When you copy files to the hard drive, if you receive the error message “Data error (cyclic redundancy check)”, don’t worry that you may lose the data. Follow the steps in this post, you’ll fix the error instantly.
Cyclic Redundancy Check is an error-detecting code used for data verification. When you get this error message, it means there is something wrong with the files or the hard drive.
The error could be caused by the file itself or the hard drive. So first, copy the file to another drive to determine the cause. If you can’t copy the file to another file either, the problem is in fact in the file itself. If you can, the problem is the hard drive.
If the problem is the file itself, you can recover the file.
If the problem is the hard drive, you can repair the drive.
Recover the file
If you don’t care about the data in the file, you can ignore the error and just delete the file. But if the data is important, you may want to recover it. There’re many free data recovery software online you can search for. If you have no idea which one should be trusted, we recommend Stellar Phoenix Windows Data Recovery. It’s a tool that recovers any corrupted data and file automatically.
Repair the drive
To repair the drive, you can run a Windows utility: CHKDSK . CHKDSK can check the integrity of your hard disk and can fix various system errors.
Just follow these steps:
1. On your keyboard, press the Windows logo key, then type command prompt. Find Command Prompt from the list of results, right-click it, and select Run as administrator.
Click Yes when you’re prompted.
2. Type “chkdsk /f x:”. Replace the x: with the drive that you’re having a problem with.
In my case, my drive is d:\, so I type “chkdsk /f d:” (see below).
3. Then press the Enter button. The process might take longer if there are problems with many files. So please be patient until it’s finished.
4. Restart your computer.
If the problem persists, you might need to format the disk. The format will remove all data from the disk. So please ensure you know what you are doing. If you are not comfortable doing it yourself, you can take your computer to the nearest repair store and have it checked.
