Free undelete programme recommendation

[shivvy]

Can anyone please recommend a free and good undelete programme that I can use to find pictures that I think I have mistakenly deleted from my external hard drive.

Thanks.

[Wak]

Over the years I have used the following programs:-

CampicRestor.zip
Fast File Undelete
PC Inspector
Recuva
Rest2514

Not sure if they are all still available but try Google for them.

[shivvy]

Will do Wak - thanks.

[shivvy]

I have dowloaded a couple of these programmes but unfortunately Ican't understand how to operate them when I open the downloaded programme. It is double dutch to me.
Can anyone help please?

[shivvy]

Arggghhh - why is this so difficult???!!!!!

I was dense enough to lose the pics in the first place and now I am too dense to be able to fix it . . .

[scotman]

Hang in there, Someone will be along eventually. In the meantime don't do ANYTHING on the drive with these pics on it.

[shivvy]

Thanks for the support scotman! I am getting a bit panicked because I need the pics for tomorrow morning but only noticed they were missing when I went to look for them this morning.

[beso]

Everything you are doing on your computer, including browsing here is potentially overwriting your photos. You should not be downloading or installing the programs onto it either.

Recuva has a version to run from an external drive.

[shivvy]

Hi beso. I have been downloading the programmes onto my laptop desktop and the pics that I have lost were saved on an external drive.

Are you able to suggest anything that I can do to get the photos back beso?

[Wak]

Hi, I mainly used fast file undelete.
If you have a floppy drive, download this file and unzip it (if it is a zip file) onto a floppy drive or a memory stick.
This way you don't write over any existing memory on your computer which may be holding the lost pictures,.
Double click on the FFundelete.exe file on the floppy drive and it opens up a panel.
Select the source file (where the deleted pictures are, C:\ drive?) and then select the folder where you want the deleted files to be shown.
There could be hundreds of them but look for the picture titles or references.
Highlight the ones you want to recover and then select the object folder where you want them to be transfered to.
Some of the titles may be altered slightly or have an X in front the title but select them anyway if in doubt as they can always be deleted again if you don't wish to keep them.
I may have got things slightly back to front above due to not using it recently but you'll get the idea once you open the undelete.EXE file and see the program panel. Just follow the obvious instructions.
Hope this helps, shivvy.

[Wak]

Just noticed they are on an external drive so download FFundelete on to the C:\ drive and work from there.
SOURCE file will be the external drive and the object folder will be on the C: drive.
See how you go.

[Buenchico]

Are you sure that you've not inadvertently saved the 'missing' pictures to a different folder to the one where you expect to find them? Try a search for *.jpg, which will find every jpeg file on your computer.

Otherwise (as long as your files were each less than 1Mb in size), this might help:
http://download.cnet....7604.html?tag=mncol;4

Chris

[Old_Geezer]

As it is Tuesday afternoon I guess the need for a solution has passed. But I'm a little confused. You say you have found out they were saved to an external drive, and yet still ask what to do to get them back? But you already have them back don't you? They're on your external drive.

Surely going to the exernal drive, to the directory where you saved them, highlighting them them and selecting 'copy' from the menu, will allow you to then go to your usual drive, into your usual directory, and select paste?

[shivvy]

Old Geezer - yup unfortunately I wasn't able to get them back in time but I would still like to retrieve them. To clarify, I knew that I had saved them to the external drive (I save everything there) and that is therefore where I have deleted them from.

Chris - thanks but I have already searched for them and can't find them. It doesn't seem clear whether the link you suggested can retrieve them from an external drive?

Wak - I have already tried using Fast File Undelete (after you first suggested it) but really couldn't understand it. Now that you have explained source file etc I will give it a go again. Thanks but please keep checking back in here for when I will inevitably need you again!

[Wak]

Hi Shivvy, Yes. I'll keep checking back but in the meantime don't put any more data on to the external H/D or you may write over your piccies.
I'll also run the program again myself just to check out the system and my description.
Wak.

[Wak]

Herewith full instructions:-
Double click on file FFU1.exe
Panel opens,
Menu. FILE- Select "Choose Source & Destination Drives"
Next Panel opens
Highlight Source Drive in top half
Highlight Destination Drive in lower half
Click on "Choose Directory" Button
In right side panel select the destination Folder for the recovered files
Click DONE
Menu. FILE- select "Scan Source Drive"
Scroll and Highlight any required files among the list of scanned files
Menu. OPTION - Select "Copy selected Files"
Close Fast file Undelete program
Open Destination Folder and check for wanted files.
Finally, tell Wak that there is no need to keep checking back now.

Hope this helps.

[shivvy]

You are so helpful Wak - I really appreciate it.
I can start to do this today or this evening but before I get started I'm not too sure which option to go for when I google fast file undelete. There seem to be a number of different options. Some seem to be quite old and some don't seem to be free. Could you suggest which site to go to please?

Thanks.

[Old_Geezer]

Free recover progs can be useful if you are lucky, and recover the data for you. But in my experience the ultra expensive ones work best. Problem being most folk can't justify paying for them for a once in a blue moon scenario.

Proabably not the case if these are personal photos, but sometimes it's quicker to go get missing files again, than it is to try to recover them.

If you get to the stage where you think it is worth splashing out for the software I've found r-studio useful. Not always the easiest thing to understand it's results, but it has recreated fixed versions of corrupted disks for me in the past.

[Wak]

Hi, Shivvy, I downloaded my copy about 2002. There are obviously newer versions on Google and I would imagine that they all work the same but maybe the panel layouts may have been improved.
However, the following site seems to have an older copy so I would suggest you try that as it will most likely be OK with my instructions.

http://www.freedownlo...st_File_Undelete.html

If you get stuck we can always try another program until you get your photos back?
See how you go.

[shivvy]

Hi Wak,

I have downloaded the programme (which is ver 5.03222.05 DEMO) but when I open it I can't see what you describe. I have a box with 8 'buttons' where the File, Edit, View etc would usually be. They have pictures on them and when I hover over them they say:
Build drive list
Build indexed file list
Build file list ONLY!
Copy files
Help
Configure
Print
Exit

Below that is a box with categories:
LID
PID
Volume
FS Type
Size
Start LBA
SPC
Sparse
Active

Below that is another set of headings:
Name
Size
Created
Modified
State

And the bottom part has 2 headings:
Type
Status


What do I do?!!

[Wak]

Shivvy, I don't understand those buttons any more than you do.
I have now sent a copy of the file which I use by CUTESENDIT.
You can download the file FFUndelete.zip by going to the following:-

http://www.cutesendit...d3fa0e74770915cfe76c/

Unzip the file and double click the FFU1.exe file then follow the instructions I sent earlier.
Let me know if you get the file ok,. OK?