anything that looks like data. Always decline formatting/initialising offers.
If the drive is making a noise (clicking) or disconnecting itself then stop: this is a hardware issue and software will make things worse. The cost for recovering a single drive is from £300 +VAT after a complimentary 48-hour diagnostic. In most cases you only pay if we recover your data.
This is a family of error messages with a single opening line and an end-line that is the diagnosis. “Access is denied” usually indicates permission issues; “The parameter is incorrect” generally shows file-system damage; “Not formatted” means Windows found no valid file-system on what was assumed to be a formatted area of disk-space.
No. Windows has built-in functionality that offers to format the drive for most of these errors; it completely replaces the file-system structures used by any successful recovery operation. Once the message appears, the data is almost always intact.
Generally through taking ownership: right click on the drive, select ‘Properties’, select ‘Security’, select ‘Advanced’ and change the ownership to yourself; the ‘Apply to sub-folders’ option needs to be selected. There is usually a mismatch in user permissions due to the rebuild process on your machine or due to using a different account; there is no real danger of damaging anything.
A damaged file structure is usually the result of a boot sector or file table failure, typically caused by removing an external USB disk during write operations. Generally speaking, the overall health of the drive remains intact. chkdsk may fix some errors but it will delete everything else it cannot reconcile; therefore always copy anything readable from the disk first.
Then stop: the failure of your drive’s heads is now a hardware problem; continuing to click will continue to cause your heads to fail & any scans/repairs will keep the drive working for hours as the damage continues. Remove it from your system immediately to prevent further damage and send it in to get evaluated.