Deleted Music Files

[devans00]

I've had CCleaner installed on my home XP computer for several version and over a year and I never problems, so I installed and ran Version 1.26.218 on my work computer. Unfortunately, CCleaner deleted about 12 GB of music files from my work computer and I am not having much success in recovering the files.

 

Both at home and work, my music folder is located C:\Temp\My Music. I don't understand why my files would be deleted on one computer and not the other. Obviously, I never would have run CCleaner if I knew it was going to destroy hours and days worth of work. Plus the inconvenience of not being able to use my files.

 

The music files were MP3 Audio files accessible by both Windows Media Player and Real Music Player.

 

Any suggestions on how I can recover the lost files. I already tried Restoration 2.5.14 but it only found about 13 of the 1250+ files that have disappeared.

 

Thanks,

Debra

[Andavari]

I can understand your frustration and know you're probably upset about loosing so many audio files, however the answer is very simple and has been recently dicussed:

DO NOT store any important files in the Temp folders on any Windows-based computer. It's not a CCleaner bug, the program was doing what it's designed to do, remove temporary files.

 

CCleaner deletes the contents of the mapped Temp folder on a system, you can find out via a Command Prompt where your mapped Temp folder is by typing in CD %TEMP% however storing any important files in any Temp folder is very high-risk since many disk cleaning utilities will empty out Temp folders, even the built-in Windows Disk Cleanup can delete those contents.

 

In the future it's important to utilize safer locations for your important files and documents, such as the My Documents folder and regularly create backups of your important files when you've made additions or changes and backup those files onto removable media such as CD-R/-RW, DVD-R/+R/-RW/+RW, Memory Stick, or even another hard disk or hard disk partition.

[Tarun]

Since Windows ME, there has been a My Music folder in My Documents. Andavari is 100% correct and I support everything he has said.

[devans00]

CCleaner deletes the contents of the mapped Temp folder on a system, you can find out via a Command Prompt where your mapped Temp folder is by typing in CD %TEMP% however storing any important files in any Temp folder is very high-risk since many disk cleaning utilities will empty out Temp folders, even the built-in Windows Disk Cleanup can delete those contents.

 

Hmmm, I'm assuming I have a different configuration for my system TEMP folder on my home computer. Since I never had this problem before.

 

I will check to see how to change that.

[mina]

Hmmm, I'm assuming I have a different configuration for my system TEMP folder on my home computer.  Since I never had this problem before.

 

I will check to see how to change that.

 

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Hi, you can use data recovery programmes like RECOVER MY files if you want to find lost files. My computer crashed recently and I had lost everything (including 330 songs I had). With a data recovery programme I was able to retrieve at least 150 songs. I don't know if that could help you.

[Ultimate Predator]

TuneUp Utilities 2006 has an app in it that is good at restoring stuff, its only a trial program but give it a go: http://www.tune-up.com/download/tu2006/

[Eldmannen]

Sorry for all your lost files, if I lost 12 gigabyte of files I would be pissed too.

 

And dont want to insult you, but really only an idiot would store files in a temp directory.

[lokoike]

And dont want to insult you, but really only an idiot would store files in a temp directory.

 

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Well, I wouldn't say an idiot; more just someone who is ignorant about how CCleaner works. While storing music in the temp folder is a bit odd (since Windows comes with a My Music folder for that very purpose), it isn't necessarily a given that CCleaner would delete one's files from temp. And Windows doesn't really give you any warning when you manually save a file in the temp folder.

 

You can try recovering your files with PC Inspector File Recovery 4.0. It is one of the only free file recovery apps I know of. Just make sure that you save the recovered files to an external hard drive or flash ROM stick.

[Andavari]

Hi, you can use data recovery programmes like RECOVER MY files if you want to find lost files.

 

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It may be worth a try to get a few files back. However the length of time of the original post 12/27/2005 suggests it's a bit long time-wise for such an attempt when considering how much file saving goes on in a modern Windows PC, even worse if Defrag was used all could be lost.

[Ultimate Predator]

That is indeed true, and s shame if it is. Let it be a lesson to you devans00 to never store anything in temp mode unless needed to.

[levin6481]

Some Data Erasing/cleaner utilities permanently erase the data by overwriting the data by using certain Data Sanitization Standards. Once the data gets overwritten it becomes highly impossible by any Data Recovery Software or Data Recovery Services to recover them.

 

Anyways, try your luck by using Digital Media Recovery Software.

 

________________

Levin

iPod Recovery

[Augeas]

I guess the original poster has either found an answer, got over his loss, or died of old age by now. I also guess that nobody bothers to take backups these days. Yes, it's boring, but it would eradicate not only half the cries for help here, but the time wasted by others trying to help the feckless.