Windows - Delayed Write Failed

B

bornon5

New Member
I have a fairly new Seagate 320 GB Freeagent external hard drive. It's been working fine, but suddenly I have been getting these popup balloons:

Windows was unable to save all the data for the file F:\$Mft

F:\ is the directory for the external hard drive. And now, although it shows 97 GB used space, which is correct, I can't see my files. My movies folder, for instance, is "empty," even though their presence is seen in the used space.

Can anybody help me? I don't want to lose all my data!
 
maybe it's just the view settings.

Open the folder containing your hard drive.
Go to tools - folder options - view -
Under "Hidden files and folders" check "Show hidden files and folders"
Click Apply to All Folders
Click OK

If this doesn't work, make sure you are logged in as an administrator.
 
No, it's not a view issue. With some restarts and unplugging/reconnecting, I can see and access the files again.

My biggest concern: does the mft issue stem from the hard drive or from my computer?
 
the Master File Table or MFT is the place where information about every file and directory on an NTFS volume is stored. If there are real problems with this you could completely lose your data.

This problem could be caused by improperly removing the external hard drive when you are done using it each time. Make sure you always use the "safely remove hardware" utility. Not doing this can cause big problems - it could crash your drive for good.

First you should make a back-up of all of your data. Then try successively removing and reconnecting your drive using the "safely remove hardware" utility and see if this solves the problem. If you don't know where this utility is, when a component is attached to your computer, a small green arrow will appear in the bottom right of your screen, left click on this and click remove when you want to disconnect the hardware.

If this doesn't work, you probably have a real problem. Go to this Microsoft article. They address this very issue.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;330174

Try some of their suggestions. It may help.
 
I had the same problem ...

with my WD My Book ES 500GB. I resolved the problem by replacing my USB PCI card with a new one. It's possible that your external drive is plugged in to a bad, or underperforming USB slot. Try other slots (you may have already) and see if that resolves your issue.
 
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