Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Best Data Recovery software

S

soundbase

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2009
30
0
I accidentally deleted the wrong External Hard Drive on my Mac.

I had an external Hard drive with 3 partitions. It had a partition with a disk image of the 10.5 install disc, a partition with the 10.6 install disc, and then a data drive with data in. I accidentally erased the drive with disk utility and created 3 new partitions of different sizes. I have not yet copied any data onto the partitions and was wanting to use a data recovery software to retrieve the 3 different partitions. Which is the best data recovery software to use for this. I have Data Rescue and Stellar Phoenix. Do I use the recover deleted/lost files of deleted/lost volumes if I use Stellar Phoenix?

What I have noticed is when I use these data recovery software for deleted items the names of the files are different after the recovery. Is there anyway to retrieve the correct filenames as well.
 
S

soundbase

macrumors member
Original poster
May 17, 2009
30
0
Best Data Recovery software

I Have been running Stellar Phoenix the whole day. It is still running but it looks like it has recovered 52GB, will be interesting to see if it actually pulls proper files back or if the 52GB is all gibberish.

On their site it states that it even pulls data from "Undelete all your files, folders, documents even after completely emptying the Trash by hitting 'Command+Shift+Option+Backspace'."

And: "Recover any Mac Partition/Volume that has been deleted months ago. With Stellar Mac Data Recovery, you can search and list all the previously existed volumes in your Mac hard drive."

So I'm holding thumbs. Will keep you guys posted if it was all successful
 
S

stellarinfo

macrumors newbie
May 24, 2011
1
0
Re:

Hi soundbase!
Thanks for using Stellar Phoenix Mac- Please update us about your progress we promise to help you. if file system is not changed, Use search for lost volume option to search for deleted partition. After Search, you needs to scan lost volume for data using Advance Recovery option. This option takes more time as compared to Quick Recovery but gives best outcome.

Please feel free to contact our Support Team if required.
Thanks
Stellarinfo
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
28,326
12,448
"What I have noticed is when I use these data recovery software for deleted items the names of the files are different after the recovery. Is there anyway to retrieve the correct filenames as well."

You probably are going to lose most, if not all, of your file/folder hierarchies when using data recovery software.

That's just the way it works. Think of it this way -- the file names and folder hierarchies are "constructs of the directory", which was destroyed when you erased or re-initialized.

But erasing/re-initializing doesn't "touch" the data itself (unless the user chooses to "zero out" the data, in which case file recovery won't work). Even though the file names and "pointers" to the location of the files are wiped out (with the directory), the data is STILL THERE, out on the sectors of the drive's platters.

File recovery software works by "going around" the directory, "ignoring" it, so to speak. The software goes right to the sectors, and scavenges whatever it finds, then "re-assembles" the pieces back into files. This is why it takes so long.

So, the consolation is that even though you lose the filenames, you get the actual data back, and isn't that what's important?
 
D

Delores

macrumors newbie
May 7, 2013
1
0
Recently, I also encountered the similar data recovery problems. That’s exactly why I came here to share my feelings with you about this old thread.
My problems like this: one of my drive partitions was mistakenly formatted by me instead of another partition. So, I even had no time to back up my important data on this partition.
In order to get back my erased data, I had read many articles and forums threads. Many people suggested me to use a third party data recovery tools. But, actually, I nearly knew nothing about data recovery stuff. Therefore, I only tried some free data drive data recovery tools recommended by them, such as Recuva, PhotoRec and iCare Data Recovery Free, etc.
They were free and efficient in retrieving my inaccessible data.
Fortunately, due to these free data recovery tools, I finally saved all my data back from this formatted partition.
So, If someone has similar problems, I think he also could give these freeware a shot.
 
J

Judith123

macrumors member
Aug 13, 2013
46
0
New York
Hello Guys,

The Mac data recovery software all of you mentioned are good, but can anyone suggest a free program? I want to find a totally free powerful function of data recover software. I also hear that free version just supports few types of files to recover. That makes me spend some money buying program. :(
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
28,326
12,448
"The Mac data recovery software all of you mentioned are good, but can anyone suggest a free program?"

