Recover if FileSize became Zero

[vn8su]

Hi everyone,

As soon as this is my first post | would like to congratulate Piriform for the great utilities and the continuous effort to improve them.

 

So some basic information about the case:

Hard disk Western Digital 500GB Formated as Primary NTFS Single Partition under Windows XP No OS is installed on this drive.

 

As you probably read from the Topic Title some files on my hard disk went zero size.

The problem applied on several file types including .avi, .wmv, .jpg, .xml. As far as this hard drive is used for storing these kind of files I suppose it affected all file types without exclusion.

The files appear normally at Windows Explores The right filenames and folder structure exists.

Also files affected independently the file modification date or any other characteristic as I can understand.

So the problem Is that The files are not deleted and as i found from Recuva they do not have cluster or header information ether.

The weird thing also is that using Recuva to recover a video file the file name did not match the content of the file!

 

Probably Causes

#1: Virus, but only if the virus could affect special part of the disk and ignore other characteristics.

#2: (Mostly Valid I think) During Defragment process using Paragon HDM 2008 Boot-Disk the proses stooped for several hours so I had to perform reset!

#3: My drive was bewitched (maybe in an other universe!)

 

So no progress has been made using CheckDisk or other commercial recovery software.

 

I tried to describe the problem briefly If there are more information that is needed please ask me.

Any help would be helpful because I have not yet identified the type of the problem so I can search for solution,

I did not found similar case on Google and I am wondering how common is that.

 

Thank you

[davey]

Probably Causes

#1: Virus, but only if the virus could affect special part of the disk and ignore other characteristics.

#2: (Mostly Valid I think) During Defragment process using Paragon HDM 2008 Boot-Disk the proses stooped for several hours so I had to perform reset!

#3: My drive was bewitched (maybe in an other universe!)

Thank you

Hello vn8su,

Welcome to the Piriform Forums !!!

I agree with your list but I would have reversed the order.

I am not an experienced user of Recuva in all it's various uses. However, it does have many options and features.

When you get to the main screen, I suggest that you check out these.

Don't forget to read all the Important Topics at the top of the Recuva Discussion forum like this one.

http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=14299

Good luck, davey

P.S. When the occasion occurs to "reset or reformat" anything, I usually have a smoke and a large mug of coffee and I review every setting there is. Luckily I have learned by reading other users mistakes on this forum. You definitely are not the first to "reset" or "reformat" one drive when you meant the other. Please do the same when it comes time to "recuva" your data.

Edited December 9, 2008 by davey

[Augeas]

I'm not quite sure what you are saying. Are you saying that live (undeleted) files have suddenly changed to zero length? Which files have been deleted, if any? If they are not deleted, as you say, are you using Recuva to show undeleted files to get the header info? Does Recuva say the files are zero length? What did you recover with Recuva, a deleted or undeleted file?

 

The only help I can give at the mo is that If a deleted file has been overwritten then Recuva will recover the data that's overwriting it, so that you may get back contents that don't match the file name. Filesize going to zero? Beats me (but option 2 is where the money goes).

[vn8su]

Hello vn8su,

Welcome to the Piriform Forums !!!

I agree with your list but I would have reversed the order.

I am not an experienced user of Recuva in all it's various uses. However, it does have many options and features.

When you get to the main screen, I suggest that you check out these.

Don't forget to read all the Important Topics at the top of the Recuva Discussion forum like this one.

http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=14299

Good luck, davey

P.S. When the occasion occurs to "reset or reformat" anything, I usually have a smoke and a large mug of coffee and I review every setting there is. Luckily I have learned by reading other users mistakes on this forum. You definitely are not the first to "reset" or "reformat" one drive when you meant the other. Please do the same when it comes time to "recuva" your data.

 

Thank you Davey for your interest.

I've already performed an advanced search but I had no results till now.

[vn8su]

I'm not quite sure what you are saying. 1) Are you saying that live (undeleted) files have suddenly changed to zero length? 2) Which files have been deleted, if any? 3) If they are not deleted, as you say, are you using Recuva to show undeleted files to get the header info? 4) Does Recuva say the files are zero length? 5) What did you recover with Recuva, a deleted or undeleted file?

 

The only help I can give at the mo is that If a deleted file has been overwritten then Recuva will recover the data that's overwriting it, so that you may get back contents that don't match the file name. Filesize going to zero? Beats me (but option 2 is where the money goes).

 

Ok!

Thanks Augeas for your reply.

1) Yes (but "suddenly" because of an unwanted reason)

2) None of the File were deleted as entry, only the contents of the files (about 10GB degrease of occupied disk)

3) Yes I have used recuva to get header info. Header info is empty!

4) Yes they are zero length with no cluster start point

5) Tried first to recover undeleted files but they were recovered zero size too. The same happened when deleted a file of those.

[Augeas]

Now I see what you mean! The only thing I can suggest is to try a deep scan (if you haven't already under 'advanced search'). This will probably take the best part of half a day on a 500gb disk. When, and if, it's done then be very careful with the Recuva window, it's all too easy to close/lose that window and all 12 hrs work will have gone. You can sort the results by folder, filename, size etc so you can recover, with Recuva, what you want to say a flash drive or your primary drive. Good luck!