How to Recover Lost Files From a Recovered Operating System
Data loss is one of the worst things that can happen to a PC user, especially when the data is important, such as professional documents or school work. Users who suffer a serious crash are sometimes able to recover their operating systems but find that some of their files are lost. Luckily, there is still hope of recovering at least some of them, as deleted files are never really completely gone from the hard drive.
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Instructions
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Recovery Lost Data
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Ensure that your system is stable enough to run a hard drive scan. If your data was lost as a result of some type of hardware failure, run a memory test on the appropriate piece of hardware to make sure that your system will not crash while your recovering your files.
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Perform a malware scan using the anti-malware tool of your choice. Mcafee and Norton are popular and reliable tools for this. If the scan shows that your machine is infected, follow the on-screen instructions to remove the malware in question. Once the malware has been removed or if the scan came up negative, continue on to the next step.
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Download or purchase an appropriate data recovery tool for your operating system. There are numerous options for Linux, Mac and Windows. Some of these focus on specific file types, such as Microsoft Office documents and photos. If you are primarily concerned with recovering Office documents, then it is recommended that you select one of those options. If you are trying to recover other file types or a wide range of different file types, then it is recommended that you use one of the more general tools, such as such as Recover My Files (http://www.recovermyfiles.com/) or one of Stellar Phoenix's data recovery tools (http://www.stellarinfo.com/).
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Run the tool. It will begin scanning your hard drive for lost and overwritten files. Depending on the size of your hard drive, it could take some time. The tool should open up a window and display all the files it found.
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Use the software's built-in interface to select all the files you want to recover. It should be noted that some tools skip this step and automatically recover all the files they find and send them to a specific folder.
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Look over the recovered files to make sure they have not been damaged. It is common that some files will not recover completely or to the most recent version of the file. This is particularly true of Word documents that have been saved multiple times, as the software, in certain situations, is only able to recover an older version of the file.
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References
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