Windows 10: Programs Disappeared

Hey all,

I ran into the strangest thing last night. Windows suddenly stopped being able to see many of my installed programs on one of my platter drives. I've set up my computer so that the OS is on an SSD the the majority of my programs are on a 1 TB platter designated as the F: drive. Here's what I know


~The platter HD still sees that there are 250 or so GB of data on it
~The file directories on that HD however only visibly contain about 50 GB of data
~all the other program and game directories that used to be visible now either deleted or invisible
~Steam no longer sees the games installed on that drive
~Shortcuts on my desktop to programs and games installed on that drive lost their icons and were replaced by the blank window icon and the error message you get when the icon doesn't lead anywhere
~No data on my SSD or my 3rd platter (used for primarily for video editing) was affected by this
~I've scanned the HD for errors and there are none and I've scanned the computer for viruses and it's clean.


Any help on restoring these directories would be much appreciated. I don't know much about to futz around in Windows 10 but my gut says it's a registry thing.


Here's my specs:
Running windows 10 Version 1511
i5 6600k
16 gb ddr 4 ram
Asus Z170 MOBO
GTX 960 Graphics Card
2x 1 TB platter
1x 250 Gb Samsung SSD

Thanks in advance for any help!

:)

 

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We're running Windows 10 Enterprise, version 1507 LTSB. We have roaming profiles set up. The domain controller (and host of the profiles, DNS, DHCP) is Windows Server 2016 Standard.

 

Hi,
Prior to undertaking any recovery I strongly suggest you create a sector image of your disk so that you have a second chance should your recovery precedure fail.

It is essential not to write anything to your HDD to maximise your chance of recovery.

1. If somehow your files were deleted, you can of course check the recycle bin.
2. If they are potentially recoverable but not deleted to the recycle bin, you can try e.g. Recuva (download, install).

3. Otherwise, suggests you may need to try rebuilding the MFT. However, noted that you say no errors were reported on the disk - by chkdsk?
So that raises a question in my mind.
E.g.
How to Repair a Corrupt Master File Table | eHow
Master File Table recovery - TechRepublic