Hard disk data recovery *Solved & Fully Recovered*

[KBC]

Alright, I should've better posted this 10 days ago before it's too late, but it's too late now.

I'll go through in-detail.

My Computer crashed few days ago, because of too little memory, and the bloody bang viruses, to name a few reasons.

Then, I couldn't log-in, or for that matter, PC would restart in few minutes after XP logo comes in, nor did the Safe mode work. It's my mistake i believe, I should've waited for and tested out all possibilities to get it working on, before lending my comp for repair.

Now they've screwed it up, I'll told them a billliion times not to do anything ANYTHING Fancy with the Hard disk, no format, nothing. But they did.

Now i have Two HDDs, Both 80 GB each + I ordered an external 1 TB one. The problem is that the Second 80 GB HDD is a little unstable, but no worries in that, it works on my PC good. But the guy who took for repair granted it as "corrupted". And the bloody end. He dumped onto the 1 TB HDD everything as much as possible from both the 80 GB hard disks, and ended up saving very few data files.


The problem is, that he formatted the first 80 GB hard disk, and created partitions and installed XP into it. Which was the laaast thing on my mind. Now the data from the hard disk is not properly dumped; And I've told him NOT to format it. But he diid.


Okay, so not to plunge you into more vines, I'll come to the point.

I need a pin-point, best hard disk data recovery tool/application. I'm ready to do anything to get the best of it.

Any help? Please! I've got so so so so important data! All my music files, graphics, you name it. Everything's on the verge of vanishing off the hope forever!

P.S. I know nothing gets lost if you format a disk, hence the topic!


Help would be worshipped!

KBC.

KBC added 3 Minutes and 38 Seconds later...

Oops. Wrong forum. This thing is really on my mind.

 

[Abhas]

Hmm.. Could be tough, but try out Recuva. It's a free data recovery software. http://www.piriform.com/recuva

Also, try out these software..
http://www.datadoctor.in/data-recovery-software/ntfs-data-recovery-software.html
http://www.stellarinfo.com/disk-recovery.htm

I would advise you to try out as many software as possible. There might be a possibility of partial data recovery, but it depends on how many times the data was overwritten.
If the disk was re-partitioned, generally, chances of data recovery become bleak.

 

[Chetan0304]

Hey Abhas one of my ex-HD Hitachi 160gb stopped working days back, whenever i connect it through usb, PC freezes.

warranty period has passed


I want it to work again if possible, giving it out for service in coming day, will be glad if you give a way out, if possible as i think it's the end of it.

 

[Abhas]

Chetan, Have you tried it with another PC? Try connecting it while windows is running in Safe mode.

 

[Chetan0304]

Chetan, Have you tried it with another PC? Try connecting it while windows is running in Safe mode.

Tried both multiple times, same result

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

KBC, as long as nothing has been overwritten on the data (Which is generally the case once the drive is formatted, and only XP is installed on it), the data recovery chances are very high. But you say its been 10 days, you might have installed a lot of stuff, deleted some, space would have been used for page files, so some overwriting must have occurred, not to mention the overwriting on the area where XP has now been installed.

Nevertheless, for the other empty area, you could try R-Studio. I've used it once, and it worked pretty well for me, though I don't know about the current times.

Hope this helps
Kshitiz

 

[KBC]

KBC, as long as nothing has been overwritten on the data (Which is generally the case once the drive is formatted, and only XP is installed on it), the data recovery chances are very high. But you say its been 10 days, you might have installed a lot of stuff, deleted some, space would have been used for page files, so some overwriting must have occurred, not to mention the overwriting on the area where XP has now been installed.

Nevertheless, for the other empty area, you could try R-Studio. I've used it once, and it worked pretty well for me, though I don't know about the current times.

Hope this helps
Kshitiz

Yeah mate, I'm not much really bothered about the new stuff. But the biggest ache comes that the guy made partitions, put it this way, he did everything i didn't want him to do.

He formatted the data from my first HDD, which has two partitions, C:, D:; blindly just copying the D:\\ partition from the disk, which though couldn't do a carbon copy. He left out another partition. And i told him like a broken record NEVER EVER EVER EVER put his usual drill, and just leave the HDD if he couldn't get what i was asking for, but he formatted the disk, and created partitions, which now fears me.

