From the makers of CCleaner... Recuva

[Lashiec]

Since the inception and great success of CCleaner, the developers of this piece of software founded a small company, Piriform, to take advantage of the success of its first application, and the development of new tools. Well, here's the first one. Recuva in words of its developers:

Recuva (pronounced "recover") is a freeware utility to restore files that have been accidentally deleted from your computer. This includes files emptied from the Windows Recycle bin as well as images and other files that have been deleted by user error from digital camera memory cards or MP3 players. It will even bring back files that have been deleted by bugs, crashes and viruses!

Lazy guy as I am (and curiously "PrintScreen" is not working...) I can't link any image, but in its web page you can find some shots. It's very much like CCleaner visual style, which, in my opinion, is a good thing.

[ed. by mouser to attach screenshot]

[Curt]

I performed a very short mini test on this app, and compared it to Undelete PLUS

Undelete PLUS would use 25 minutes to scan my PC

- now hold on to your hat:

Recuva Beta 1 would use 52 seconds to do the same!

- Undelete PLUS found 9839 files - Recuva Beta 1: 9802

Other that that, you can tell that Undelete Plus is version 2.5.2 - it is far more finished and userfriendly, and comes with a user interface in 24 languages. If that is enough to waith another 24 minutes is up to the user. I would think that for both programs there has to be a better 'undelete' program somewhere out there...

[Curt]

I should add that the Recuva scan will 'transfer' some time critical operations into the processing phase (filling State, or Status Column, etc.), and will give a lot less informations on the result, than Undelete PLUS - thereby saving scanning time.

But of course Recuva is still a lot faster. I'll hope their next version will give a hole lot more info on the scanning. Undelete PLUS is a fine example on relevant info.

I wrote the author of Undelete Plus, but he has so far been more keen on finding faults in Recuva, than speeding up his baby's scanning time. But time will show.

Ads by google on 'file recovery'.

[Curt]

 

I've got mail:

>>Hello Curt,

Thanks a lot!!!!!

We found the way to increase speed at least twice. New version 2.53 will be
ready at Monday. It will also support compressed and sparse files and
some FAT32 bags will be fixed.

support at undelete-plus.com<<

 

[Lashiec]

Thanks for the screenshot, mouser.

52 seconds??!! That's AMAZING! I mean, the program I'm using right now (TuneUp Utilities bundled undelete utility) takes at least 3 times that time, but the level of accuracy (both in number of results, and the integrity of these results) is very low. I want a new computer NOW, to test the program. It seems more impressive than PhotoRec, a command line program which I tested a few months ago and amazed me with its thoroughness. It recovered files deleted ages ago, some embarrassing ones as well

[TucknDar]

Must say I'm very impressed by Recuva. Found ancient deleted files even on my USB pen drive. An only in seconds!

Will be just as valuable as CCleaner!

[Nighted]

Handy Recovery....best file recovery program EVER!!!!!!!!!!

www.handyrecovery.com

I'll be checking out this Recuva thing though. I've been using CCleaner since the day I first installed it.

[f0dder]

The recovery software that has worked best for me to date is RunTime GetDataBack. It's extremely slow, but has given me ~99% recovery the couple times I've had filesystem crashes.

[Curt]

Another fast recovery program is the free Restoration Version 2.5.14 (from Snapfiles) - not as fast as Recuva, but fast anyway: 3 minutes to scan my PC.

Restoration has one clever feature which the other recovery tools mentioned on this thread are missing: it will offer to delete all unrecoverable files found. I clicked 'yes' and was relieved of 10,000 files!

[f0dder]

Restoration has one clever feature which the other recovery tools mentioned on this thread are missing: it will offer to delete all unrecoverable files found. I clicked 'yes' and was relieved of 10,000 files!

-Curt (January 24, 2007, 09:57 AM)

You weren't "relieve of 10,000 files" - you just made 10,000 files even more unrecoverable

I also don't see the point of speed++ in a recovery app, surely the most important feature must be the ability to actually recover stuff? I somehow doubt that the superfast tools are as thorough as the ones that do a full sector-based scan of your disk.

[Curt]

Yes, you're right.

- as I wrote in my first post:

- Undelete PLUS found 9839 files - Recuva Beta 1: 9802

-Curt (January 19, 2007, 07:39 PM)

But you sure made a point - well, THE point:

I also don't see the point of speed++ in a recovery app, surely the most important feature must be the ability to actually recover stuff? I somehow doubt that the superfast tools are as thorough as the ones that do a full sector-based scan of your disk.

-f0dder (January 24, 2007, 10:08 AM)

I followed the link from Lashiec and used PhotoRec, a command line program that will do "full sector-based scan of your disk." This little app is out off this world! After one hour the program stopped, having scanned only 15% (expected full scan of my 38 GB: 8 hours)(I should add that it will scan and recover in one and the same process). Why did it stop scanning and recovering after only 15%??  Because my harddisk ran out of free space! 1.5 GB had been recovered. 1½ GIGA - with only 15% scanned!!!

Before anyone gets all exited, I should add that 99.9% recovered files were text files you would not care to recover.

It also recovered 195 small mp3 files (sounds) and 300 small pictures, but why would I want to recover 60,000 text files? No, thank you! Sixty thousands text files, with only 15% scanned. Talk of a undelete program!

[f0dder]

Hm, scan and recover in one go sounds like a bad idea - specifically when recovering, you'll always want to recover to ANOTHER partition, so the act of recovering a file doesn't reduce the chance of recovering another.

This is tricky stuff to get right

[Nighted]

I agree...slow scan. I recently deleted a partition by accident. many gigs of little software apps and source code that took years to accumulate. I wouldn't want to risk losing anything for any speed trade off.

Anyway, if you ever DO delete a partion, remove that disc ASAP and salvage it from another machine if you can. I got every single file back.

[masu]

Recuva 1.03 Final is out now 

[Lashiec]

Yep, thanks for the heads up. I'll modify the topic title accordingly.