Re: Reformatted, lost data. Can I get it back?

Carey Frisch [MVP] wrote:
If you indeed reformatted your hard drive, all files
have been permanently erased and are non-recoverable.


Not quite true. The sectors are "hard formatted" (or "low level formatted"). Reformatting just rewrites master boot record, the sector map (different for different file systems), renumbers the sectors and marks them as available, and so on.

During re-install of XP, many sectors are overwritten.

However, overwriting the data does not change 100% of the magnetic particles in the surface of the HD: a few remain the same. Only repeated overwriting will delete all traces of the previous data - so-called "wiping utilities" do just this. The NSA standard requires at least seven overwrites, IIRC.

Because traces of previous data remain, it's possible to recover the data, but it takes technology and expertise that are not easily available. OP could take the drive to a company that specialises in data recovery. If (s)he has done little or no work on the reformatted machine, most of the data should be fairly easy to recover, ie, relatively cheap.

OP will have to decide whether lost data is worth the cost of recovery.

OP's tale of woe is a common one, and illustrates the fact that computers still require knowledge and skill to operate safely and reliably, no matter how pretty and user interface looks.
.

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