I'm ready to pour out as much money as possible, it's not a bother, but i want to recover like as much data as it was, not to sound greedy, but every single KB.

Oh man, Why would he do it? meh........ I'm gonna go seriously crazy if the last hopes would diminish.

Hmm.. Could be tough, but try out Recuva. It's a free data recovery software. Recuva - Undelete, Unerase, File and Disk Recovery - Free Download

Also, try out these software..
http://www.datadoctor.in/data-recove...-software.html
Disk Recovery | Hard Disk Recovery Software tool recover data from hard disk - Stellar Phoenix

I would advise you to try out as many software as possible. There might be a possibility of partial data recovery, but it depends on how many times the data was overwritten.
If the disk was re-partitioned, generally, chances of data recovery become bleak.

My worst fears abhas, . He did re-partition, I don't know why, he did exactly everything which were the last things on my mind.

Do you think there's still a chance of recovery inspite of the re-partitions? And it probably requires a high-end program and some serious shelling out of money? I'm ready. Just that i badly need that now.

Thanks guys, I'll try out every tool you've mentioned there. But if you think there's a best(estestestestest) of ways to recover the data, but it might take handsome amount of money, I'm prepared.

Thanks a lot. Please, I've got no other scope, all the data has been my life.

KBC added 6 Minutes and 24 Seconds later...

Another good thing i'd like to mention is that one partition, D: is almost never touched for 3 years, EXCEPT that I've created and put new folders, nothing much ever has been over written.

The damn thing is exactly opposite with C:\. It has Windows XP OS, and ironically, In all senses, I had no real options but to save some data temporarily from other drives to save some space in the disks, and i'm not sure if there's any overwriting happened in C, but I'm sure it's a busy place with a lot of work going thru and many folders shifting from here to there and stuff!

And to add even more irony to it, I'd tunes recorded in Sound recorder and those were saved in Windows folder.... I really do look like a fool but if someone was in my place i'd doubt they'd have any special options to do than me.

I BEG FOR HELP!

 

[MattW]

I'd hit whoever this tech guy you took it to with a shovel.

That said, I've been in a position before where I destroyed a partition (was poking around with other OSes and messed something up), it formatted everything and repartitioned. But through using windows installed on another HD put in the PC I was able to recover everything.

Considering Windows is the first thing you'd have installed in the partition in the first place, you'd likely have not overwritten much. Try out one of the tools for file recovery mentioned here, they scan through the disc for files and tries to recover what it can. Just do that, save everything to an external HD, then try it with another tool. I can't remember the one I used, I just googled for tools and downloaded one of the first results.

Try to avoid running the OS as much as possible.

Unless you do what is called a low level format, nothing is actually erased by a format. All formatting does is drop the file allocation table and make a new one.

 

[omkarjere]

Yeah mate, I'm not much really bothered about the new stuff. But the biggest ache comes that the guy made partitions, put it this way, he did everything i didn't want him to do.

He formatted the data from my first HDD, which has two partitions, C:, D:; blindly just copying the D:\\ partition from the disk, which though couldn't do a carbon copy. He left out another partition. And i told him like a broken record NEVER EVER EVER EVER put his usual drill, and just leave the HDD if he couldn't get what i was asking for, but he formatted the disk, and created partitions, which now fears me.

I'm ready to pour out as much money as possible, it's not a bother, but i want to recover like as much data as it was, not to sound greedy, but every single KB.

Oh man, Why would he do it? meh........ I'm gonna go seriously crazy if the last hopes would diminish.



My worst fears abhas, . He did re-partition, I don't know why, he did exactly everything which were the last things on my mind.

Do you think there's still a chance of recovery inspite of the re-partitions? And it probably requires a high-end program and some serious shelling out of money? I'm ready. Just that i badly need that now.

Thanks guys, I'll try out every tool you've mentioned there. But if you think there's a best(estestestestest) of ways to recover the data, but it might take handsome amount of money, I'm prepared.

Thanks a lot. Please, I've got no other scope, all the data has been my life.

