[Jay Adam]

Hi all,

I had Windows XP Professional freshly reinstalled on my PC by someone after encountering problems with the previous Windows XP on my system.

This obviously erases everything previously on the PC ie Programs and Files. I can get hold of new programs, but unfortunately prior to fresh installation, ALL the files were not saved onto my USB!

I am very distressed due to the fact that some VERY important files have
now been erased.

1)Can someone please tell me if there is any way for me to recover these files?

2) I also had important websites "bookmarked" on Mozilla Firefox, any way to recover them as well?

Please help in any way you can.

Thank you.

Kind regards,

Jay

[Taffycat]

I'm sorry to hear about your lost files, some here, have had success with this free application called Recuva
there is a thread about it here at PC Review from last year, you might want to check out.

Regarding your Firefox bookmarks... they are recoverable if you were using Firefox's add-on "Foxmarks" but if not, I think they might be gone

[Jay Adam]

Hi Taffycat,

Thank you for your advice.

Just an update............


I used the free online recovery program Recuva, which recovered a couple of my files, not most of them or the important ones I wanted. As my PC is a second hand one, it recovered loads of files from the previous user, several years old!

Clearly, the fact that Microsoft Office and other programs were installed on my
PC after XP Reinstallation, didn't help the recovery cause.

Recuva does seem to work to a certain extent though......as I stated in my original post, I was pretty distraught, I do feel better now though even though I haven't got all my files back and I do have the option of scanning hard copies of a couple of documents and then putting them onto my PC.

When faced with this problem, I think the best thing is not to install any other programs onto your PC, mount it as a slave drive onto another PC, and run a recovery program from the other PC, or use your PC but run the software from
a USB drive, which will at least increase your chances of recovering some files, even though this may be slim from the outset.


Thank you for your help!

Regards,

Jay

[Taffycat]

Hi there Jay,

Thank you for taking the time to let us know how you got on, it's always appreciated.