photo recovery program

[Dana]

Any recommendations on a good free photo recovery program. I  erased all of our family photo's while uninstalling an old microsoft office program.

[Ianab]

If you did actually delete the files (as opposed to just the links or program that views them), then TURN THE MACHINE OFF !!!

Reason is that once files are deleted the data may still be there, just now marked as "Free space". The more you use the machine, the more likely that that free space gets over written but other data, and you can't recover it.

If they are actually deleted I would be removing the hard disk from the PC, and connecting it to another machine with a USB adaptor, then you can examine it with no danger of the remaining files being overwritten. Even if it's just a link lost, you can still explore and find the files with little risk of overwriting something important.

Ian

[corke]

I had excellent results with a free program called PC Inspector Smart Recovery.  You can download it from the CNET site.  It says it's for memory cards in cameras (and that's what I used it for) but I just checked the operating interface and it will scan hard drives to recover photos as well. 

[Dana]

Ianab, The photo,s were in Windows picture gallery. I can still see the titles to all the photo's and video's but when I click on them nothing is there. I've been looking at the software recovery programs offered for sale not sure if they will help?

Corke, Thanks for the info I will look into it as well.

[Kevin]

Dana;
Are they "hidden" maybe and not deleted?

[Dana]

I don't know Kevin. How would I tell?

[Kevin]

Try right clicking and look at properties.
If you can do that you will see two boxes, one marked read only and another marked hidden.
Remove the hidden check mark.
If you can't open the properties then you will have to go into control panel.

[Ianab]

Ianab, The photo,s were in Windows picture gallery. I can still see the titles to all the photo's and video's but when I click on them nothing is there. I've been looking at the software recovery programs offered for sale not sure if they will help?

Corke, Thanks for the info I will look into it as well.

Chances are the files are still there, you have just deleted the program that would normally open them.

Try "Right Clicking" on one, and select "open with" Should give you a number of options. If one of them works and you can view the picture, then your files are still there and you just need fix the file associations to open them normally.

Ian

[clearcut]

From your description, I suspect that Ianab is correct, that you deleted the program that images and video was associated with.

If the files are there you should BACK THEM UP! Today.

External hard disks are relatively inexpensive. On line back up plans like Mozy, Carbonite, Crashplan, and others make backing up simple and automatic. Remember that all media, hard disks, CDs, DVDs, Flash Memory, etc. will eventually fail. You should have multiple back ups of everything important. Back ups should be in separate places.

If the files not there, PhotoRec is a free yet powerful recovery tool. It is not the easiest to use, but it can recover images from seriously damaged media.

   http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

I was able to recover several hundred photos off of an accidentally formatted disk using PhotoRec.

Good luck.