"Location is not available" message. Flash drive not being found.

Hi, I'm trying to recover many jpeg images using Recuva from a problematic flash drive. I'm hitting a snag very early in the Recuva Wizard though and receive this message when I check E:// from the "Browse for Folder" tab : E:/ is not accessible. The volume does not contain a recognized file system. Please make sure that all required file system drivers are loaded and that the volume is not corrupted.

I would really appreciate help with this and am pretty much a beginner at data recovery. Thanks in advance!

it sounds like the flash drive is so damaged that your PC cannot even recognise it.

which would make using Recuva a non-starter right off the bat.

to double check that, have you tried different USB ports, different PC's and if possible Linux instead of Windows?

Yeh, you can try working with linux tools. There's a kind of partition tool (g-parted) on hiren's boot cd that might recognize the partition. See if it is recognized by that. G-parted is also available as standalone. This is all freeware material.

Otherwise, I'm afraid your only route is going to be pro-level service.

I tend to think of Recuva as the Big Daddy of undelete software. It requires the hardware be in good shape and that you have a disk that can be recognized and mounted.

The big guns in data recovery software are very costly tools, and they have a lot of manual settings to work with. Not beginner's material by any stretch of the imagination.