Major HELP CALL! Testdisk recover data

[coffee412]

Thank you first for clicking in on my message.

Because a customer of mine is inefficient in doing backups I have to do a recovery if possible. Drive had vista on it and was really bug infested to point of a reload. I reloaded vista from scratch and then my customer says "Oh, I guess I forgot to back those files up...".

Is it possible to recover some files even though vista was reloaded? I suppose the basic answer is "As long as they havent been overwritten yet".

Im running testdisk and its made a ton of directories with files in them that I assume it has recovered. Im going to have to write a script I guess to grab the files as there are about 600 directories!

I guess what Im asking is 1. What are my chances of success? 2. Has anyone ever recovered files from a vista re-install? 3. Is testdisk the best way of going about it (with photorec).

Of course, Any links to discussions of anyone recovering from a re-install of the EVIL MS System is appreciated.

I get the feeling they are toast

Thanks,

coffee

---------- Post added at 06:38 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:18 PM ----------

Seems testdisk has completed. I have been recovering a bunch of their files already. Testdisk made almost 600 directories with the data inside them. Im going to write a quick script to search and copy the important files to MY RAID and then zip em all up for customer.


Thank heaven for linux and testdisk!!!

Now I bet my customer will take backing up alot more seriously!


coffee

[bob]

Just googling a bit, there's a lot of commercial programs out there, but this guy seems to have done it himself. http://www.computing.net/answers/win...tall/8160.html Of course, he didn't say HOW he did it, just that Vista had saved a backup copy.

[coffee412]

Originally Posted by bob

Just googling a bit, there's a lot of commercial programs out there, but this guy seems to have done it himself. http://www.computing.net/answers/win...tall/8160.html Of course, he didn't say HOW he did it, just that Vista had saved a backup copy.

Thats interesting. Ill have to check it out.

Can you imagine ---> My customer has that Mosey online backup, A file server in the back room and cds/dvds but never backed this stuff up thats on a laptop!

Thanks, Ill check the link out.

coffee

[forkbomb]

Originally Posted by coffee412

Because a customer of mine is inefficient in doing backups I have to do a recovery if possible. Drive had vista on it and was really bug infested to point of a reload. I reloaded vista from scratch and then my customer says "Oh, I guess I forgot to back those files up...".

Have to? Does your contract require you to sink a bunch of man-hours into fixing your customer's failure to back things up? I mean, maybe your contract does have such wording but I for one wouldn't touch data recovery with a 10 foot pole... unless the pay was good.

1) Tell him to bug off and back up next time
2) Refer him to data recovery services
3) Try it yourself and charge him a couple hundred an hour

[coffee412]

Originally Posted by forkbomb

Have to? Does your contract require you to sink a bunch of man-hours into fixing your customer's failure to back things up? I mean, maybe your contract does have such wording but I for one wouldn't touch data recovery with a 10 foot pole... unless the pay was good.

1) Tell him to bug off and back up next time
2) Refer him to data recovery services
3) Try it yourself and charge him a couple hundred an hour

Im going with number 3

Actually, I let testdisk run and just left the room. It finished the drive in about 5 hours or so. I just came back and ta-da- their files are there.

Im kinda left holding the bag here as I didnt have them sign a form listing what they wanted backed up. I assumed (mistake ) that everything was in the users directory in vista. But this program they use uses a few seperate directories outside of the users "home" directory.

Besides, I get to learn abit about file recovery that I havent done in years

Thanks for your post,

coffee