You really aren't going to get any suggestions, because there aren't any "free" data recovery apps. They ALL work the same way.

At least all the data recovery apps that are easy to use.

I will mention ONE application called "test disk", that could be of use.
But it IS NOT "easy to use".
 
phoenixsan

phoenixsan

macrumors 65816
Oct 19, 2012
1,342
2
In my opinion.....

Data Rescue and Stellar are very good software to tackle your problem. Abandon all hope about recover hierarchies and proper file names. With Stellar you can get gibberish in the folder and file names. And have to filter all info to see the extent of the recovery. I can share with you my metrics, based in my practice doing recovery work for me and others: Stellar can get between 85-95% of your data. Data Rescue is between 90-98%

So, you have a long way before you.....Good luck with the recovery....:D



:):apple:
 
georgi0

georgi0

macrumors regular
Aug 21, 2006
148
3
Cyberspace
sparsebundle / time machine

What would be the best option in recovery tools for recovering a non working time capsule backup file - sparsebundle not able to mount in my system?

I can still see the packages if i right click where I can not make out anything at all.

I see also that the image file size is correct to the one of my old backup, so I assume everything is still there but I can not access it.

thank you.
 
300DDR

300DDR

macrumors member
Jul 5, 2012
44
0
Los Angeles, CA
An expert's advice...

As someone who deals with Mac data recovery daily, I can say for sure that Data Rescue 3 most often gives the best results. But there are hundreds of data recovery apps out there and most are junk (or clones of another app).

One application that no one mentioned is R-Studio (they have PC versions also). R-Studio can recover non-Mac drives (unlike Data Rescue) and also has more advanced RAID recovery options than DR3.

For *free* recovery, as mentioned TestDisk is good, and so is it's brother Photorec. The latter can recover more than just Photos and they are both completely free.

Be sure to create an image of your bad drive first with DDRescue (for data recovery when the problem isn't "deleted files" or "format recovery" like in OP's case) and THEN run DR applications on the image file created. You should never run any data recovery software tools on a dying drive.
 
A

Alco83

macrumors newbie
Apr 21, 2014
2
0
Recovery of USB HDD accidentally formatted

Hello there. First of all thanks for your comments. After reading several posts, including this one, I have much more clear if I have any solutions to my problem.

Additionally, i would appreciate any additional suggestion/comment to my problem:
- I had a MAC extended format USB 2TB HDD, that I used with my mac Mini.
- Accidentally (i have the HDD plug on USB when reinstalling Windows on other PC) i have quick formatted on NTFS the Drive. As soon as I realized I unpplugged the HDD and not let to write anything on it.
- Apparently I lost all my data, and i want to understand the best workaround to recover all my data (aprox 1,5TB).

I am very committed to buy Data Rescue 3.0 SW, and try to recover all data from my HDD.

Questions:
- What would you think if would be the best option to recover all data stored on the HDD with MAC Forma: OSX or Windows.
- What would be the best SW? Data REscue?
- Any comment, to take into consideration for this particular situation where I have a MAC format and changed to NTFS?

Thanks in advance!
 
Fishrrman

Fishrrman

macrumors Penryn
Feb 20, 2009
28,326
12,448
I make no promises for this advice, and do it at your own risk.

You can -try- DataRescue on the drive "as it is now", but if DataRescue can't "see" the drive in the finder, you could try this next:

1. Re-initialize it to HFS+ format (yes, I said RE-INITIALIZE), but...
2. Do not, repeat, DO NOT choose to "zero out" the data !!!!
3. Then, run DataRescue on it in the "deep scan" mode.

The idea here is to replace the munged directory with a good one, but at the same time, leave the actual data "out on the platters" UNtouched.

Now the finder can mount the drive and DR can "see" it, and even though the directory "looks to be empty", DR will "look around" it and go right to the platters, to scavenge and rebuild what it finds there.

