Unable to read MFT

Recuva
1

Hello,

I have a Seagate 3 TB USB 3 drive.

I mistakingly erased files from a single directory with Windows 7.

I realised immediatly my mistake and I have made no changes to the drive yet even after a deep scan (> 12 hours) Recuva has found no files erased. Again, no changes have been made to the data on the drive except read operation. I can read the other data on the drive without problems.

When I use the wizard and indicate the location, on the drive, of the erased files, Recuva states "Unable to read MFT".

Can Recuva recover files from a large USB drive? Does anyone have an ideal of why Recuva can't manage the MFT?

Thanks in advance

What am I doing wrong?

2

If you had system restore enabled for that drive, you could try restoring back to a prior time.

Check if it is enabled first, before you proceed.

If your drive has it disabled, this option won't work.

3

Thanks for the reply...

No, no such luck.

4

External drives may start life as FAT32 for the benefit of non-Windows users

A 3 TB external drive may well be FAT32 ( I just googled to confirm that)

How is your 3 TB formatted ?

You only get MFT on a NTSC formatted drive.

Some Piriform products have difficulties with more than 2 TB NTFS

Perhaps Recuva can manage 3 TB NTFS

but if it sees 3 TB FAT32 it may present a "default" error message.

5

Temp, at the moment, I am inclined to believe that they have a problem with more than 2 TB data limit.

I concurr with Alan's belief here.

I would advise to try another free data recovery utility for now, till they can get it updated for more than 2 TB drives.

While I am not 100% certain this is the case, I am sure a mod here will correct Alan & I if we are wrong on this.