Recover deleted files
Free file recovery software can get back deleted photos, documents, and more, reveals Mike Bedford
Deleting files by accident is extremely easy to do. It’s a sickening feeling when you realise what you’ve done. Fortunately, you might be able to get them back without spending any money. Even though Windows may not be able to see a file that you deleted accidentally or was the victim of a disk failure, it’s quite possible that the data could still be there. There are many free applications that will attempt to recover deleted files, but you need to be careful before installing and using them (we’ll explain why below). In this tutorial we’re using Disk Digger (diskdigger.org), but most file recovery utilities work the same way, and we’ll recommend some alternatives if this doesn’t work for you.
Look in the Recycle Bin
The first thing you should do is check the Recycle Bin if you’ve just deleted something you didn’t mean to. When you select a file and press the Delete key (or right-click and choose the Delete
option from the menu), Windows makes no attempt to delete it at all. Instead, it moves it to a special folder called the Recycle Bin, which has its own icon on the desktop. Restoring a file from the Recycle Bin is a simple matter of double-clicking on the desktop icon to display the contents and then right-clicking on the file and selecting Restore from the menu.
If the Recycle bin icon is not there, search in the Start menu for ‘Show or Hide’ and you should see a shortcut to the settings where you can tick the box next to the Recycle Bin and make it appear.
Don’t rely on the Recycle Bin as a safety net, though: it has a size limit and once you exceed that, older files will be deleted permanently and automatically. The default size is more than adequate for most people, so there’s a good chance that any files you want to restore will still be present in the Recycle Bin. To check the capacity or alter it, right click on the Recycle Bin and choose Properties. There are occasions when you’ve emptied the Recycle Bin too hastily, or perhaps you’re overly fond of the Shift-Delete shortcut, which bypasses the Recycle Bin and actually deletes the data. (We’re still tying to wean ourselves off this unhelpful habit.)
If your files were on an SD card or USB flash drive, there is no Recycle Bin function, so delete really is delete in this case.
But before resorting to file recovery software, it is still worth checking other avenues. Have you shared the file or document via email? Have you saved or synchronised it with a cloud storage service? Or have you been sensible and made a backup of the files on another hard drive? No? Well fear not, because there are plenty of applications including Disk Digger and PC Inspector File Recovery (pcinspector.de), which might be able to bring them back. There are lots of others, too: Recuva (tinyurl.com/kw6g2u8) Paragon Rescue Kit 14 Free (tinyurl.com/jk6p5jp) CGSecurity PhotoRec (tinyurl.com/zdbpjx5) Minitool Partition Wizard Free Edition 9.1 (tinyurl.com/huf952f)
Undelete programs
They work by looking on the disk to see if the data is still there, even after a ‘permanent’ deletion. All that Windows really does when it deletes a file (permanently) is scrubs out the information about where it was stored on the disk. It’s a bit like crossing out the address on an envelope: the contents are still in it, but a postman wouldn’t know where to deliver it.
However, it pays to understand the limitations of this method. First of all, as well as removing the ‘pointer’ to the file, Windows also marks the areas of the disk occupied by the file as available for reuse, Windows will eventually overwrite them with new files and, once that’s happened, your data is gone for good.
So the sooner you realise you’ve accidentally deleted a file, the better your chances of recovering it. When you notice your loss, don’t save anything to the disk and don’t even download or install a file recovery utility if the file was on your PC or laptop’s hard drive as it might overwrite the very files you’re trying to recover.
Some recovery software can run directly from a USB flash drive, but you must download it using a different computer. Even browsing the internet to find an undelete utility causes files to be written to your disk so use a different PC to download the utility.
Undelete utilities only work reliably with sequential files. If your disk is reasonably full, Windows often has to split the file across spare blocks around the disk and in this case, a deleted file is very difficult to recover. Plus, different types of drive use different file systems and any undelete utility will work only with particular types of file system. Hard disks in Windows PCs use the NTFS file system but USB flash drives and memory cards usually use some variant of FAT (FAT16, FAT32 or exFAT) and you should select software with the necessary support for all your media.
