Can't recover files from a formatted USB?

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xJ3rian

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Apr 26, 2014
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Hello,

My USB had troubles being detected by my system, as it always asked to Format it before using it. As I remembered, data recovery programs could recover data. I used Recuva to try to recover data before I tried formatting it, and it couldn't detect the file system of my USB. I proceeded to format my USB key.

After formatting (Windows Quick format), I did not try to copy any files on it as it could have overwritten my previous data.

I then used Recuva again which detected my file system, however it found 0 files! Which then resulted into using other data recovery programs such as:

MiniTool Power Data Recovery
EaseUS Data Recovery
TestDisk

And none of them could recover my data! (except some files that were used for the recovering process)

The data on my USB is quite important, are there any solutions to recover my data?
 
Solution
Phillip Corcoran
It seems the pen drive is faulty, beyond rescue.

You shouldn't save important data to a pen drive anyway, and certainly not without having that data backed up somewhere else.
Pen drives are suitable for short-term storage only, like transferring data from one PC to another. They are too unreliable for anything else as you have unfortunately discovered.

When Windows keeps prompting you to format a device that's already been formatted, it's a clue that the device is faulty and you should have thrown it away there and then instead of formatting it and continuing to use it. Big mistake.
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Phillip Corcoran

Phillip Corcoran

Titan
Moderator
Sep 7, 2013
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It seems the pen drive is faulty, beyond rescue.

You shouldn't save important data to a pen drive anyway, and certainly not without having that data backed up somewhere else.
Pen drives are suitable for short-term storage only, like transferring data from one PC to another. They are too unreliable for anything else as you have unfortunately discovered.

When Windows keeps prompting you to format a device that's already been formatted, it's a clue that the device is faulty and you should have thrown it away there and then instead of formatting it and continuing to use it. Big mistake.
 
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Solution
The Original Ralph

The Original Ralph

Distinguished
Sep 14, 2011
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does that apply to external hard drives as well? I've got 3 of seagate 2 TB Backup Plus slim (laptop) external hard drives and one of them goes thru periods where it will keep flashing a small window asking me to format it (even though i formatted it initially and have nearly 1 tb of video files on it. It'll be fine for a few weeks, then start the same routine with multiple requests to format it, all the while disconnecting itself from the computer and then reconnecting

been wondering if i should RMA it to seagate for a replacment

 
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xJ3rian

Honorable
Apr 26, 2014
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10,510
I worded it wrong, sorry. It was only recently that my USB was detected, but could not show the data. I had this USB for quite a long time, and it is still working after formatting, however all my data is gone. Probably no ways to recover my data then :/
 
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sougo

sougo

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Jan 1, 2015
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bro no need to worry, though there's a thing to worry now,
let me explain it ti you, if you want to retrieve data from any hard drive or pendrive then don't format them until you recover the files,
if you have once formated it then you can't get the previous data , even with the help of recovery softwares, so as you have formated thr rescue said 0 files found
but if you have not formated then i would suggest you to use testdisk win 7.0, isobuster 3.5.0 ,find and mount pro ,ease us data recovery to use before formating, hope it will help you ^-*
 
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