Thinkpads Forum

I tried searching that, but came up with a bunch of recovery disks, ghosting, and mirroring drives. I'm curious if there is any recommended software to recover data from any media that is erased/recycle-binned. I know there is one for photos, but what about program data, videos, etc? Googling just brings up questionable and expensive "cheap" software or data recovery companies. I would just like any input. Thank you.

I have successfully used GetDataBack for NTFS to rescue date from Win XP HDD's (NTFS!), which were no longer bootable. It is possible to make a bootable "GetDataBack for NTFS" CD-ROM, and rescue data on a more or less dead HDD, and save data onto external drives, via the network and even via ftp. I have never tried the program on a HDD which had been formatted - but for the other situations mentioned, I surely recommend it.

I has a cost, yes - but it may be well worth the money!

Johan

Keyone wrote:I tried searching that, but came up with a bunch of recovery disks, ghosting, and mirroring drives. I'm curious if there is any recommended software to recover data from any media that is erased/recycle-binned. I know there is one for photos, but what about program data, videos, etc? Googling just brings up questionable and expensive "cheap" software or data recovery companies. I would just like any input. Thank you.

Maybe the following is the app you meant when you said you are aware of a recovery tool for photos, but if so: Despite the name, it is definitely not just for recovery of photos. I do think they should make that more clear, since it works so great that it's a waste for ppl not to be able to tell very easily. It can recover well over 100 file types. I had occasion to use it recently on a formatted disk, and it even recovered some proprietary file types that weren't on its capability list. This app, 'photorec,' comes packaged with an app called 'testdisk' that recovers lost partitions. Oh, and it's all free/open source, but I gather it works as well as reputable paid recovery programs, if not better than many.

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

A lot of ppl recommend an app called 'Restoration' too, and I have also used that and liked it. But photorec worked better, and recovered data was much easier to sort and work with (as well as retrieve in the first place).

You may want to take a look at Tune-Up Utilities 2008. It has a good data recovery module that scans your hard drive for deleted items based on customizable search criteria. You can also restrict the scan to only items in good condition.

The bundle also includes, among other things: registry scanner & defragmenter, hard disk defragmenter (which unfortunately does not have a stealth always on mode), disk cleanup tool, disk integrity monitor, secure data shredder, windows optimizer, install manager, process manager, and a host of other odds and ends. Price for the suite is $50, which I think is pretty decent given what you get.

I find the cleanup & registry tools better than CCleaner in some respects, although you'd still need something like PerfectDisk or Diskeeper for stealth defragging.

You can use file recovery software. This software scan every sector of your hard and can locate the files without the aid of file system data structures.This software is very easy to use. You can download the demo version of the software from
http://www.stellarinfo.com/file-recovery.htm

Johan wrote:I have successfully used GetDataBack for NTFS to rescue date from Win XP HDD's (NTFS!), which were no longer bootable. It is possible to make a bootable "GetDataBack for NTFS" CD-ROM, and rescue data on a more or less dead HDD, and save data onto external drives, via the network and even via ftp. I have never tried the program on a HDD which had been formatted - but for the other situations mentioned, I surely recommend it.

I has a cost, yes - but it may be well worth the money!

Johan

+1 I also bought the FAT version, and it has saved my family a TON of grief and money. It does work quite nicely pulling "old" partitions off of the disk.

If you have the time and will to learn if needed, there is one (testdisk) that is on the Ubuntu LiveCD that some people swear by, but I've not tested it yet on NTFS or FAT(32) because of the above tools. It looks to be EXTREMELY powerful.