NAS drives
Another drawback with most undelete utilities is that they won’t work with networked storage, in other words NAS drives. The disk(s) in a NAS drive are under the control of the drive’s own operating system (usually a Linux variant), so software running under Windows isn’t typically able to attempt a recovery. If you’ve accidentally deleted a file it might just be in the NAS drive’s own recycle bin (if enabled) in which case you might be able to recover it, so first check the documentation. If the file is properly deleted, though, there are only two options.
So long as you don’t mind getting to grips with the insides of the NAS drive and your PC, it might be possible to remove the disk(s) from the NAS and attach them directly to your PC. Now it becomes possible to use a Windows undelete utility but with two provisos.
First, your NAS drive might use a different file system from the drive in your PC so you’ll have to check the NAS drive’s documentation to select suitable software. Secondly, if your NAS drive uses a RAID array, your file might be distributed between more than one physical disk.
Some recovery software is able to handle RAID arrays but, again, you need to bear this in mind in making your selection.
If you don’t fancy dismantling your NAS drive and selecting suitable software, the other option is to send your array off to a professional data recovery company.
How to recover corrupt files
Another way files can be lost is if they become corrupted. This could happen, for example, if a power failure occurred while a file was being written, leaving the disk directory in an unpredictable state. As with accidentally deleted files, the data could all be there but Windows wouldn’t know where to find it. Often this sort of problem will manifest itself by Windows reporting some sort of error when you try to open a file or, conceivably, files could just have disappeared, even though you’re pretty sure you hadn’t deleted them.
Software utilities are available to identify and correct this sort of error and you’ll find that some undelete products also offer the ability to recover from logical errors in the file system. While some pure undeletion utilities are free, you’ll often have to pay for those more fully featured products.
Some let you try before you buy, though. With RecoverMyFiles (recovermyfiles.com), for example, you can download the software in evaluation mode and run it to see what files it can recover from your disk. If you like what you see, you pay a fee to allow those files to be permanently recovered.
An exception to the rule that you get only what you pay is TestDisk which is free and open source and has earned a good reputation. It’s available for Windows, Linux and macOS. Whatever software you use, though, as with pure undeletion packages, don’t install it to the offending disk as doing so could render your lost data permanently unrecoverable.
Also bear in mind that packages will differ in their ability to recover lost data. It would be a good idea, therefore, to try out several (so long as they have an evaluation mode which will show what they’re able to recover without actually writing to your disk) and choose whichever has the best success. Alternatively, if you don’t find any software that meets your needs, the option of using a data recovery service is always available, but it isn’t necessarily a cheap option.
Recover files from a broken hard drive
Having dispelled the myth that deleted and corrupted files are lost forever, we now come to the problem that all PC users dread – a hard disk failure. This could manifest in several ways but generally Windows won’t start, even in Safe Mode, and turning on your PC might be accompanied by unhealthy clicking noises. What you stand to lose, therefore, isn’t just a few of your treasured files but the entire contents of the disk.
It’s commonly suggested that hard disks can be repaired by putting them in the freezer. While this has been known to work, bringing the drive back to life for just long enough to extract the most important files, it’s effective only for certain very specific types of fault. Often it won’t work and attempting it might just prove to be the last straw for your ailing disk. Our recommendation, therefore, is that you don’t attempt this nor any other DIY repair.
Instead, as soon as you suspect a hardware failure, turn off your PC immediately and make contact with a data recovery company such as Kroll OnTrack (krollontrack.co.uk). These companies have vast stocks of parts that they are able to swap in their clean room to restore a disk to a working state. Once this has been achieved they’ll copy all the data they can recover to encrypted removable media such as a USB drive. This will work for failures of most parts of the disk including the electronic circuit boards, the motor and the read/write head, but there’s a limit to what can be achieved.
As the part on which the data is stored, if the platter is scratched or shattered it’s normally game over, though, fortunately, this is rare. As always, it pays to shop around before deciding which firm to use and it’s also a good idea to choose a company that will diagnose the problem for free. As guidance, if you were to go to Kroll OnTrack, you’d pay a fixed fee of £599 as a consumer whereas charges for businesses depend on exactly what’s involved.