It's interesting how technology can make you look like a fool,
even if you are not one. It's also frightening how easy it is to lose
valuable, irreplaceable data stored on your computer with a push of a
button!
Accidentally formatting the wrong drive is a feat many unlucky technophobes have managed to accomplish. Luckily, all those pictures and documents may not be lost forever!
It is almost as easy to recover those deleted files as it was accidentally deleting them - provided you performed a quick format, not a full format. Quick format deletes just the file address table, not the files themselves. They are still on the disk, it's just that your operating system has no record of them.
When you perform a full format, your operating system will not only delete all the data on a drive, but will additionally overwrite them with zeroes and perform a bad sector scan. With quick format, the data is only made "invisible" to your operating system - it is still on the drive!
The first step in recovering the lost files is to cease using your drive immediately. The space where your deleted data used to live is now marked as "available space" for your computer to overwrite with the new data. Whenever you make any change on that drive, this overwrites the files you are trying to save.
The deleted files are still on the drive, waiting to be discovered! To recover them, you will just have to choose between a host of recovery utilities available, some of them for free. You will also need some time - and sometimes, a lot of time - to perform the data recovery process.
You will need to follow all instructions provided by the recovery program to install a copy of the program on your computer. Don't install the recovery tool on the same drive that you have performed a quick format on earlier - remember that any change to that drive will damage your files further and may make them unrecoverable!
Launch the data recovery tool and let the program wizard lead you through all the steps of the recovery process. Every data recovery tool will require a fairly long scan of the whole drive in order to find the files you have deleted. You can usually choose which file type and file size the program should look for.
You can choose which recoverable files you want saved. Make sure that you save all the files that a program manages to recover to a new location, on a (preferably) different drive!
If the files you need are not found by a recovery tool, don't despair - pick another one and try again. Each recovery tool uses a slightly different method of data recovery. One may be more successful than the other on your files! If all else fails, or the data is really important, you can try with a professional data recovery program, or simply let the data forensics lab handle the recovery of your files!
Accidentally formatting the wrong drive is a feat many unlucky technophobes have managed to accomplish. Luckily, all those pictures and documents may not be lost forever!
It is almost as easy to recover those deleted files as it was accidentally deleting them - provided you performed a quick format, not a full format. Quick format deletes just the file address table, not the files themselves. They are still on the disk, it's just that your operating system has no record of them.
When you perform a full format, your operating system will not only delete all the data on a drive, but will additionally overwrite them with zeroes and perform a bad sector scan. With quick format, the data is only made "invisible" to your operating system - it is still on the drive!
The first step in recovering the lost files is to cease using your drive immediately. The space where your deleted data used to live is now marked as "available space" for your computer to overwrite with the new data. Whenever you make any change on that drive, this overwrites the files you are trying to save.
The deleted files are still on the drive, waiting to be discovered! To recover them, you will just have to choose between a host of recovery utilities available, some of them for free. You will also need some time - and sometimes, a lot of time - to perform the data recovery process.
You will need to follow all instructions provided by the recovery program to install a copy of the program on your computer. Don't install the recovery tool on the same drive that you have performed a quick format on earlier - remember that any change to that drive will damage your files further and may make them unrecoverable!
Launch the data recovery tool and let the program wizard lead you through all the steps of the recovery process. Every data recovery tool will require a fairly long scan of the whole drive in order to find the files you have deleted. You can usually choose which file type and file size the program should look for.
You can choose which recoverable files you want saved. Make sure that you save all the files that a program manages to recover to a new location, on a (preferably) different drive!
If the files you need are not found by a recovery tool, don't despair - pick another one and try again. Each recovery tool uses a slightly different method of data recovery. One may be more successful than the other on your files! If all else fails, or the data is really important, you can try with a professional data recovery program, or simply let the data forensics lab handle the recovery of your files!
Download a freeware data recovery tool, Aid File Unformat, from http://formatdriverecovery.com.
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