Accessing files in unallocated space of hard-drive

cash22

Hi there,
I recently left my WD harddrive in an internet cafe.....I got it back (phew!) but now all of my files seem to be hidden in a newly created unallocated space in the drive.

It is a 250gb drive, however when I go into disc management only 30gb is allocated to a drive, the remaining 220gb is unallocated space. None of my original photos/music files are in the 30gb portion, however I ran a scan of the harddrive which showed up missing photos etc so I'm assuming that my files are all in the unallocated portion of the drive.

And so my question:
Is it possible to allocate this 220gb to a drive and recover my files or will they be wiped by this process. If so, how do i get my files back. Help!

Cluster

cash22 wrote: »

Hi there,
I recently left my WD harddrive in an internet cafe.....I got it back (phew!) but now all of my files seem to be hidden in a newly created unallocated space in the drive.

It is a 250gb drive, however when I go into disc management only 30gb is allocated to a drive, the remaining 220gb is unallocated space. None of my original photos/music files are in the 30gb portion, however I ran a scan of the harddrive which showed up missing photos etc so I'm assuming that my files are all in the unallocated portion of the drive.

And so my question:
Is it possible to allocate this 220gb to a drive and recover my files or will they be wiped by this process. If so, how do i get my files back. Help!

What in the name of Christ happened it??

Thats really weird, there was tampering going on somewhere.

I'd get a rescue cd on the case and transfer all the files onto another disk before I did anything else.

cash22

I know! Very weird! There's random C drive files on the 30gb portion. I think someone was trying to mess with my head (successfully!)

So I'm not the most tech-savvy person. A rescue CD???

The problem with transferring the files is that I can't access them in the first place as there all in this unallocated limbo!

I was going try this but I'm worried that it will wipe all the files that are on the unallocated portion

MunsterCycling

Try http://www.filehippo.com/download_recuva/ it should be able to do something for you.


MC

extra-ordinary_

What was the original configuration of the drive - one partition of ~250GB?
Is there any data on the new 30GB partition?

Sounds like the 250GB partition has been deleted and a new 30GB partition created leaving the remaining space on the drive unallocated. Creating a partition in this unallocated space will further overwrite your lost data. You will need recovery software to recover the data from the unallocated space. Have a search online for 'Hirem's Boot CD' - it contains loads of support tools including a few recovery programs.

monkeypants

Sounds like someone encrypted it, just to mess with your head.

Capt'n Midnight

most likely it was removed before it was safe to do so
and the partition table took a hit

use testdisk to rebuild the partition


- always click on the icon to eject it and wait OR wait until the PC has shutdown