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General discussion

Please Help! massive computer problem!

Dec 2, 2003 7:39AM PST

Hi, i had a major problem with my computer recentley, it got some virus and it totally ruined the whole computer so i had to wipe the hard drive and restart the computer from new (like brand new from the shop!) The thing is i had lots of personal things on the computer like 100s of photos, college work ect ect that i dont have anywhere else, is there anyway the computer would still have these on the system?? Is there any software that can be used to track them down on the computer or are they gone forever?!
cheers, if anyone can email me at partydrummer83@hotmail.com i would be very thankfull.

Discussion is locked

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Re:Please Help! massive computer problem!
Dec 2, 2003 10:03AM PST

When you say "I had to wipe the hard drive" I assume you mean you re-formatted it. If that's the case, the data is gone and not recoverable. That's why it's important to regularly backup your data.

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reformatting does not necessarily write over the data.
Dec 2, 2003 10:50AM PST

There are programs to try to recover ssome of the data, but I don't have any links to them. Start a new thread with Recover lost data in the subject line. You should get some good links to freeware and shareware.

Having reformatted, it won't be easy.

The Soviets could do it when they were the enemy. LOL

Please learn to make your subject line specific. You'll get more help that way.

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Bulldozer, How Important Is The Data ?? &....
Dec 2, 2003 12:11PM PST

...how much do you want to spend? If it's really important to your STOP using the computer immediately and take/send the hard drive to a data recovery specialist. The more times you "write to" the drive, the more you will damage the previous files. A simple "Google" search will give you quite a few options to select from. Here's a link with lots of choices:

"Data Recovery" Search At Google

If you want to proceed with a free version, I have used the one below, but is best used in a different machine where the damaged drive can be installed as a "slave" so the main hard drive can receive the program install.

PC Inspector File Recovery for FAT32 and NTFS
http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm
Hope this helps.

Grif

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Re:Bulldozer, How Important Is The Data ?? &....
Dec 3, 2003 4:51AM PST

Thanks for all the advice guys, i will check out the links you gave me.