WD 250GB SATA-II = C drive
WD 500GB SATA-II = D drive
WD 500GB SATA-II in enclosure with eSATA = external G drive

Quick summary of what went on:

-XP and program files are always installed on C drive.
-Games and all documents, pictures, art, music, movies, etc etc are on D drive.
-These files were all copied to external drive which I put together. Enclosure + eSATA + normal HDD.
-I have a massive brainfart as I suddenly decide to try Vista. I formatted to install Vista Ultimate x64
-Files were copied from the external to D in Vista. Unfortunately, I moved the "movies" folder.
-Newsflash: Vista is ********. Reinstall XP.
-C drive is quick formatted and XP is reinstalled.
-After booting up, instead of realizing the movies folder was the original copy present, I quick formatted it in Windows.
-I didn't realize I did such a GODFORSAKEN BLUNDER until this morning. Whoop-de-friggin-doo.


Can anyone recommend some good software? So far I've tried Recover My Files and File Scavenger. Both have yet to recover ANY files at all. It seems all they're doing is displaying what's on my hard drives right now. wtf?

Basically, I made a big bonehead move when I was going from Vista back to XP (long story short, Vista is ******** and it took less than two days to go back to XP).
There was an entire movies folder that I accidentally moved from the external (rather than copied) into my D drive. Another bonehead move was quick formatting the D drive when I ran XP for the first time. I should've just deleted the games folder and that's it, but I wasn't thinking.

Is it really possible to recover files from a quick format? It really doesn't seem like it for me so far. That movies folder was precious. The downloaded films are nothing, it's all my own video work over the past 2 years that I've lost instantly.

PS. I've installed the recovery programs on the external to avoid disk overwriting when scanning the D drive.

***

Power Data Recovery didn't do crap for me. File Scavenger on the other hand pulled up a bunch of files from the D drive. So far only a small fraction of my irreplaceables have been recovered. File Scavenger will run overnight but now I'm trying to scan the external itself. I'm seriously at my wit's end. If this doesn't work, I have no damn clue what to do next

Those videos are too god damn precious to lose and I won't stop torturing myself until they are safe and sound.

You can't have too many backups! - I even keep one at the bank - although it is about 6 month old now!

If you do a quick format and then try to recover lost files, you will have a near 100% success rate.

However, the moment you start to save files on the drive, your recovery rates rapidly diminish, and quickly reach next to impossible.

I have had some success with Recuva, from the makers of CCleaner. Be sure to uncheck "Install Yahoo Toolbar" option during install. Others I trust have recommended Restoration.

Entering: unformat hard drive in your search engine will bring many results - but I have no experience with any of them, so use at your own risk.

If unsuccessful, forensic techniques are available through professional data recovery services but understand that can cost many $100s and even $1000s. And note the more you mess with it, the greater the chance more data is overwritten. Only you can decide if the data is worth it.

BTW - the vast majority of Vista users like it. Sadly, those with the most problems are those that attempted to upgrade their older systems designed to run with XP. I don't recommend upgrading XP machines unless they are less than a year old, and then only by doing a full format and fresh Vista install.

Here is another that I've seen good reviews on but it is not free, listed at $59.95 usd Recover My Files

I've never used it but the reviews I read are positive.
I hope you can recover, I learned my lesson years ago when recovery software was unheard of.

Like Digerati stated "You can't have too many backups"
I have backups on external drives along with CDs & DVDs, onsite and offsite.

and offsite.

The ONLY way to ensure recovery in the event of a catastrophic failure (or massive attack of cranial flatulence) or loss due to fire, flood, or burglary.

Well I'm still at it and refusing to give up. So far many videos have been recovered. Some were luckily backed up to my laptop. Others were damaged and I could repair only a few of them.

Originally Posted by Digerati

BTW - the vast majority of Vista users like it. Sadly, those with the most problems are those that attempted to upgrade their older systems designed to run with XP. I don't recommend upgrading XP machines unless they are less than a year old, and then only by doing a full format and fresh Vista install.

Oh trust me, this machine is more than capable of running Vista. It runs Crysis DX10 on XP on highest settings and doesn't drop a beat. Vista is just a bloated resource hog.

Vista is just a bloated resource hog.

It is bloated, no doubt - but it never pretended to be otherwise. It was designed to take advantage today's hardware capabilities, not hardware designed to run an 8 year old OS that came about when typical PCs came with 256Mb of RAM and 40Gb hard drives and simple 2D graphics. So to say "just a bloated resource hog" is simply not right, and a bit narrow in focus. Gaming is just a tiny niche in the computing world.

Good luck in your recovery process.

Originally Posted by CaptainMazda

Oh trust me, this machine is more than capable of running Vista. It runs Crysis DX10 on XP on highest settings and doesn't drop a beat. Vista is just a bloated resource hog.

Trust me, you weren't running Crysis DX10 on XP. Especially not in June of 2008.

Windows XP doesn't natively support anything higher than DX9.

The wrappers that were available to supposedly allow XP to run DX10 simply ate up too much system resources to work. That would be like using a single core processor to emulate a quad core processor... Might be able to do it in theory, but in practice it's a waste of time to try.

Note, LT, you are responding to a 6 month old and inactive thread.

I was aware. I just had to call that one out for the principal of it. If the person HAD been running dx10 xp wrappers it's no surprise his recovery software didn't find anything (also considering he had re-installed) as the system's resources would have been too taxed to complete the search.

Well, not sure what principle was served this late in the game, but no harm done.