File Recovery Software and Honesty

[Agaricus bisporus]

I've recently been trying to find a free data recovery programme and have failed.
Don't get me wrong, there are loads out there that advertise as free, some even claim to be the real deal, all you'll ever need, the ultimate free recovery tool etc etc.

To date every one have been utter liars. Not one has recovered a thing. Despite all the promises every single one lets you waste considerable time and effort downloading it and searching the memory and then demands sometimes insane amounts of money ($89 in one case) to "upgrade" before restoring the files it had found. Free? My arse!

The upshot is that I haven't managed to recover the files (photos) I've lost on a memory stick.

Can anyone recommend a free program that does actually do what it claims?
is there such a thing or are all software companies swindling liars?

[Garrie]

Sandisk do a good recovery program that comes bundled free with their compact flash cards! Might be worth having a nosy at sandisk's site to see if I can be downloaded?

I have used this software after the police ordered me to delete some photographs I had taken, it recovered the photographs without any issues at all :) oh and it doesn't have to be a sandisk product as the medium in which you want the files recovered from.

[ZH875]

Have a look on here (http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/) and look at the comments for this piece of recovery software, it should give you pointers on which ones may do what you need. This page may not be valid after today.

the link points to Giveaway of the Day - free licensed software daily. Today: GRT Recover My File 3.0 - Have you deleted important files from your disk, or your hard drive became corrupted, or you have formatted disk losing ... (http://www.giveawayoftheday.com)

ZH

[Milo Minderbinder]

Recuva is free and works
Recuva - Undelete, Unerase, File and Disk Recovery - Free Download (http://www.piriform.com/recuva)

If that can't find the lost data then I use the two variants of GetDataBack
That's chargeable, but you can run the the free trial to see if it will actually find anything. You can buy and activate after the scan has finished
Comes in two flavours - for NTFS and FAT. Normally you just need the NTFS version though I find sometimes on a badly trashed NTFS disk you need to use the FAT version if the partition table is wiped
Data Recovery Software Products - Runtime Software Products (http://www.runtime.org/data-recovery-software.htm)


Word of warning though - memory stick data loss is usually because the drive has physically failed, not because the data is corrupted

[Mac the Knife]

IsoBuster is good and useful for lots of other things - Recover Files & Data from CD, DVD, Hard Drive, USB, SD with IsoBuster! (http://www.isobuster.com/) - worthwhile if you spend a lot of time messing around with computers.

As Milo says however "memory stick data loss is usually because the drive has physically failed, not because the data is corrupted"

Mac

:8

[seacue]

CNET has "TestDisk" and its companion "PhotoRec" for free. I haven't used them.

I found very favorable comments on PhotoRec in a review of Stellar Phoenix!

I vaguely remember using Stellar Phoenix Photo recovery, but now see that they want $39. I'm sure I didn't pay that.

[Elias.K]

I have used Recuva as well. Most of the free ones are lacking in some features but most will do the job.

Make sure you stop using the disk as deleted files are not actually deleted, they are simply tagged to allow for that space on the disk to be written on. So make sure you stop using the disk to ensure you don't write over deleted files you're trying to recover.

If you formatted the disk then I believe you will be wasting your time, if you deleted the items with the disk in your pc then check your recycle bin.

[Milo Minderbinder]

I've pulled a lot of stuff off formatted supposedly wiped drives using the programs I suggest
If the drive hasn't actually failed, then theres a good chance of getting it back

[Agaricus bisporus]

Drive hasn't failed, silly bugger here pressed delete all thinking he'd downloaded the pics when he'd only looked at them!

Thanks all, I'll get to work on those suggestions.

Sadly both recuva and isobuster seem to be products of the unenlightened that only work on PCs, I'll have to dig up the dinosaur and see if I can revive it!

[Bushfiva]

Sadly both recuva and isobuster seem to be products of the unenlightened that only work on PCs

Just imagine, if you'd spent less time bottling up snide remarks but instead given us enough info to provide a more informed response, you would have received a, wait for it, more informed response.

[Agaricus bisporus]

Oh! Woe is me!

mea culpa!

lighten up, it's not many software companies that still live in the world of nothing but PCs.

Anyway, it seems to be working on the PC so thanks to all who didn't take offence at my unwittingly "snide" remarks.

[Milo Minderbinder]

So just which enlightened operating system do you use?
Android OS? Linux? BSD? Xenix? OpenDOS? FreeDOS? OS/2?.......can't think of any others offhand

[Mac the Knife]

Suspect its VAX/VMS Milo and I'm a bit rusty.....

Poking around in response to this thread I discovered a file manager hitherto unknown to me (I must have tried them all, though as an old NC user I'm partial to the cross-platform GNU Midnight Commander - Midnight Commander (http://www.midnight-commander.org/))

MultiCommander - Multi Commander | Multi Commander (http://multicommander.com/) - is a remarkably fully featured file manager that bills itself "for professionals" and with easy Registry access, creation of links, multi-rename, checksum, file find, etc., etc. it really is.

Its free, highly customisable and there is a portable version.

Well worth a look.

Mac

:cool:

PS: FAR Manager is another worth considering if you prefer Orthodox file managers like Midnight Commander - it is much more sophisticated (and bulkier!) - see Far Manager Official Site : main (http://farmanager.com/index.php?l=en)

[Milo Minderbinder]

Midnight Commander.....now theres a blast from the memory. Didn't realise that still existed. Seem to remember using it on DOS5 and not being impressed (probably because at the time I was too naive to understand it)

[Avtrician]

I use Pandora Recovery, works very well though it takes a little playing with to use it properly.

[le Pingouin]

I think you mean Norton Commander is the blast from the past. Midnight Commander is very much alive and well.