How to use Recuva File Restore Utility
Written by admin on Thursday, December 11th, 2008 in Free Softwares, Freeware, Softwares.
Recuva - File Recovery
Recuva (pronounced “recover”) is a freeware Windows utility to restore files that have been accidentally deleted from your computer. This includes files emptied from the Recycle bin as well as images and other files that have been deleted by user error from digital camera memory cards or MP3 players. It will even bring back files that have been deleted by bugs, crashes and viruses!
You’ve accidentally deleted a file – what do you do?
Turn off any applications you don’t need, if you are trying to recover files from a media card, stop using that card immediately. Ideally install Recuva before you need it, as just browsing the internet and downloading the installer creates a huge number of temporary files and any one of them could over write the file you are trying to recover. When you need it, just scan the drive the file was on.
Finding the file
Recuva will often find a huge number of files, so the first task is usually to identify the file you want to recover.
- By file name
The easiest way to find a file is by its name. Press Scan and then type the name in the filter box. If you know the file name and it’s not in the list, then don’t give up, try the options below or see the FAQs.
- By file type
If you don’t know what the name is, but are certain of the type, then click on the filter box and select the type of file you are looking for. Alternatively, you can enter a specific filetype if you know it e.g. ‘.jpg’ will display just the files ending with .jpg (JPEG photos)
- By path
If you are not sure of the name but know where it was, then you can try entering part of the path. Note that if the file was placed in the Recycle Bin before it was deleted, then the path has probably been changed. Typing in ‘recycle’ will list all the files that were deleted from the recycle bin.
- What to do if you can’t find your file
If you placed the file in the Recycle Bin before deleting it, then it is possible that it has been renamed by Windows – this is a standard feature. In this case, the best way to find your file, is to identify all the files in the Recycle bin and then sort by Last Modified or by Size. Files in the Recycle Bin are renamed in the following way
• Dc19.jpg
This is short for Disk c, the number is purely sequential. Windows does not change the file type.
Understanding the results
When you’ve found your file, Recuva displays a variety of information about it. If it is an image file, you may have a preview. You also have Info and Header information.
Each file is given a Status – Excellent, Poor, Very poor, Unrecoverable. This is visible in the Status column in the list view or the Info tab. Files marked Excellent have the best chance of recovery but it’s still possible a file marked Poor can still be recovered and vice versa.
Restoring the files
You can select the files you want to recover using the tick boxes, or the right click options. If possible, restore the files to a different drive, this increases the chance of a successful recovery.
Testing the files
Recuva will attempt to restore your deleted files, but it cannot analyze the contents of the file after it has recovered it and tell you if the recovery was 100% successful.
The only way to test if the file has been recovered successfully is by opening it with the originating applications – e.g. does it open properly in Word? If it fails to open in the originating application, then the recovery has almost certainly failed.
