Photo recovery size

[Zorro1]

I was delighted when Recuva found some deleted photos that I spent a lot of time looking for. However, when I tried to put it back into its file, it was tiny and grained up when enlarged. Am I selecting the wrong way of doing this please? Thanks.

Edited June 9, 2020 by Zorro1
Some detail got lost.

[nukecad]

From your description I would guess that Recuva has found and restored the thumbnails of the photos rather than the photo files themselves.

It's quite possible that the actual photo files have been overwritten with something else and so they can't be recovered, whereas the thumbnails which are stored elsewhere can still be recovered.

Someone more familiar with Recuva may have further insights, and maybe suggestions on how to get the actual photos if they are at all still recoverable at all.

[Zorro1]

Thank you nukecad. This seems to be a very possible answer, which looks as though I can say goodbye to a part of my life I can never get back. Amazing how many times i back stuff up and yet can still wind up with this. Thanks again.

[nukecad]

18 hours ago, Zorro1 said:

Thank you nukecad. This seems to be a very possible answer, which looks as though I can say goodbye to a part of my life I can never get back. Amazing how many times i back stuff up and yet can still wind up with this. Thanks again.

You had deleted your backups as well?

I may be overcautious but I make at least 2 backups of important stuff to different removable drives.
A backup drive can fail just like any other drive.

If It's really important then I'll give one copy to a trusted friend to keep for me, so whatever happens at home there is still a safe copy.
These days it's easy to have your stuff backed up 'off site', everyone from banks, to your email provider, to your browser, is offering cloud storage often for free. (If you trust then not to be hacked that is).