Featured Freeware: Pandora Recovery
The name Pandora originates in Greek mythology, and it means "all-giving." It's an appropriate name for Pandora Recovery, which can give you back files you've deleted--even those gone for months.
Now for NTFS and FAT-formatted volumes, Pandora functions by scanning the hard drive and building an index of existing files and deleted file markers. This, in turn, allows the dead files to be brought back to life--as long as the file format is currently supported by the computer. Users can browse for deleted files, search for specific ones, preview certain file types like images, and get an estimate on the chance of recovery and the amount of time the procedure will take.
The program offers a guidance wizard to make sure that you're able to find deleted files. Pandora cautions you to recover deleted files to a separate drive from the one which they're being recovered from--sound advice, and the program makes it easy to recover to an external hard disk or portable drive. The interface isn't anything special, but combines Windows XP Explorer-style navigation with its own toolbar for an effective if uninspired layout.
There's also a portable version of the program that costs $40.
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The only 2 things Pandora let me use to narrow the search was the file extension jpeg and the size of the file. I guessed my photo was between 95 and 125 kB, so I searched all the deleted photos within that range one by one. Otherwise, it could take forever, and most of the deleted photos are already overwritten and corrupted. VirtualLab lets you browse a folder of deleted photos at a time.
If you lose a file you can't risk losing, you have to stop using that computer, because even searching the web and downloading Pandora could overwrite your file. As well, Pandora told me to save recovered files to an external device such as a USB stick to avoid overwriting more files. I was too lazy to even do that, but I was lucky.
- by cptcanuck2 March 14, 2009 9:55 PM PDT
- Eureka! Pandora found 1 jpeg photo I deleted by accident. It wasn't easy though because the 2 file recovery programs I tried Pandora & VirtualLab don't have your old file names for almost all of the deleted files.
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(4 Comments)The only 2 things Pandora let me use to narrow the search was the file extension jpeg and the size of the file. I guessed my photo was between 95 and 125 kB, so I searched all the deleted photos within that range one by one. Otherwise, it could take forever, and most of the deleted photos are already overwritten and corrupted. VirtualLab lets you browse a folder of deleted photos at a time.
If you lose a file you can't risk losing, you have to stop using that computer, because even searching the web and downloading Pandora could overwrite your file, so Pandora says to physically attach your C drive as a "slave" to another computer to do the recovery risk free. As well, Pandora told me to save recovered files to an external device such as a USB stick (or the D drive) to avoid overwriting more files. I was too lazy to even do that, but I was lucky.