KBC added 6 Minutes and 24 Seconds later...

Another good thing i'd like to mention is that one partition, D: is almost never touched for 3 years, EXCEPT that I've created and put new folders, nothing much ever has been over written.

The damn thing is exactly opposite with C:\. It has Windows XP OS, and ironically, In all senses, I had no real options but to save some data temporarily from other drives to save some space in the disks, and i'm not sure if there's any overwriting happened in C, but I'm sure it's a busy place with a lot of work going thru and many folders shifting from here to there and stuff!

And to add even more irony to it, I'd tunes recorded in Sound recorder and those were saved in Windows folder.... I really do look like a fool but if someone was in my place i'd doubt they'd have any special options to do than me.

I BEG FOR HELP!

Too much XXX is bad for PCs you know ? Anyway I didn't have any luck using those tools mentioned when I had problems I suggest getting an expert guy with pro tools that should help. Good Luck

 

[sohum]

KBC. First things first, make sure you are attempting data recovery from a separate computer... i.e. connect the hard disk you're attempting recovery from to a different computer.

Secondly, do you know if your hard disk was NTFS or FAT32 formatted? If NTFS, I've had luck with the FindNTFS tool. You can view a tutorial here. The tool can be found here. Data recovery varies from hard disk to hard disk so nothing can be guaranteed.

 

[KBC]

I'd hit whoever this tech guy you took it to with a shovel.

That said, I've been in a position before where I destroyed a partition (was poking around with other OSes and messed something up), it formatted everything and repartitioned. But through using windows installed on another HD put in the PC I was able to recover everything.

Considering Windows is the first thing you'd have installed in the partition in the first place, you'd likely have not overwritten much. Try out one of the tools for file recovery mentioned here, they scan through the disc for files and tries to recover what it can. Just do that, save everything to an external HD, then try it with another tool. I can't remember the one I used, I just googled for tools and downloaded one of the first results.

Try to avoid running the OS as much as possible.

Unless you do what is called a low level format, nothing is actually erased by a format. All formatting does is drop the file allocation table and make a new one.

Okay Matt! That actually brings a new brilliant hope again. Thank you tons!

Yep, I've not done anything much on the computer, turns out positive of the fact that since i couldn't digest the disaster, i didn't use the computer much. Good! I do have an external 1 TB HDD matt, and mainly as a cover to store the reocovered data. But having said that, one thing bothers me is that --

-- C: used to be the partition for the OS (windows XP SP2) before the guy formatted and extended the partition space for C: from 15 GB to 30 GB and now that distracted the space in D: too . That, bothers me. It's sort of a manipulation.

Now here are the possibilities i see reading this. Data may be recovered only from the free space that's in the new partition, because free space means nothing would be written over the data. So i might have to get up for a compromise when it comes to recovering data which are in the WINDOWS folder and some overwritten data files. I hope i can still recover that data too.

The C: drive is now in my first HDD and it has the same operating system installed in it, so is it advisable to start recovery of data from the same hard disk the OS is in, or should i install XP on my 1 TB HDD and start recovery from there? And i believe, not confirmed, the format must've been a low level one. It'd only add up troubles if it isn't.


Thanks a lot for the support everyone! Hope is building up every second in me. I'm bound to try and bring good news.

 

[sohum]

I got confused reading your post so let's simplify it:

1. Actual data is not stored on a disk in terms of partitions. Data is just bits. Unless those bits have been wiped, the data is still there, albeit inaccessible.

2. Partitions are a middle layer that is used by operating systems to organize data. A partition table is stored at the beginning of each hard disk that holds this information. The hardware, though, does not know about the partitions. The table contains information about what sectors of data the partition represents.

3. On the software level, the OS mounts the partition at a certain location in memory. In Windows, these locations are known as drives. In Linux, they just look like normal folders (you can mount a hard disk wherever you want, pretty much).

So what your data recovery success comes down to is (a) whether those bits have been wiped and (b) whether the software you use is able to make sense of those bits without having the original partition table to fall back on.

