So you've lost an important file in Windows, and you need to get it back. Recuva can help! Recuva is a softwares made by priform so that you can recover your deleted files, images, and other things. I have also used it manier times it’s a nice softwares It has the ability to recover all files.
Why use Recuva?
It happens to all of us. Maybe you deleted a file you need back, or you clicked Yes when you should've clicked No. Or maybe you had a glitch on a memory card from your digital camera or the USB drive you use with your laptop. Or your iPod suddenly won't recognize some of your music tracks.
If you catch it right away, you can often undo the deletion in Windows or recover the file from the Recycle Bin. But what if you don't catch it right away, or a program has deleted the file? Recuva to the rescue.
Recuva is a small freeware program you can use to recover pictures, music, documents, videos, or any other types of files on your hard drive, memory cards, floppy disks, iPod or MP3 player, or USB sticks.
Usually, when you or Windows delete a file, a lot of the file is left behind, even if you can't see it in Windows Explorer. Recuva scours your media (except CDs, DVDs and other optical media) and puts together the pieces so you can recover the files you need.
Recuva also has the special ability to securely delete recovered files. For example, you may have deleted a sensitive document the regular way (emptying the Recycle Bin or highlighting the file and pressing the Delete key). This type of deletion could let others recover the file. By using Recuva's restore-and-securely-delete functionality, you can make sure it's erased once and for all.
What it can and cant do
Recuva can:
· Scan through your hard drives, memory cards, and USB sticks to find files and folders you've deleted.
· Tell you in advance how likely it is that your file(s) can be recovered.
· Recover files that Windows can't .
· Securely delete a file you may have previously deleted.
· Recover emails you deleted 'permanently' from Microsoft Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird, or Windows Live Mail.
· Recover files from your iPod, iPod Nano, or iPod Shuffle (iPod Touch and iPhone not supported at this time). Recuva will even recover songs with Apple's FairPlay DRM.
· Recover Canon RAW (.CRW) format image files.
· Recover files from NFTS, FAT, and exFAT-formatted drives.
· Bring your files back!
Recuva cannot:
· Recover all files. Yes, as great as Recuva is it won't work all the time. Sometimes Windows has overwritten the area where the file used to be, or sometimes the file is too corrupted to recover.
· Recover files you've deleted securely. For example, if you've used the CCleaner software to delete files using the Secure option, they're gone for good.
· Securely delete certain very small files that are held in the Master File Table (MFT) and files of zero-byte length.
· Recuva is capable of recovering from NAS devices, however the drive needs to be connected directly to the machine via USB/IDE/SATA. Recuva is not capable of recovering data over a network.
Using Recuva
Recuva provides you with two ways to recover your files: a Wizard mode, and an Advanced mode. You can also take a look at our Quick Start section if you're in a real hurry Note: Ideally, you should install Recuva before you need it. The process of installing Recuva can in fact overwrite the file you are trying to recover.
Using the Recuva Wizard
Recuva has a wizard that can guide you through the basic steps of recovering files. If you're looking for more detailed control over the process, or you're an expert user, you can use the Advanced mode. Otherwise, I recommend you try the Wizard mode first to get a feel for how Recuva works.
To run Recuva in Wizard mode:
1. Start Recuva. If the Wizard doesn't appear, click the Options button. Select the Show Wizard at startup button, and then click Run Wizard.
2. On the Welcome to the Recuva Wizard page, click Next.
3. On the File Type page, select the type of files you want to recover, then click Next. If you're not sure what type of files you're looking for, select Other.
4. On the File Location page, select the location where you want to search, and then clickNext.
5. On the Thank You page, you can optionally choose to run a deep scan. This advanced scan can take several hours, but has a better chance of finding your files.
6. Click Start. Recuva displays the progress of the scan, and then shows its search results in the main window.
7. Click Recover. Select a destination for the recovered files (ideally, on another drive). ClickOK.
Using Recuva without the wizard
Expert users can use Recuva in Advanced mode to quickly specify the files they're seeking, where they're located, and other options within the same window.
To run Recuva in Advanced mode:
1. Start Recuva. If the Wizard appears, click Do not show this Wizard on startup, and then click Cancel. Restart Recuva.
2. Specify the drives, file types, and optionally the file names you want Recuva to search for.
3. Click Scan. Recuva displays the progress of the scan, and then shows its search results in the main window.
4. Select one or more files and then click Recover. Select a destination for the recovered files (ideally, on another drive). Click OK.
The Deep Scan option
By default, Recuva uses the Master File Table to scan for deleted, corrupted, and overwritten files. If you run the Recuva Wizard and it doesn't find the files you're looking for, you can run it in Deep Scan mode.
Deep Scan mode goes through the entire hard drive to find files. This is a far more thorough method, but it also takes a lot longer - over an hour on a large drive.
To enable a Deep Scan, select the Enable Deep Scan check box and then click Start. After the deep scan completes, the Results window will appear.
Notes:
1. A deep scan can only find and recover files which are non-fragmented. Want to defrag your hard drive? Check out the great free defragmenting program on priform site
2. A deep scan can only recover files, not file names. Files found during a deep scan appear in the list view as [<number>].<extension>. For example: [00001].jpg
3. A deep scan can only identify the following file types:
· Graphics: BMP, JPG, JPEG, PNG, GIF, TIFF
· Microsoft Office 2007: DOCX, XLSX, PPTX
· Microsoft Office (pre-2007): DOC, XLS, PPT, VSD
· OpenOffice: ODT, ODP, ODS, ODG, ODF
· Audio: MP3, MP2, MP1, AIF, WMA, OGG, WAV, AAC, M4A
· Video: MOV, MPG, MP4, 3GP, FLV, WMV, AVI
· Archives: RAR, ZIP, CAB
· Other file types: PDF, RTF, VXD, URL
Running Recuva from a USB drive
You can install Recuva to and run it from a USB drive.
Why would you use this? If you're helping a friend recover his files from his PC, or your mother needs to recover some files she's deleted from her digital camera's memory card, you can put Recuva on a USB drive and take it with you, easily.
To install Recuva to a USB drive:
1. Download Recuva if you haven't already and install it on your PC.
2. Browse to the Recuva folder (typically, C:\Program Files\Recuva) and copy its contents to a folder on your USB drive.
3. Create a dummy portable.dat file in the folder. You can do this by right-clicking a blank area in the folder, and then clicking New, and then Text Document. Replace the New Text Document.txt file name with portable.dat and then press Enter. You will be prompted to confirm the file extension change. Click Yes.
To run Recuva as a portable application, double-click the Recuva.exe file in the folder.