My dad asked me to call some lady I didn't know this morning, and see if I could help her with a computer problem... which I couldn't.

Apparently she used the CD Writing Wizard to try and write all her daughter's schoolwork onto a disk (to transfer to another computer I think?) Thing is, the files aren't on the CD, and the original folder is I think gone, or empty... Anyone have any ideas? I had her check the recycle bin and there were some folders like 'English' in there but no files in them... She really, REALLY needs to find the files, if possible, or she will apparently be murdered by her daughter...

Any ideas? I'm clueless.

If there are no other files wrote on the space where the old one appeared, Then it is easy to recover the deleted files from the HDD using a program like Get Data Back http://www.get-data-back.com/

System restore?

If she knows the names of any of the missing files she could try searching for them, they could have been moved somewhere else.

I asked her if she did a search and she said yes, so I'll assume she did that correctly.

I HATE troubleshooting by phone.

As kaynd said, there are plenty of programs available to recover deleted files from hard drives. As long as the drive hasn't been overwritten you should be able to recover the deleted files in their entirety.

Try Restoration

If you´re sure the files are gone (deleted!, not moved somewhere else) and were located on system drive:

Rule 1 - Power off PC asap
Rule 2 - Don´t attempt to boot from drive until rescue procedure is done
Rule 3 - Attach HDD to other computer (or use bootable rescue-CD)
Rule 4 - Run tools like R-Studio, GetDataBack, Unerase to recover your lost files (use more tools to get as much files recovered as possible)
Rule 5 - Recover lost files onto other HDD (avoid writing anything onto original drive)

The point is - never ever try to boot from the original drive, or even install software (even recovery) on it as it will irreversibly reduce chances of later successful recovery.

Quote from TV[cz] :

The point is - never ever try to boot from the original drive, or even install software (even recovery) on it as it will irreversibly reduce chances of later successful recovery.

Or just leave the PC turned on and run recovery software from a USB drive?

Quote from amp88 :

Or just leave the PC turned on and run recovery software from a USB drive?

Bad idea.

The OS would still happily keep writing and rewriting its caches, temp files etc. in the background on the same disk that should be kept untouched to avoid inevitable overwrites on the sensitive sectors.

Or something.

Yeah, well I'm pretty sure that by now they've used it to the point of no recovery, lol. Thanks for they help tho.

Well then she has not much to lose, so it's likely the right time for uncautious gamble. Just suggest her to download & install recovery SW of your choice and let it cast the magic

Be it for instance:
"Recover My Files"
"O&O Unerase"
"R-Studio"
"GetDataBack"
etc.


All of listed are commercial tools though. It all depends on the value of vanished files

I've used som file recovery programs before - Handy Recovery I think was the best one I used, and it didn't realyl have any trouble restoring files long after I had deleted them and used the PC. Depends where they are on the drive I suppose.