Now, from what I understand you have your original hard disks that you want to recover data from. Let's call those A and B. You also have a 1TB hard-disk. Let's call that C. Unfortunately, your 1TB is an external, so unless you have an eSATA port on both the hard disk and your mobo, you won't be able to load an operating system on it. But if you do, or if you want to risk opening up the case to connect the HDD to your mobo, you should definitely install XP on the 1TB.

If you don't have that option, then I'd either find a small, spare HDD (XP doesn't take more than like 5 gigs anyway) to perform your backups. Your last choice should be to boot your OS from the hard-disk that you're attempting recovery from.

 

[KBC]

KBC. First things first, make sure you are attempting data recovery from a separate computer... i.e. connect the hard disk you're attempting recovery from to a different computer.

Secondly, do you know if your hard disk was NTFS or FAT32 formatted? If NTFS, I've had luck with the FindNTFS tool. You can view a tutorial here. The tool can be found here. Data recovery varies from hard disk to hard disk so nothing can be guaranteed.

NTFS mate! Absolutely! In that case i might need to hand it over to another techie again.

Thanks! I'll try my best by tomorrow.

Another incident which might not be much useful now is that, As i mentioned in my first post, In one of 10-11 tries in running safe mode before all this happened and when the PC wasn't running normally, it worked once with no problems whatsoever. But my chance was spoiled a few minutes later when one of those tech guy came to note down the specs of my PC, and i'd to shut it down.

Not much use, but the more i put, the more i clear off my mind.

But i'll try my best to get it on another PC, and try recovering!

KBC added 9 Minutes and 12 Seconds later...

I got confused reading your post so let's simplify it:

1. Actual data is not stored on a disk in terms of partitions. Data is just bits. Unless those bits have been wiped, the data is still there, albeit inaccessible.

2. Partitions are a middle layer that is used by operating systems to organize data. A partition table is stored at the beginning of each hard disk that holds this information. The hardware, though, does not know about the partitions. The table contains information about what sectors of data the partition represents.

3. On the software level, the OS mounts the partition at a certain location in memory. In Windows, these locations are known as drives. In Linux, they just look like normal folders (you can mount a hard disk wherever you want, pretty much).

So what your data recovery success comes down to is (a) whether those bits have been wiped and (b) whether the software you use is able to make sense of those bits without having the original partition table to fall back on.

Now, from what I understand you have your original hard disks that you want to recover data from. Let's call those A and B. You also have a 1TB hard-disk. Let's call that C. Unfortunately, your 1TB is an external, so unless you have an eSATA port on both the hard disk and your mobo, you won't be able to load an operating system on it. But if you do, or if you want to risk opening up the case to connect the HDD to your mobo, you should definitely install XP on the 1TB.

If you don't have that option, then I'd either find a small, spare HDD (XP doesn't take more than like 5 gigs anyway) to perform your backups. Your last choice should be to boot your OS from the hard-disk that you're attempting recovery from.

Didn't see this post before mate!

Yeah! Brilliant! Perfect dig through of the situation! I think i have the eSATA port luckily considering my other HDD lies on it's support, so i'd try mounting the External 1TB HDD to my mother board with a proper OS, and try recovering. That's a better idea, or as you said, much easier is to recover data from the HDD the OS is in, and dump them to the the 1TB HDD OR I'll take it better to my uncle's (who's also a brill techie) and use his HDD to perform the recovery actions. I'm glad i have all the three choices!

I know i sound really confusing. But i have no option!

Thanks, saviours!

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

Yeah, the bits are not wiped from the HDD platters unless something is overwritten, which is how after all they retrieve data. Creating partitions doesn't matter, the actual thing is that nothing should be written on that exact area.

 

[KBC]

Yep! Some interesting news! There's actually a complete backup of D: Drive in my 1TB HDD, though some files are missing, which i terribly need (the .FLPs)!!!! So, I'm happy i can recover even more data from the new partition that used to be D:

And I've fell up on an idea. I'll take my HDD to my Uncle and connect it to the mobo, and connect the external 1TB HDD too. In that way, I'll have his HDD which with no problems has an XP installed, and i can start recovery from there and dump the data to the 1 TB HDD. Might seriously take time but really possible.