Can you restore files on a PC that you accidentally deleted or are just plain missing?

The answer is yes to maybe.  If you have deleted a file that you must have back or need to recover files and data from a disk drive with errors on it there are file recovery applications ready to serve you.  If it has been a while since you deleted that file the chances of getting it all back uncorrupted could be slim.

The best way to get that file back is to immediately stop using the hard disk that has the file on it so that it will not get over written with new data. If you know how to remove the drive from the PC then you can add that drive to another PC then run one of the file recovery programs listed here.  If you are in need of recovering a whole drive worth of data when the disk drive has errors on it, these applications will recover as much of the damaged files on the disk as is possible.

How to restore deleted files on a PC

When a file is deleted the data is not removed from the disk the index to that file is just modified to make it look like it is gone.  On the disk drive there is a table that contains all of the file names and where they exist on the drive media.  If the file has not been written on then all a restoration program needs to do is re-activate the table entry for the file.  If there has been data written to some of the areas of the disk where the file is located then the recovery software can recover all of the data except for where it has been over written.

Deeper file recovery happens when the master table itself has been corrupted causing loss of information about the file name or where the file starts and ends.  A sector by sector scan of the disk can pick up files if this type of corruption has happened.  Also if the disk has had errors, partial recovery of files is possible.  The recovery software will skip over the spots on the disk media where it cannot read the bits. If it reads the bits and the verification read of the same bits are different the software will also skip over those as well.

How to restore deleted files on a PC with Unistal Deleted File Recovery

The Unistal Deleted File Recovery utility provides quick recovery of deleted files with a unique “Guided File Excavation Technology” or GFETch.  GFETch is a graphical representation of deleted files on the disk drive making file recovery easier with a single click.  You can recover files from a previously formatted hard drive or just recover a single file.  The easy to use interface provides restoration progress with minimal user intervention.

Program Features

• Unique GFETch interface

• Recovers deleted files in previously deleted folders

• Retrieves data from the disk even if the media has errors or bad sectors

• Salvages files and folders cleared from the Recycle Bin

• Unicode and Multiple language support

• Long File name support

• Recovers files and folders from formatted partitions

• Supports all Windows file system formats

• Restore files to user defined location

The Unistal Deleted File Recovery has three different modes for restoring your deleted files or data:

• Quick Mode: This mode quickly analyses the Disk and displays the available files to recover.  Quick mode is a process offering sorting of recovered data in terms of name, type, size, date and time created.

• Advance Mode: An important mode of the Quick Recovery when Quick mode fails to recover the required data. This exhaustive method where all lost folders/files are excavated using a proprietary algorithm (GFETch) is used. Files are previewed in a tree-like structure allowing the user to select the files to recover.

• Raw Mode: This mode is used to recover the data in raw format and when both the above mentioned modes fail to deliver the expected results. Used to recover data from severely corrupted Partitions, this mode successfully scans all sectors on the Disk sequentially and searches for specific file header signatures.

How to restore deleted files on a PC with Renee Undeleter

Renee Undeleter provides three different methods for recovering files from your system.  With a fast partition scan to a whole disk scan you can quickly recover all of the deleted files on your disks.  Renee also provides a way for you to clone any partition on your disk providing you with a backup of the whole partition at a single point in time.  The three options to use when looking for files are:

• Fast Partition Scan – Recover the files after emptying the Recycle Bin, or using the shift delete without a backup of the files.

• Whole Partition Scan – Scans the whole disk partition for all recoverable files.  This is very useful in the case that a partition is accidentally formatted or there are inaccessible sectors on the disk.

• Whole Disk Scan – Scans the entire disk finding all partitions with all information about files and folders contained on the partitions.

The Renee Undeleter is particularly adept at displaying image files that are on the disk showing you what the image is giving you an idea of what you will be restoring.  This is handy because most image files downloaded from cameras or other devices do not contain names that are easy to remember.  Renee Undeleter also comes with these features:

• Office Document Preview – If for some reason some of the information on a file is missing the office document preview speeds up the recovery of your document files.

• Memory Card Data Recovery – If you have ever deleted files from your memory cards by mistake this utility can read the data on the card and recover any file on the memory card.

• Formatted Disk Recovery – If you have accidentally formatted a hard disk containing important files you can get them back as long as there has not been a lot of data written to the disk.

