75ZT Community

Posted this on "another side" earlier today.....

Oh dear, what a Muppet I appear to be

Let me explain......

I'm currently in the process of transferring some old Video 8 camcorder tapes onto DVD (with the help of an extraordinarily generous loan of a camcorder and Dazzle Device from JustMicky )

Anyway, I was doing one about two days ago and, as usual, formatted the DVD prior to burning it. Problem is, that I have just noticed this morning, I have stupidly formatted a partition of my HDD instead...

Now, as it happens, this isn't a total disaster, as all of my photos are on the main C: partition (as well as being backed up elsewhere), my music is on an external drive, and my documents are on a pendrive as well as the C: drive

However, I would like to get whatever was on the E: partition back if possible, even if I can't remember what it was! I've so far tried PC Inspector, which has found shedloads of files, with a range of extensions, but having now saved these to an external drive, I see that they are all called things like "cluster 16284.exe", "cluster 16222.doc", "cluster 12345.xls", "cluster 13245.jpg" etc - so not a lot of use

I haven't done any reading or writing to the E: partition since the format (which was a quick one, not a full one btw) so am hopeful that most of the data should be recoverable

Can anyone advise on the best way to get the stuff back in a usable format, either using some other recovery software or even PCI (if the latter, can anyone advise on how to use it, as I find the help file for it confusing!)

A couple of members have PM'd to suggest software which might help and I have tried two so far ("R Studio" and "OnTrack Easy Recovery"

Problem seems to be two-fold now:-

1) Although loads of files have been recovered, they are just available as files, I can't find a way to re-create the structure
2) Aforementioned loads of files seem OK whilst viewing in a list, but I can't find any that will actually open. They all seem to be corrupt

Thing is, am I wasting my time trying to go any further with this, or might there be something I can do to get the data back, with the structure it had, and actually be able to use it?

If anyone can offer any pearls of wisdom, I would be very grateful!!

Try 'Recuva' t'is very good for this sort of thing..

Hmm, not able to help I'm afraid, But... To prevent future problems, get a copy of "Norton Ghost" on a floppy disk.. Use that to copy all-any drive as files onto a backup drive. Then, in the advent of any problems you can use the floppy to reinstate any drive you wish to any location you want it....

PS>> To do this, you must log out of windows and back into the floppy, trying to do it when in "Windows" will result in disaster as you will overwrite the programme that you are using to run the Ghost from.... Just don't ask------- d'ohhhh.....

A bit like sawing off the branch you are sat on innit.....................................

...

Come on now......a Floppy Drive? Haven't seen these fitted for years now in bespoke computers.

Zeb wrote:Try 'Recuva' t'is very good for this sort of thing..

Hi Carl

Followed this link http://www.piriform.com/recuva/download for Recuva, which ended up with me downloading MagicCute which I guess is the same thing?

Looked to be working well after a lengthy scan, until the point where I needed to save the "found" files, when I couldn't get any further without buying it (despite the website saying this was a free copy)

James.uk wrote:Hmm, not able to help I'm afraid, But... To prevent future problems, get a copy of "Norton Ghost" on a floppy disk.. Use that to copy all-any drive as files onto a backup drive. Then, in the advent of any problems you can use the floppy to reinstate any drive you wish to any location you want it....

Perhaps I should get something like this. You always think you are safe until something goes wrong!

Thing is, I'm pretty sure that there wasn't really anything of importance that I have wiped, but as I am not sure, I now find myself obsessed with having to get it back!

Have to agree with John on the "floppy" issue though!

(PS sorry for late reply to above posts, but not getting notifications at the mo!)

These days you make a boot CD rather than a floppy, but Ghost is still a good tool for this kind of thing.

Other ways are using portable hard drives or network attached storgage. But remember if your PC gets infected by something nasty, it may infect your backups if they are still connected. I have a permantly connected storage box, and then every so often (overdue now) back that up to a hard disc and lock it away. The most secure thing is to get someone else to look after your backup hard disc as fire flood or theft at your own home won't affect it.

Think I'm being over the top? Think how many irreplaceable digital photos you have.

I've got Norton Ghost on a slate somewhere........



( really I've got nothing Norton since the Dominator tank got weighed in )