[mikeb88]

Hi,
if this is posted in the wrong forum, then please move it to the right place...

My problem is that I ran the recovery CDs (for XP) on my harddrive, believing that I had all data securely backed up. Big mistake. It turns out that I cannot read/find the files (pics) on the DVD (my backup). Some files and folders have been copied onto the DVD correctly, but other files appear to be missing and in many cases entire folders are labelled "Folder is Empty" when trying to open them. On one of my DVDs containing the backup, the info provided in "my computer" says that it contains 4.22GB data, but when going onto the DVD itself and adding together all the files and folders, then it adds up to no more than 3GB. It clearly seems like data has been copied, but somehow I cannot see it (same result on 2 different computers).

What could be the problem? Is there an easy way to recover my files on the DVD?

If not, how much of a chance would I have when it comes to recover the files from the harddrive on which I have run the recovery CDs? After running the recovery CDs, nothing has been written or deleted onto the harddrive. The harddrive is 80GB and the pic files I'd like to recover are no more than 1-2GB in total, so there should be a good chance that the new Windows+applications is not going to sit on top of my files.

Apart from an estimate on how much of my files on the harddrive I can hope to recover, can I expect my recovered files be complete, i.e not partially corrupted?

[guitar]

try isobuster here
http://www.filehippo.com/download_isobuster/

[mikeb88]

I downloaded isobuster and had a look, but I'm not sure if it will help me or not. What I see when using the program is the missing folders (great!), but the content seems totally messed up. The folders (a dozen or so of them) contain, each, between 6,000-48,000 files... each file being between 0.5-4GB in size. That is clearly not true. Each folder should contain about 20-100 files (pics), each being about 1-1.5MB in size.

Will isobuster be of any help? Any other ideas as to what has gone wrong and what can be done?

[guitar]

you may have to rename the files and tell windows which program to open them with ie: if its a mp3 open with media player, you may have to do a bit of guesswork here
it worked for me

[mikeb88]

The problem is that isobuster does not correctly identify the files, number of files, or file size. Have a look at the attached screenshot and you will see what I mean...

[guitar]

a bit of guesswork now
are they video files [ size tells me they might be )
try opening with media player
see what happens

[mikeb88]

nope. they are all jpg (1-2mb), pics snapped by myself, which is why the info in isobuster does not make sense.

[greco8523]

you might be able to still recover some data of the drive still.Even after a format and reinstallation.

http://www.datarecoveryadvice.org/da..._software.html

the link should give you advice on how to recover the data.