OTG Flash Drive shows files with 0 bytes

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syabilng

syabilng

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Jan 6, 2014
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Hello everyone, I am desperate and in need of help in any way possible.

I went for a company trip and couldn't bring my camera along so I had to record nice moments with my colleagues using my Samsung Galaxy S6, which turned out very nice. However, since I was recording QHD quality, space started to fill up fast until I had 100MB over left in my storage. Didn't want to delete anything because I thought everything was nice. Yes, I deleted the ones I didn't want/like.

So, I went to the local gadget store and got a OTG flash drive which looked like this. What I wasn't aware of was it came with SanDisk branding on the box and the drive itself but when I tried looking for the model on the website, it wasn't there. I was desperate so I plugged in, selected a few video files and moved them into the flash drive. When I wanted to show a friend the video, I could easily hook it up to his phone and could play back on the phone. Not sure if this is the cause but he did not unmount the drive before pulling it out. Next day, I could still transfer files into the drive.

Now, when I got back and checked, drive showed 100% free space, footages were all there but all with 0 bytes, and I panicked. Example I knew the last thing I want to do is format the drive. I tried Recuva, iCare Data recover softwares but only showed empty files and folders.

Please help because I'm losing a lot here. Job depends on the video.

Thanks.
 
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Shaun o

Shaun o

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Oct 7, 2007
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Did your phone say the Sandisk needed to be formatted before you started to transfer files to it ?

You should always unmount any kind of flash medium before you remove it from your phone.
The way flash memory works is to erase data it sends a higher voltage the the nand flash memory chip to erase it.

If you pull the Flash device out of a phone before you unmount it there is a potential that a surge of current by doing so can wipe of corrupt the data stored on the Nand flash chip of the device.

Have you tried just plugging it into a pc right clicking on the drive and going to properties.
And scanning the flash drive for errors and windows trying to fix the file structure that way ?

Right click on the usb flash drive.
Select properties.
Select the tools tab

Select check now.

 
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syabilng

syabilng

Honorable
Jan 6, 2014
12
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10,510


Hi Shaun, thanks for the reply.

No, my phone did not say or prompt that the Sandisk needed to be formatted.

Yes, when I got back and tried on the PC it shows 0 bytes. On the phone same thing. Yes, I've tried scanning the dirve for errors using the method you mentioned.

Been looking around and someone said to reformat and run Recuva or iCare again. But I can't risk formatting for now.
 
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Solandri

Solandri

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Jan 4, 2012
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It's unfortunate that you had to learn it this way, but Shaun o is correct. Removing a drive (flash or HDDs) without first unmounting it can cause problems like this.

For future reference, if you have a Google account (you do if you signed in to Google on your Android phone), it includes unlimited free cloud backup of your photos up to 2048x2048, and videos up to 2 GB. You just have to install the Google Photos app and turn it on. If the photos are larger, you can either have them automatically downsized, or store them in their original resolution and have the space count against the 15GB Google gives you for free. There are options to backup immediately over your data plan, or over wifi next time you have a wifi connection.

https://support.google.com/photos/answer/6193313?rd=1&co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid&oco=1
 
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syabilng

syabilng

Honorable
Jan 6, 2014
12
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10,510


I didn't like Google Photos and turned on Dropbox instead. However, the footages I took were 16GB in size and on the island I don't think there's good connection for a 16GB sync.

Is there any other way I can look at to recovering my files? Or can someone confirm that it's 100% gone?
 
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