IMPORTANT:
You WILL need another drive of sufficient capacity to receive the recovered files.

ALSO IMPORTANT:
You are probably going to lose most of, or ALL of, your previous file names and folder hierarchies. You have to accept this reality as part of the recovery process.

What you could do in some specific instances:
For music files, try dragging the lot of them into iTunes (you will want to run iTunes from a drive that has NO music on it beforehand). There is a -chance- that iTunes will be able to read the file metadata, and create a new iTunes directory even though the actual file names are missing. This has actually worked for me on a partition I recovered using the method described above.

I'm wondering if photo files have similar metadata? If so, you might be able to use the same recovery process (as used for mp3 files above) to recover photo files, as well, using iPhoto, Aperture, or perhaps another image app.
 
A

Alco83

macrumors newbie
Apr 21, 2014
2
0
Fishrrman said:
I make no promises for this advice, and do it at your own risk.

You can -try- DataRescue on the drive "as it is now", but if DataRescue can't "see" the drive in the finder, you could try this next:

1. Re-initialize it to HFS+ format (yes, I said RE-INITIALIZE), but...
2. Do not, repeat, DO NOT choose to "zero out" the data !!!!
3. Then, run DataRescue on it in the "deep scan" mode.

The idea here is to replace the munged directory with a good one, but at the same time, leave the actual data "out on the platters" UNtouched.

Now the finder can mount the drive and DR can "see" it, and even though the directory "looks to be empty", DR will "look around" it and go right to the platters, to scavenge and rebuild what it finds there.

IMPORTANT:
You WILL need another drive of sufficient capacity to receive the recovered files.

ALSO IMPORTANT:
You are probably going to lose most of, or ALL of, your previous file names and folder hierarchies. You have to accept this reality as part of the recovery process.

What you could do in some specific instances:
For music files, try dragging the lot of them into iTunes (you will want to run iTunes from a drive that has NO music on it beforehand). There is a -chance- that iTunes will be able to read the file metadata, and create a new iTunes directory even though the actual file names are missing. This has actually worked for me on a partition I recovered using the method described above.

I'm wondering if photo files have similar metadata? If so, you might be able to use the same recovery process (as used for mp3 files above) to recover photo files, as well, using iPhoto, Aperture, or perhaps another image app.
Click to expand...

I will try to do it the next days. I have been totally crowded and packed the hard drive to get more energy to start the recovery process.
I will share with you the results!
Thanks for the advice
 
C

Copey

macrumors newbie
Apr 26, 2014
1
0
Here are some tips you may need when you meet data loss problems:
1. If you meet the file loss situation, keep calm and stop using your computer to do any read or write operation until you find the way to recover the lost files because any wrong operation.
2. If you’ve lost a file, time is of the essence. As new files saved to Mac hard drive or storage devices, the original files gets overwritten. So do not use the drive or disk which your deleted files are stored before at all, until you have completed the scanning and recovery process.
3. The system crashed or the files loss situation happens occasionally, so remember build a backup for the files periodically is strongly needed.
4. If you meet the file loss situation again, stop using the Mac or storage device right now, use another computer to process the files recovery.
5. Remember this, no matter at the normal time or after files recovery, build a backup for the files periodically is the best method to protect your files from data loss situation.

This guide offers you more tips you may need: http://www.wikihow.com/Recover-Windows-Hard-Drive-Using-Systools-Hard-Drive-Data-Recovery-Software
 
Last edited:
Rizvi1

Rizvi1

macrumors 6502a
Mar 29, 2006
823
12
Maryland
Seems Data Rescue is my best bet for a blunder I just made of erasing the wrong external HD. There's a few hundred gigs of video file data on there that I would like to recover if possible.

My big worry though is that I had been using FileVault to encrypt that HD. When I just did the accidental erase, it was with the format "Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted)" again with the same password. I didn't do zero out or anything.

