Encrypted Partitions Listed as RAW in Win 10

[Cathy Preece]

I used Veracrypt to encrypt my system drive - no problems. I then used it to encrypt the partitions on my other hard drive. These are now listed as RAW in Windows 10 disk management, though NTFS in properties under file explorer. These partitions are also no longer listed in the system restore settings. Is this normal behaviour? The system drive is still listed as NTFS in disk management and available for system restore, so why are these other partitions different? I have tried in place encryption as well as creating new volumes in Veracrypt.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[Kurt Fitzner]

Non-system partitions are listed as RAW because Windows cannot natively read any data on the partition. When you are looking in disk management, Windows is looking at the partition directly and the part of Windows that is looking isn't aware of encryption. All it sees is a partition and all the data on that partition just looks like random hash, so the disk manager throws up its hands and says "I can't tell what this is, it must just be raw data".

The same partition is shown as NTFS in the properties under file explorer because when you are using file explorer, you are exploring the filesystem as VeraCrypt is providing it to the system. Windows is looking at the filesystem using VeraCrypt as a lens and then it understands that it is NTFS.

[Cathy Preece]

Thank you very much.