Recovering files from old HDD

[starmage21]

So i've got this old IDE hard drive that has my wife's resume on it, and she needs it. I plug it into the only machine we've got left in the house that even has IDE support and try to boot to it. No bones, windows wont boot, even to safe mode. So I boot up to the regular SATA drive and claim ownership of the files on my D drive (the IDE HDD that I plugged in) using the security console. Now I cant even see the files that were supposed to be there except for a few hyperlinks.

Running an EASUS file recovery tool shows that the files (namely the woman's resume) are not deleted from the HDD, so where the heck did those old files go, and how does I get em back?

For the record, the machine that the IDE drive is plugged into is a P4 machine with 2GB of RAM and WINXP w/ SP3. The old HDD has WINXP w/ SP1 on it, last used in June of '04.

 

[starmage21]

As per your suggestion I have downloaded and tried to use Recuva. I used the option to scan for undeleted files as well as securely overwritten ones and was unable to find the files that I am looking for.

I have noticed that in the old user files, the recent items folder links to many documents that it claims no longer exist. Could these files have been lost when I claimed ownership of the main user file folder and all child objects?

 

[Ijack]

Not much use to you, I'm afraid, but advice to anyone attempting any sort of hard-disk recovery. If at all possible, use some cloning software to make an exact copy of the drive or partition before starting to work on it (and then work on the clone). This has saved me many headaches ever since the days of floppies.

 

[starmage21]

I appreciate the help Gentlemen.

 

[aford10]

Claiming ownership of the files shouldn't do anything except change the security rights of the file. It should still be there.

I would suggest removing the SATA drive. Make the IDE drive the master. Boot off your OS disc, and try to repair your windows install. That may be all you need to boot off the drive.

 

[starmage21]

thats exactly what I did to finally get it to boot up. I couldnt find any files, so at this point im assuming that the wifey remembered wrong and cleaned up all her files before ceasing to use the old 'puter

 

[aford10]

thats exactly what I did to finally get it to boot up. I couldnt find any files, so at this point im assuming that the wifey remembered wrong and cleaned up all her files before ceasing to use the old 'puter

Never tell the woman she was wrong though ...... :lol:

 

[saint19]

Try with active file recovery. Few moths ago i use this with HDD 500GB, 120GB and 80GB and was really great for recover all the files (documents, movies, games, programs...)