Knowing that FileVault is part of my complexity, would Data Rescue still be the way to go?
 
Last edited:
P

paredes

macrumors newbie
Nov 6, 2014
1
0
Safe sites

Hi everyone

I am also looking into buying either DiskWarrior or Wondershare's DiskRescue but am feeling weary of doing it unless I have a safe link, because I just lost 80 bucks on a site that was a scheme. Did anyone of you buy it already? If so could you share the link for a safe site?

Thank you in advance.
 
Evren Carven

Evren Carven

macrumors regular
Dec 16, 2014
238
21
Fishrrman said:
I make no promises for this advice, and do it at your own risk.

You can -try- DataRescue on the drive "as it is now", but if DataRescue can't "see" the drive in the finder, you could try this next:

1. Re-initialize it to HFS+ format (yes, I said RE-INITIALIZE), but...
2. Do not, repeat, DO NOT choose to "zero out" the data !!!!
3. Then, run DataRescue on it in the "deep scan" mode.

The idea here is to replace the munged directory with a good one, but at the same time, leave the actual data "out on the platters" UNtouched.

Now the finder can mount the drive and DR can "see" it, and even though the directory "looks to be empty", DR will "look around" it and go right to the platters, to scavenge and rebuild what it finds there.

IMPORTANT:
You WILL need another drive of sufficient capacity to receive the recovered files.

ALSO IMPORTANT:
You are probably going to lose most of, or ALL of, your previous file names and folder hierarchies. You have to accept this reality as part of the recovery process.

What you could do in some specific instances:
For music files, try dragging the lot of them into iTunes (you will want to run iTunes from a drive that has NO music on it beforehand). There is a -chance- that iTunes will be able to read the file metadata, and create a new iTunes directory even though the actual file names are missing. This has actually worked for me on a partition I recovered using the method described above.

I'm wondering if photo files have similar metadata? If so, you might be able to use the same recovery process (as used for mp3 files above) to recover photo files, as well, using iPhoto, Aperture, or perhaps another image app.
Click to expand...

Maybe this is a method for recovering data. One thing you need to notice is this operation(Re-initialize) will rewrite some data on the volume.

Copey said:
Here are some tips you may need when you meet data loss problems:
1. If you meet the file loss situation, keep calm and stop using your computer to do any read or write operation until you find the way to recover the lost files because any wrong operation.
2. If you’ve lost a file, time is of the essence. As new files saved to Mac hard drive or storage devices, the original files gets overwritten. So do not use the drive or disk which your deleted files are stored before at all, until you have completed the scanning and recovery process.
3. The system crashed or the files loss situation happens occasionally, so remember build a backup for the files periodically is strongly needed.
4. If you meet the file loss situation again, stop using the Mac or storage device right now, use another computer to process the files recovery.
5. Remember this, no matter at the normal time or after files recovery, build a backup for the files periodically is the best method to protect your files from data loss situation.

This guide offers you more tips you may need: http://www.wikihow.com/Recover-Windows-Hard-Drive-Using-Systools-Hard-Drive-Data-Recovery-Software
Click to expand...

Thank you for your share.

Delores said:
Recently, I also encountered the similar data recovery problems. That’s exactly why I came here to share my feelings with you about this old thread.
My problems like this: one of my drive partitions was mistakenly formatted by me instead of another partition. So, I even had no time to back up my important data on this partition.
In order to get back my erased data, I had read many articles and forums threads. Many people suggested me to use a third party data recovery tools. But, actually, I nearly knew nothing about data recovery stuff. Therefore, I only tried some free data drive data recovery tools recommended by them, such as Recuva, PhotoRec and iCare Data Recovery Free, etc.
They were free and efficient in retrieving my inaccessible data.
Fortunately, due to these free data recovery tools, I finally saved all my data back from this formatted partition.
So, If someone has similar problems, I think he also could give these freeware a shot.
Click to expand...

There is another Mac data recovery software named Data Recovery Wizard you have not mentioned.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom