Fixing A Corrupted Windows NTFS Partition

Fixing A Corrupted Windows NTFS Partition

Luckily you can schedule an NTFS consistency check within Ubuntu to attempt to repair your tattered Windows partition, but you’re going to need to install a couple of things. It is worth mentioning that this should work with any NTFS drive that refuses to mount in Ubuntu too. Open a Terminal window by clicking Applications, Accessories and then Terminal.

First install NTFS-3G by typing this command:

sudo apt-get install ntfs-3g

Enter your password and hit Enter on your keyboard. Next install NTFSProgs in the same way:

sudo apt-get install ntfsprogs

Now with both of those tools at your disposal, you can set about fixing Windows. First locate your Windows partition. In the Terminal type:

sudo fdisk -l

You’re looking for an entry that looks like this:

/dev/sda2   *         638       12312    93773824    7  HPFS/NTFS

The important bit is the /dev/sda2 which tells us where the Windows partition is mounted. HPFS/NTFS lets us know that the partition is a Microsoft Windows formatted device, and that little star denotes that this is a bootable partition.

So in my case /dev/sda2 means that Windows is on sda (my internal hard drive) and that it’s partition 2 that I want to play around with.

Armed with this information you want to use NTFSProgs to attempt to fix the partition. In your Terminal window type:

sudo ntfsfix /dev/

Replace with your Windows partition (e.g. /dev/sda2) and enter your password followed by Enter. Your drive will now be mounted, checked for consistency and any errors found should be fixed. Restart your PC to assess the situation, if all goes well you’ll see Windows.

Fixing A Corrupt Master Boot Record

If you’ve got a problem with Windows’ oh-so-important boot record then you can also fix that from within Ubuntu too. Assuming you’ve already booted into Ubuntu, open up Terminal and install lilo by typing:

sudo apt-get install lilo

Enter your password to proceed with the installation, you’ll get a few warnings pop-up along the way.
If you followed the first part of this tutorial you’ll know which partition Windows is installed on, if you missed it type:

sudo fdisk -l

Find the HPFS/NTFS partition that relates to your Windows install, and type:

sudo lilo -M /dev/ mbr

Replace with your Windows partition (e.g. /dev/sda2) and hit Enter. Ubuntu will attempt to restore your master boot record. You’ll probably want to restart your machine now, just make sure you take any Live CD/USB devices out as you do.