Actually, the actual file is never modified by the delete process, only the
pointer to the file kept in the file system's tables. When you delete
something, it is not truely gone until another file overwrites the
leftovers. The operating system just forgets where it put it (by killing the
entry in the file system index). As for the rest of the advice on using
another machine to do the recovery, that is sound practice. A USB adapter to
convert your IDE drive makes the process that much simpler, as you only need
to remove it from one frame and plug it into the other machine's USB port
using the adapter, rather than opening a second case and having to mess with
drive jumpers and the like. I keep just such an adapter in my toolkit just
in case, and it only set me back about $30. Mine also works on SATA and
notebook IDE drives, too. Only drawback is that it doesn't protect the drive
like a USB drive enclosure would.

-----Original Message-----
From: Personal Computer Hardware discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Paul Hachmeyer
Sent: Monday, November 05, 2007 2:39 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCBUILD] how can I Retrive ...


If this relates to the recovery of a deleted file, windows doesn't
actually delete files.  Trying not to be too technical, a file that has
been deleted simply has a small electronic bit of it changed to say that
it is deleted - windows sets the delete flag 'on'.  By doing that,
windows now makes the space available for use by another document,
program or something else, when it will eventually write over the
previous data or file.
Depending on how important the file is that is lost, the best option is
to use another computer to access the drive containing the file and
attempt to recover or 'undelete' the file.  If you install a program on
the same hard drive, you run some risk of overwriting the file with the
new program.  By running a program, you run the risk of writing the
output from that program to the old file space.
So, if you have access to the computer through another computer on a
network, install a recovery program on the 2nd computer.  You may also
be able to remove the hard drive and install it as a slave drive in a
second computer, installing recovery software on the second computer's
primary drive.  In both cases, it's best to try to write the recovered
file onto a different drive (even a usb drive) to make sure you got back
the missing file completely before you risk writing over it on the
original drive.
Paul Hachmeyer


[log in to unmask] wrote:

>I would be interested to know what happens if one only has one drive.
>
>Dorothy Jones
>
>

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