How do you fix a corrupt file?

MidnightQueen

Hi ya. I have a huge problem. I'm using a memory stick at the moment and it holds most of my college projects. I cant open most of them because they are corrupt. How can i fix this problem? Most of these projects have to be in before the end of this week by the way. Just not my day. Please please help!!

Mr. Presentable

Are they Word docs?

Try:
Step 1 - Open Microsoft Word
Step 2 - Click File -> Open -> and select your damaged document
Step 3 Click on the down arrow of the open button and select Open and repair

MidnightQueen

They are .jpg, .psd, .mp3, .jsp and many more. No word docs tho.

MidnightQueen

By the way i also tried using command promt to open the files but it wont work for me.

aidan_walsh

Important lesson about backups learned tonight, I reckon...

MidnightQueen

Well is suppose your right. I do have backup files but they are not up to scratch. So stupid. HELP!

stevenmu

First of all, copy off any files that you can and make sure you have good backups of them.

If most of the files are corrupt then it's probably a problem with the file allocation table on the card not with the files themselves, so it's hopefully going to be quite easy to recover them.

One way to do it is to run scandisk on the drive, right-click on it in 'My Computer', to properties, the tools tab and then error checking. This may be able to fix the problems with the file allocation table, allowing you to copy the files off.

Another way would be to download some 3rd party utility specifically designed to recover files from flash memory sticks. There's some listed here including 2 free ones near the bottom of the page, Smart Flash Recovery 2 and Smart FAT recovery 2, altough I don't know much about them so I can't say if they're any good or not. Others may be able to recommend some better known, more reliable ones.

The biggest worry is that running one or the other may not recover the files and may prevent the other option from working too, altough it's not very likely. I don't really want to recommend one course over the other in case that happens, but if it was me I'd go with scandisk first and then both the free utils above (probably Smart FAT Recovery 2 first). It's probably best to try and wait a bit to see if any one else spots something stupid in what I've said.

If you do get them back, you consider the memory stick to be little more than junk, only keep trivial unimportant things on it, or for convenience to hold files that you definitly have good backups of. Actually that's how you should treat any memory stick really, they can't be relied on to keep data secure, always have backup copies.

Good Luck

MidnightQueen

Thanks for that, but the computer i'm working on has Administrator priveledges on it. *Colleges - shakes fist. I'll try it out when i get home on my laptop. Thanks agin.

SouperComputer

One way to do it is to run scandisk on the drive, right-click on it in 'My Computer', to properties, the tools tab and then error checking. This may be able to fix the problems with the file allocation table, allowing you to copy the files off.

IMO this is a big mistake. If data loss\corruption occurs, the worst thing to do is to write to the media. Unless of course you take an image of the entire flash drive first!

Use the above software to scan for files, DO NOT WRITE TO THE DRIVE!