How to easily recover files deleted from your PC

By , 30 October 2015 at 15:30
How to easily recover files deleted from your PC
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How to easily recover files deleted from your PC

By , 30 October 2015 at 15:30

We explain step by step how to use a simple free tool to retrieve files you have accidentally deleted.

We recently recommended ten essential applications for Windows 10, one of which was Recuva. This is a free tool for recovering deleted files. It works within the system, on external hard drives and even on an MP3 player, smart phone or USB flash drive. It can do this because when you delete a file, it does not really disappear completely until it is overwritten by other data in the sector occupied on the disk.

So, if you delete something by accident and it is not in the recycle bin or you lose a file and you are sure you saved it somewhere, this tool can be of great help.

Run the program and tell it what kind of files you would like to recover. The more specific you are, the faster the process will be.

Recovering files with Recuva

Before you start retrieving files, it is important to bear two things in mind:

  1. The first is that you should stop using the computer immediately in order to avoid writing information over what you want to recover. For the same reason, it is important for you to have previously installed Recuva, but if you haven’t done so you can still try.
  2. The second is that if the file you have deleted is on the computer’s hard drive, the best thing to do to increase the likelihood of recovering it is to take out the disk and connect it to another PC. If this is not possible, you can still try. If the files have been deleted from a portable device such as a flash drive, don’t use it until you recover what has been deleted.

Preferably install Recuva from another computer and save it on a flash drive. Try not to download the application onto your hard drive because you will run the risk of permanently deleting the files you want to retrieve.

When it’s time to decide on the target directory where Recuva is to be installed, choose the external device where you downloaded it and not your disk with the lost files. If you want you can create a folder on the flash drive in which to store the installation.

Run the program and tell it what kind of files you would like to recover. The more specific you are, the faster the process will be. If you are just looking for a document, there is no need to tick, for example, photos or music files. It is better to know what you want to recover to make the process shorter, but if you have deleted several kinds of files, you should choose the first option.

In the next step, the wizard will ask you where the files were saved. You can tell it you are not sure, that they were on a removable drive, in My Documents, in the recycle bin or on a CD or DVD or you can indicate the specific route if you know it.

If you delete something by accident and it is not in the recycle bin – this tool can be of great help.

You can perform a thorough scan, something which will be necessary if you have used another application to recover the files and did not get anywhere or if you have already done a couple of quick searches with Recuva and you haven’t found what you wanted. If you tick this box the process will take longer.

The program will begin the search and, when it ends, a window will appear with a list of all the files it has found with the characteristics you indicated. A green, red or yellow icon will be displayed on the left of each file. These colours indicate the status of the file; red stands for a file which is too badly damaged to recover and green stands for a file which can be easily recovered. Yellow stands for a status somewhere between the two.

Tick the boxes of the files you want to recover and click on “Recover” in the bottom-right hand corner of the screen. At this point you will be asked which directory you want to store them in and you will have to choose the external storage device you are using again. On completion of the recovery the program will display a window indicating that the process has been completed and tell you how many files have been recovered.

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