# recover deleted file?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 17, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693 "2004-02-17T19:06:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![mister\_me](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cdc98d/32.png) [@mister\_me](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_me)\
**Post date:** [February 17, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693/1 "2004-02-17T19:06:29Z")

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HELP!!

I had an important file on my desktop. I deleted it by accident and NO it isn’t in my recycle bin. It’s gone! Can I recover it anyway???

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**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\
**Post date:** [February 17, 2004, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693/2 "2004-02-17T19:14:56Z")

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First of all, are you sure the actual file was in your Desktop folder, and not just a shortcut to it? Secondly, there are plenty of undelete programs out there, some of which may be freeware, others come bundled with various utilities, such as Norton Disk Doctor. If you haven’t done a lot of writing to your drive since the file was deleted, there’s a good chance of successfully recovering it. The more the drive has been written to, the less the chance of the file remaining intact, and the more unlikely is a successful recovery.

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**Author:** ![mister\_me](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cdc98d/32.png) [@mister\_me](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mister_me)\
**Post date:** [February 17, 2004, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693/3 "2004-02-17T19:29:36Z")

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File was right on desktop - not a shortcut.

Been browsing the web for freeware file recovery but can’t find one for Windows.

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**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\
**Post date:** [February 17, 2004, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/recover-deleted-file/229693/4 "2004-02-17T20:07:56Z")

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[Here’s one,](http://www.freewareweb.com/cgi-bin/archive.cgi?keyword=rest2514) but I haven’t tried it.

[Here’s one](http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm) that I used successfully to recover data from a smartmedia card. I believe it works with hard & floppy drives also.

Both of these are freeware.