I accidently deleted a very important file. Not only did I bring it to the recycling bin, but I deleted it from there too.
Please tell me if I can get it back in some way and how ?
Please,please,please !
Thank you.
I’m desperate.
Well… perhaps. But we need more info. Your OS, filesystem type, and whether you’ve done much since then would help.
If it’s 'doze on FAT32, you could try something like Drive Rescue 1.9b (later versions are not free, this one is). If you’re using NTFS though I’m pretty sure you’re SOL. There is stuff out there that might help, but it costs $$$.
In any case, if you plan to try getting it back, it’s a good idea to stop using the machine in question, lest you overwrite the meagre data that is left.
Did you save anything or create a new file after you removed it from the Recycle Bin?
If not, there’s a good chance you can get it back. If yes, there still is hope.
What operating system are you using?
I’m not really sure what a lot of those words are, but I have windows 98 if that helps.
I don’t think I created a new file. The file had two word documents in it. I deleted it yesterday morning, but didn’t realize what I did until I went looking for it late last night.
See Recovering deleted files. At this stage you’re pretty much screwed without a file recovery utility, and the more you continue to use your PC (and the hard disk by extension) the greater the chance the data will be overwritten, and the less the chance the file can be recovered. If the file is critical you need to stop using the PC for anything but mission critical tasks, and get one of the recommended recovery utilities ASAP.
I was gonna recommend that you download Drive Rescue 1.9b (Diverse Tools->Datei Tools) as per advice above, but I can’t be sure the downloaded software won’t overwrite the deleted file :smack:
Anyone with a clue?
Her best bet would be to shut the PC down, remove the hard drive and load the recovery software on another PC with the file deleted hard drive attached as a slave and then attempt recovery on that drive. This would minimize the chance of the data being overwritten (if it hasn’t been already).
Or, if her computer has more than one logical drive, save the recovery software to the drive on which the file wasn’t (so - if the file was someplace under D:, save to C:, or vice versa). If the Recovery Software isn’t too large (under 1.4 MB, duh!), it may even be possible to save it directly to a diskette (A: ), and run it from there.
All this assuming attaching the disk to a different computer is not feasible. The very best idea, as already mentioned, is to remove the disk the file is on, take it to a computer all set up to do recovery, attach it as a slave and immediately run the recovery software.
Sure:
undelete windows 98 free. VirtualLab™:
www.actionfront.biz/undelete-windows-98-free.html
That lets you see if you can find your file first. Other software to do things like this try: download.com search for say: undelete.
actually, IIRC, you can acquire Microsoft’s Undelete from an old DOS 6 (maybe even DOS 5) or higher or Windows 3.x disks, copy it to the c:\windows folder, reboot the machine in MS-DOS mode and then run undelete - that would be the least-destructive way other than swapping the hard drive completely as astro suggested. However, I don’t remember if it works on FAT32 partitions or not, or if it even cares.
critter42
If the hard drive is above a certain size (forget what size limit precisely) I think DOS 5 or 6 will have a heart attack with larger modern drives.