The main menu for Renee Undeleter show it all.  You can do a fast scan for files, a single partition scan, a whole disk scan , or create an image of a partition.

Above is a screen shot of the fast scan.  You are provided with a list of file types to select from for the scan.  Once the scan is complete you are provided with a list of files that were found within the parameters you provided.

This screen shot shows how easy it is to view photos before recovering them.  The same is true for the Office Word, Excel, and other files.

How to restore deleted files on a PC with Ashampoo Undeleter

The Ashampoo Undeleter was developed for those times when the recycle bin was emptied along with that important document, only copy of family pictures, or that radical new song from your favorite music group.  Undeleter is not limited to just disk drives but can also be used on many USB drives and flash drives.  What do you get with the Ashampoo Undeleter?

• The ability to recover files from all Windows file system formats

• Recover files with Windows NTFS compression turned on

• Recovery of files in Windows NTFS encrypted partitions

• Ability to recover Alternate Data Streams on NTFS partitions

• Extremely fast Master File Table (MFT) and File Allocation Table (FAT) algorithm with fast recovery.

• Ability to asses and evaluate the condition of recoverable objects

• Quick and intuitive user interface

With Ashampoo Undeleter you are able to select files with greater than zero bytes and those files that are not majorly damaged either due to too much overwriting of data or media errors, turning off the restoration of directory structure makes it easier to restore a few files at a time.

Recoverable files are shown as a list of files with the path to the file listed along with the name, file extension, file size, and if it is good or not.

How to restore deleted files on a PC with LionSea WiseRecovery

If you are looking to recover data from off of more than just hard disk drives then the LionSea WiseRecovery utility just may be what you are looking for.  WiseRecovery helps you recover files from Memory Sticks, USB storage media, cell phones, SD cards, and other storage devices.  The utility performs a read only operation on the device protecting the data stored on it.  WiseRecovery also recovers data files on your system that were deleted or corrupted due to formatting, viruses, or disk drive failures.  With WiseRecovery you can:

• Recover any file type from many different types of storage media and devices.

• Select the file types you want to search for before scanning the device.

• All Windows file system types are supported

• Select from over 600 different file formats.

• Recover from deletion, device formatting, or corrupted storage media.

• Recover from devices that can be attached to the PC from USB storage media to iPods and MP3/MP4 players.

• Works on the storage device without changing anything on the device keeping the device in pristine condition.

Recover a whole drive, just a partition of the drive, or a single file.  It is as easy as selecting the tab and setting your options.

Recovering a formatted drive is as easy as selecting the device and pressing the start button.  Above you can see what happens when a formatted drive is scanned for recovery giving you the tree listing of the drive contents along with a file break down in the right side window.

With this screen shot you can see how simple it is to look at a recoverable .jpg file to see what it is before you recover it.  This same feature works on office documents and other files making it easier to see the files you can restore before restoring them all.

How to restore deleted files on a PC with Hetman Universal File Recovery Software

As far as file recovery software goes the Herman Universal File Recovery application has a very easy to use interface that looks a lot like disk drive management software in other operating systems (Linux).  With this easy to use interface you are able to select the device you want to recover files from then as it scans the device it shows the recoverable files and folders right in the window.  As with the other software you can click on a photo file to bring up a thumbnail of the photo making selection easier than guessing what you are recovering.

Features of Hetman Universal File Recovery Software:

• Recovers all File Types – No exception.

• Context-aware analysis – For certain file types Hetman goes further by scanning the entire disk surface, looking for deleted files by their unique signatures.

• Support for Major Devices – All makes and models with FAT and NTFS file systems are supported, Memory cards from SD to Compact Flash cards, and USB pen drives.

• Pre-recovery Preview – Allows for peaking inside the deleted files giving you a chance to determine if it is a file you want to restore.  Preview supports hundreds of file types and allows looking into executables with a built in hexadecimal editor.

• Quick and Comprehensive Recovery Modes – Quick mode scans all the data on the partition returning recently deleted files in just moments and comprehensive does a surface scan of the disk retrieving a list of files no longer in the file tables for the partition.

• Data Safety – Hetman never changes any of the data on the device scanned.  Using read only operations all data that is restored will be recovered to a different device.

Each of these file recovery software packages allows you to find the most recently deleted files and allows for deeper scanning of storage media to dig up long lost files.  Pick on and try it for free.