Unformat

[Guest]

Hello. I was in the midst of installing Win XP Pro onto a new Western Digital 120Gb HD so that I would be able to take the original (also a 120Gb drive) and place it into a PVR. Once the new drive was loaded with Win XP, I was going to transfer data from the original (D: drive) to the new (C: drive). I did not remove the cables from the D: drive. D'Oh! I inadvertantly loaded Win XP onto the D: drive, which started with a format. D'Oh! I have not run any utilities on it thus far, and have emptied (deleted all of the Win XP files) from the drive

Question: How do I recover the data that was on the D: drive after it was formatted and had Win XP loaded onto it

Though I would love to be able to recover all of the data, I would be extremely pleased if I could recover all the JPG images, followed by MP3 & MPEG files, and then the DOC/TXT files. Applications are unimportant

Thank you and Best Regards. I await your knowledgable responses

 

[Ross Durie]

Life is sometimes hopeless. This is one of those times!!

--
Ross

Hello. I was in the midst of installing Win XP Pro onto a new Western

Digital 120Gb HD so that I would be able to take the original (also a 120Gb
drive) and place it into a PVR. Once the new drive was loaded with Win XP,
I was going to transfer data from the original (D: drive) to the new (C:
drive). I did not remove the cables from the D: drive. D'Oh! I
inadvertantly loaded Win XP onto the D: drive, which started with a format.
D'Oh! I have not run any utilities on it thus far, and have emptied
(deleted all of the Win XP files) from the drive.

Question: How do I recover the data that was on the D: drive after it was

formatted and had Win XP loaded onto it?

Though I would love to be able to recover all of the data, I would be

extremely pleased if I could recover all the JPG images, followed by MP3 &
MPEG files, and then the DOC/TXT files. Applications are unimportant.

 

[ChrisM]

It's extremly unlikely that you will be able to recover anything from this
disk.
There are 'Unformat' and various data recovery utilities around (Norton,
Symantec etc. I not used any of them since the days of DOS/Windows 3.11, so
I can't recommend any particular product.).
Even if the data survived the format, which is possible, XP has now been
written over at least some of it, so I don't really reckon your chances too
much.
If it was really desperate, there are companies that specialise in
recovering data from trashed/formatted disks, but they are expensive..

Sorry!

ChrisM

Hello. I was in the midst of installing Win XP Pro onto a new Western

Digital 120Gb HD so that I would be able to take the original (also a 120Gb
drive) and place it into a PVR. Once the new drive was loaded with Win XP,
I was going to transfer data from the original (D: drive) to the new (C:
drive). I did not remove the cables from the D: drive. D'Oh! I
inadvertantly loaded Win XP onto the D: drive, which started with a format.
D'Oh! I have not run any utilities on it thus far, and have emptied
(deleted all of the Win XP files) from the drive.

Question: How do I recover the data that was on the D: drive after it was

formatted and had Win XP loaded onto it?

Though I would love to be able to recover all of the data, I would be

extremely pleased if I could recover all the JPG images, followed by MP3 &
MPEG files, and then the DOC/TXT files. Applications are unimportant.

 

[Malke]

Life is sometimes hopeless. This is one of those times!!

--
Ross

Digital 120Gb HD so that I would be able to take the original (also a
120Gb
drive) and place it into a PVR. Once the new drive was loaded with
Win XP, I was going to transfer data from the original (D: drive) to
the new (C:
drive). I did not remove the cables from the D: drive. D'Oh! I
inadvertantly loaded Win XP onto the D: drive, which started with a
format.
D'Oh! I have not run any utilities on it thus far, and have emptied
(deleted all of the Win XP files) from the drive.
formatted and had Win XP loaded onto it?
extremely pleased if I could recover all the JPG images, followed by
MP3 &
MPEG files, and then the DOC/TXT files. Applications are unimportant.

I wouldn't say your case was "hopeless", but since you already did some
work on the drive in question (deleting files counts as work), I think
it is unlikely that commercial software will recover your files.
However, you could try Ontrack's Easy Recovery Pro. It is expensive.
Another alternative, which is almost 100% sure to get your files back,
is to send the drive to a professional data recovery firm. DriveSavers
is highly regarded in the tech industry and will probably consider
retrieving your files a walk in the park. Their website is
www.drivesavers.com and their US phone number is 800-440-1904. I don't
work for them, but I do recommend them. They are not inexpensive, but
only you can decide how much your data is worth.

Good luck,

Malke

 

[Mike]

Easy Recovery Pro from Ontrack will get most of your files back..

http://www.ontrack.com/

or you could try this free one.. it works surprisingly well

http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm

The more times that you run these programs, the less they find on each
pass.. so try to get as much on the first pass.. I used both to get lost
files, but have to admit that getting back mp3 files was less sucessful than
other file types.. most were lost and those that weren't had been corrupted
somewhat.. an example would be three MP3s joined as one large file.. good
luck..