Hi Mike,

You may perform system restore to restore the system settings back to a previous date. Please refer to the link: http://bit.ly/10Y7wsp.

*Note: System Restore will not cause any loss of data. However, any applications installed after the dat to which the system is being restored to would be uninstalled.

Keep me posted with the results. I will be glad to assist you.

Reboot the computer and check the drives again. Use Disk Management to see a visual of the partitions. I'm surprised that you never combined Dell's original partitioning--small C drive and huge data drive D-- to one large C drive. You should not have downloaded numerous driver updates for the 1764 model. Laptops don't have many driver updates. I have a 1764 and there have not been any driver updates in 2-3 years. Using your service tag does not guarantee every update is for your exact hardware. You must be aware of everything you have in Device Manager and make sure you actually have the hardware that is updated.

I attempted to insert a screen capture into my last reply, but I'm not seeing it, so I'm going to type the information I was trying to share.

As you suggested, I did run a successful system restore to a point before I started installing all those driver updates.  However, when I run Disk Management, I only see my C: drive and do not see my D: drive.  I see the following on the Disk Management Screen:

Volume        File System     Status                                                     Capacity

(blank label)    (blank)          Healthy (OEM Partition)                          100 MB

OS (C:)            NTFS           Healthy (Boot...Primary Partition)            155.79 GB

RECOVERY    NTFS           Healthy (System...Primary Partition)        9.77 GB

In the box diagram below that, I see all three of those, plus a box highlighted in green (300.10 GB - Free Space; extended partition?).  That's my D: drive space.  I don't know what steps I need to take to make my D: drive accessible.  Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Mike

Thanks, Amogh.  As you suggested, I restored my system settings back to a previous date -- a date before I had installed all those driver updates.  The system restore was successful, however, I still only see my C: drive and not my D: drive.  When I run Disk Management, I see the following:

Thanks, Mary.  I had already rebooted and checked the drives before receiving your response.  I've since performed a system recovery to a point before I started the driver updates.  Unfortunately, I'm still not seeing my D: drive in the Disk Management program -- however, I CAN see the space allocated to the D: drive (300 GB).  Instead of combing the C: and D: drives, I earlier (a year ago?) had enlarged my C: drive (to 155 GB) to have extra system processing space.  As for installing all those driver updates, I did so in an attempt to resolve another recent problem occurring constantly with my laptop (my internet connection has started disconnecting constantly...it's not happening to other internet-connected devices in my home, so it's definitely something happening with the laptop).  Anyway, I had no clue which driver updates would apply to that situation, and the Dell.com said I had 33 driver updates available (under my service tag), so I blindly trusted them to tell me what needed updating.  There are no instructions there as to when to apply driver updates, so I attempted updating everything.  That's how I lost access to my D: drive.  Based on your advice, I now know that I shouldn't have done that -- but I had no way of knowing before I did so.  Live and learn...the hard way.  :-(

Hi desertmike62,

If it’s showing 300.10 GB as free space and that was your D:\ partition space then it means that the D:\ partition has been deleted permanently from the system and nothing can be done to retrieve the data.

Please feel free to reply for any further questions. I will be glad to assist further.

Hi Amogh,

If you can provide instructions on how to recreate the D:\ partition, I can reload the missing data from a cloud backup service that I use.  THANKS for your assistance!

Mike

Did you try re-assigning a new drive letter (D) ?

When I right-click on the "free space" that was my D drive, the available options I get are "New Simple Volume" and "Delete Partition".  Under the "More Tasks" options, I also have "Create VHD" and "Attach VHD" available as options.  I don't have any knowledge about what any of that means, so I'm clueless as to how to proceed.  Thanks for your help!

That didn't sound good to me either!  ;-)  I did as you advised (i.e., selected the "New simple volume" option), and am now successfully downloading my backed up data to the new D:\ drive from my online cloud backup service (Mozy.com).  Thanks for your guidance!!!

Mike

Hi Mike,

I’m glad to know the issue has been resolved and I hope the system is working now the way you want it to work.

Please feel free to reply for any further questions. I will be glad to assist you.

HELP (again!), Amogh!  Today is exactly one week since my D:\ drive suddenly disappeared after I had reinstalled a bunch of drivers for my Dell laptop.  Since that originally occurred, I had to recreate a new D:\ drive, and I successfully downloaded my "lost" data from an online backup service I use, and I've been using my restored computer all week with no issues.  Suddenly, in just the past couple of hours (with no computer activity), I returned to my computer, and the D:\ drive has completely disappeared AGAIN!  This time, I did nothing to prompt that to happen (i.e., I have not run any driver updates nor installed anything else on my computer.  What could possibly be causing my D:\ drive to get automatically deleted?  It is curious that it's happened for a second time exactly one week since it happened the first time.  Any ideas???

Mike :-(

Hi desertmike62,

I would suggest you to run the hardware diagnostics to check for the hardware functionality. You may follow the steps below:

• Reboot and tap 3-4 times to enter the Boot Menu.
• When the boot device list appears, highlight ‘Diagnostics’ and press .
• The computer begins to run the Pre-boot System Assessment, a series of embedded diagnostics that perform initial testing on your system board, keyboard, hard drive, and display.
• In case any hardware component is bad, you will get a corresponding error

You may update the system BIOS, please refer to the link: http://dell.to/1323kj5.

Keep me posted with the results. I will be glad to assist you.