system recovery and secondary drive

[sanarita]

I made a stupid mistake when I ran a full system recovery on my computer. I failed to disconnect the secondary drive. Now that the system recovery is complete, the secondary drive is showing up as unformatted. Is the data still there? And if so, how do I recover it? I tried the demo version of Nucleus data recovery, but no joy. Any suggestions?

[GDH]

Your data is still on the disk and you should be able to get it all back.

Download Recover My Files from www.recovermyfiles.com. Start by running a "Fast Format Recover", and in the drive selection window select and search the "physical drive".

If the Fast Format Recover does not work, next try a "Complete Format Recover" of the physical drive and search only for the default selected file types. This will be a longer search.

At the end of both searches, look in Folder View of the results screen for your files. Click on them to preview their content, and then if you can see them, you can activate the program and save them to your C: drive.

Dont write any data to the problem disk until you have recovered everything (writing data to the problem disk will overwrite and destroy the lost data).

Please let us know how it goes.

Thank you.

[sanarita]

As you instructed, I downloaded Recovermyfiles. When I attempted the rapid recovery, the unformatted disc did not appear as an option for recovery. I then attempted the advanced recovery option. Two physical discs appeared as options for searching, but the search seems to be limited to certain file types, and some of the files I wish to recover are not on the list. I set both physical drives to be searched. Both are close to 280 Gb. The search has been running for a day now, and is less than half completed. Many files have turned up, but they so far have all been trash, that is, unwanted details that apparently originated from the C: drive. I know the data that I put on the unformatted drive did not contain the items that are being turned up by the search.

What I am wondering is if there is any merit to formatting the problem disc and trying a utility that specifically retrieves data from discs that have been reformatted?

The files that have turned up so far are listed file by file. The data on the disc contained thousands of files arranged in folders. Even if material from the problem disc starts appearing, will I have to go through the data file by file? Thousands of the files are the contents of my photo collections and I am not sure what I would do with them if I had to recover them one by one. Is there any way of restoring the folder structure to the retrieved files?

Also, many of the missing files are RAW photo files, designated .cr2 in the file system. It doesn't look like your program is set up to retrieve them. Is this the case?

Thanks so much for your speedy reply to my query and helpful suggestions. I hope that when the seach is completed I will have turned up the things I wanted to get.

[GDH]

A "physical drive" means the actual physical hard drive connected in your computer. You have two physical drives connected to your computer - the one that Windows is installed on, and the problem drive.

You only need to search the problem physical drive. You should be able to tell which one is which by the size. If both physical drives are the same size, then usually the one which is running windows is "0 physical" and the secondary drive is "1 physical".

Do not format the drive.

First try a "Fast Format Recover". Search the problem physical drive only. At the end of the search all files and folders will be shown in "Folder View" of the results screen.

If the Fast Format Recover does not work, next try a "Complete Format Recover". Search the problem physical drive and search ONLY for the default selected file types. At the end of the search it will rebuild the entire file and folder structure with full file and folder names.

[mw_warren]

So, if I understand this thread correctly, your recommended procedures for sanarita would also apply to recover files lost on an external hard drive?

I was in the process of transferring files (all music files) on my external HD to my laptop when the power cable for the external HD was accidently pulled from the wall. Now, while my laptop still recogized the external HD exists, I cannot see any of the files on there. I simply see a message that the HD needs to be formatted.

Do I just go to the www.recovermyfiles.com site and do teh "Fast Format Recover" and search my problem drive only (my external HD)? Thanks for your prompt response!

[admin]

Yes, download Recover My Files from www.recovermyfiles.com or http://download.getdata.com/RecoverMyFiles-Setup.exe

Install the program on your C: drive. The first thing to try is a "Fast Format Recover" and when you get to the drive selection window, select and search the external "physical" drive (you should be able to identify it by it's listed size).

A Fast Format Recover will look for the old partition records, and if it finds them it will display the results in Folder View of the results screen. It does not always work - depending on what exactly has happened to your partition. If it does not work....

You should next try a "Complete Format Recover". This is a much longer search, but will find your files. Again, search the physical drive. In the file selection window, do not change the default selection of files to the search - only add music files if these were the only files that were on your external disk (i.e. it did not contain any of the other default selected files).

You do not need to let a Complete Format Recover run all the way to the end. When "OS Items Found" in the results screen reaches a high number (each OS Item Found represents a file with its full file and folder name) then you can stop the search and let the file system rebuild and display in the results screen.

You need to save the search results back to another drive. Once you have recovered the files, test them, and then when you have recovered all possible files, you can format the drive and copy them back.

I hope this helps.

[mw_warren]

Awesome...that's exactly what I thought. My files were indeed recovered so I guess now I need to go get another external 250GB HD to save them on and then reformat my existing drive so I can put them back on. Thanks for your help.