Files lost after chkdsk - set to zero

[Nennad]

Hello,
If anyone can help me with the problem i have with few of my files and how to restore them. My OS is Windows XP, NTFS filesistem, 160 gb hdd (happily, windows is located on second hdd, so damaged disk is not so much exposed).
After i restarted computer CHKDSK checked for problems and did some changes involving:
....
Deleting corrupt attribute record (128, "")...
and
Inserting data attribute into file 36015...
....

After boot, some of my very important files (about 10mb each before loss, 10 of them in same folder) are listed as zero byte files - they contain 0 bytes.

I tried many software recovery tools but no one show me possible link to the lost-emptied files, or option to repair those files, they show only deleted files.

It is not simple undelete because file is present but its content (MB) is gone somewhere. I have not found any solutions on the web so far now.

Thanks for any clues!

 

[kjv1611]

What software have you tried?

Here are a couple that work extremely well:

http://www.runtime.org/

http://www.active-undelete.com/

Also, there are some free ones that work, but generally not as well. I'm guessing that if anything works in this case, it's going to be one of the above.

This one is free. I doubt it's as good as the others:

http://ntfsundelete.com/

If your data is truly that important, I'd suggest you try one of the firs two... if it doesn't work, then try the other.

And until you recover your files (assuming still possible), then I highly suggest you not save ANYTHING to that drive until recovered. So, if you have any programs that save temp files there, or you have your SWAP file (virtual memory) stored there, or hibernation file, etc, anything... then you need to disable them, or change their settings to use another drive.

Then if/when you DO get the files recovered, I'd suggest spend some serious time looking at a recovery plan. Whether that's just a manual copy to another drive on a regular basis, or whether you use some backup software (Sync Toy by MS is one that's free, and there are other free ones, and other cheap ones as well).

Also, another option would be to try and recover the entire partition. Active Partition recovery (same company as one of the 2 file recovery apps listed above) is very good at recovering lost/damaged partitions... and in this case, could in effect restore your files.

And one other thing to look at. If a CheckDisk repair ended up flattening a few files, then I'd suggest it's time to be at least looking for a new hard drive. If your data is of any value, then this should be a top priority. If that drive fails, it's bye bye data, short of spending $300, minimum, up into the thousands for data recovery.

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"If to err is human, then I must be some kind of human!" -Me