iPad Data Recovery Question

[ahope]

For some reason, almost all but approximately 15 icons/apps are missing suddenly from my IPad 2, including the major icons such as Mail, Camera, Notes, etc. Luckily after rebooting several times in a complete panic, somehow the Settings icon is back but nothing else returned. I unfortunately have not backed up to Itunes because four family members sharing one Windows computer to backup devices ultimately made everything jumbled up (our fault for not knowing what to do, or how to do it correctly). However, since this happened to my IPad, my sister got a new MacBook and gave me her old MacBook (10.6.8). Finally my question is, assuming data is somehow still on my IPad even though I can't see it, how can I safely recover data using my MacBook? PhoneView? iExplorer? iMazing? Which is the easiest and offers the highest chance of recovering data? What I want from my IPad more than anything else are my photographs and Notes, that's my MAIN priority even above my music and videos and even apps. I don't mind resetting it if need be, but I want to retrieve as much as I possibly can from it beforehand. As you can tell I am not tech savvy at all and would appreciate any advice. Thank you in advance!

 

[s2mikey]

Had you been using the cloud backup feature with your ipad 2? If so, then you'd be able to retrive most of it from the macbook by using the cloud storage.

If you can get to settings on your iPad then do that and turn ON iCloud backup and perform a backup right now. Then, you'd have to sign into the iCloud account on your macbook and should be able to get at most of what was backed up from your iPad.

I think.

 

[ahope]

I very much appreciate your response...

Yes, cloud backup has been turned on for several years BUT I was told from someone that works at Apple that the cloud is a joke and doesn't save much of anything? For instance pictures are deleted and recycled every 30 days? Is that correct?

When I sign into icloud.com it only shows notes from 2013, nothing from 2014.... nor previous years... only 2013. Terribly upset.

When I use the Spotlight feature on my IPad 2, when I search for Notes from 2014 by title, they appear but when I click on it, it won't open I guess because the MAIN Notes icon is gone???

I don't understand what happened or how this happened to lose all of the main IPad icons????

Terribly upset and desperate to retrieve Notes and Pics, somehow...

 

[rigormortis]

For some reason, almost all but approximately 15 icons/apps are missing suddenly from my IPad 2, including the major icons such as Mail, Camera, Notes, etc. Luckily after rebooting several times in a complete panic, somehow the Settings icon is back but nothing else returned. I unfortunately have not backed up to Itunes because four family members sharing one Windows computer to backup devices ultimately made everything jumbled up (our fault for not knowing what to do, or how to do it correctly). However, since this happened to my IPad, my sister got a new MacBook and gave me her old MacBook (10.6.8). Finally my question is, assuming data is somehow still on my IPad even though I can't see it, how can I safely recover data using my MacBook? PhoneView? iExplorer? iMazing? Which is the easiest and offers the highest chance of recovering data? What I want from my IPad more than anything else are my photographs and Notes, that's my MAIN priority even above my music and videos and even apps. I don't mind resetting it if need be, but I want to retrieve as much as I possibly can from it beforehand. As you can tell I am not tech savvy at all and would appreciate any advice. Thank you in advance!

the only thing you really need to rush out and omg omg omg omg and save are pictures and videos you recorded using the camera and maybe books. a lot of people worry about their apps. they think they might lose them. but apple keeps every app you ever purchased safe.

turn off find my phone
do a full dfu to get rid of everything
make sure iTunes downloads a new fresh copy of iOS
set it up as a new iPad


everything you ever purchased from apple, like apps, movies and tv shows and music., are your's forever. even "ultimate warrior sound board", " flappy bird", and any banned app that apple had ever pulled is your's forever as long as you paid for it. even if you paid $0.00

after you wipe the iPad go to music and app store and go to purchases , not on this iPad and redownload everything from the stores

you might lose documents inside apps , like u dunno pdf files, or videos in vlc

hopefully any in app purchases will be restored as well

maybe delete all your old backups from iTunes, and then resync to iTunes. make sure you click on "transfer purchases" so the copies of apps in your library are updated to new versions and any music you purchased gets put onto iTunes

anything you did not buy from apple. like tv shows, music, that you SYCNED to that iPad should be in an iTunes library as well. so it does not matter if you erase the iPad as long as you have iTunes
you can't put non purchased stuff from the iPad to iTunes because iTunes sync is only one way. it only goes from the computer to the iPad. and not the other way around (except for photos and transfer purchases)

remember you can back up your iPad to any computer running iTunes. but you can only sync to one.
itunes backups DO NOT CONTAIN anything that is sync'ed from the library.


as far as mail and pages and calendar all that stuff should be safe on iCloud

another good idea is turn on iCloud keychain. so when you erase your iPad the keychain will be safe.
itunes also backs up your keychain


good luck and i hope this helps

i dunno aboiut notes!! you can airdrop them or email them.. all your notes should be in iCloud