HEEEEEEEEEELP!!!!!!!!!!

[HecateHarshPants]

My USB stick. On which are all my photos, all my work, is buggered.

I don't know what happened to it. I tried to open it and it said that before I could use it, it must be formatted. Well, since I have been using it, I knew that couldn't be right! I can't retrieve anything from it.

All the children's photos. All my work! hundreds of template policies and procedures.

My cash flow forecast! I have no clue what's coming out when!

I am truly up shit creek in a concrete canoe. And I don't have nose plugs. Or a snorkel. and the people who live on the banks of the creek have constant diahorroea.

If you tell me how I can fix this, I will snog you, shag you, give you all my money, kick david cameron in the nuts or wear a placard declaring you God and walk round the streets of london ringing a big bell.

Take your pick. Just SAVE ME!!

Hopefully Network guy may see this and be able to help.Try googling Recuva ,it is a program for recovering deleted files,I have not used it but often seen it reccommended in similar situations.

What operating system are you using?

What was the last operating system you used before the time it told you it needed formatting?

The PC that had the photos on...when were they removed? And was the PC formatted or not?

Yep, DH is wrong. Stuff stored on the hard drive will not affect the speed the computer runs at, unless you hardly have any space left at all (then it struggles). What affects speed is RAM and processor, and how much these are being used. I have a handy little gadget on my desktop which informs me of this

If you want to be really clever, then install two hard drives, install all system files/program files on one and documents on another.

I never do the green arrow thing any more either

HHP - if you're out of other options then I'd be very willing to have a go. The USB stick may well be doomed (unless you have any national intelligence agencies handy) , but recovery from the PC from which they were 'deleted' is a reasonable possibility. Just shut it down and don't use it before someone has a look at it (if at all possible).

The less you use them the more recoverable they might be.

Recuva is good. I can't pm as on my phone but dh is a data recovery technician he managed to save my USB stick files once

www.piriform.com/recuva

If you pm me I will ask him tomorrow

It sounds like either the USB stick has been physically damaged or you have accidentally formated\deleted all the data. However, don't panic as you will probably be able to recover it if you use a data recovery company. You can try it yourself by downloading a usb data recovery programme as this will recover any data that has been accidentally deleted. - When you delete something it's not actually deleted but what they called marked for deletion so that it can be overwritten when you next use the stick

However, if you or you DH are not particularly IT literate or if the stick is physically damaged then you are better off sending it away to get the data recovered. It may cost up to a couple of hundred pounds. But, be very careful which company you use. I was part of a bit of a scam getting data off of a damaged hard drive. Luckily, I managed to get my £300 back (with the threat of legal action) but I lost all data on the disk including the first year of my DS. :( and I strongly suspect that the company involved actually low level formatted the disk - but that's a different story! Anyhow, this company were quite good in trying to retrieve the data that had been deleted by the dodgy company. www.datawreck.co.uk/ They will confirm whether they can retrieve the data before they charge you.

No help to you now, but as well as backing up to an external hard drive I store all my photos with photobox, & can access them whenever I need to

Recuva is good. Not sure it'd work on an unreadable memory, though?

Before you panic, Hec, (OK, too late for that) you have tried restarting your computer? Also try plugging the stick into a different USB port. This computer randomly refuses to recognise my camera, but they start 'talking' again after I've shunted the camera lead around a few different ports.

I never 'safely remove' USB sticks, either! Eeek!

Just found these:- www.cnet.com/topic-software/data-recovery/usb-flash-drive.html

What operating system are you using? - windows 7

What was the last operating system you used before the time it told you it needed formatting? Same

The PC that had the photos on...when were they removed? And was the PC formatted or not? several months ago and formatted since then? no. But, we do regular clean ups and defragments. Will that affect things? This pc is not windows 7 though, it is XP

I just downloaded that recover and tried it - it says the path does not exist.

There is a lot of personal and some very confidential business information on the disk. on reflection, I really can't risk sending it away.

It looks like I just have to accept that I have lost it.

A lot of it I can get back from other places. Even retyping from hard copies if I have to. Cashflow forecast I am currently redesigning (it's a spreadsheet with lots of formulas to carry cash forward etc) It's just the photos I am gutted about. Little toothy grins that I will never see again.

Makes me cry every time I think about it.

I tried that one too last night garlic - it couldn't retrieve it either

AHA!!!!! Heat damage! I just saw the link to the data recovery guys.

I left the usb stick in the computer for ages and when I pulled it out it was very warm. That's it, isn't it? Heat damage!

Yup, entirely possible, Hec.

Just a thought,Recuva was for the PC that once held the photos not the usb stick.

ah, I see. When I go to the office on monday I will try that. Thanks.

I dont know if it will work but its worth a try,as I said I have seen it recommended many times.

The same thing happend to my USB stick about a year ago, gave it to the IT guy at work and he sorted it!!Dont know how, but I did by a hard drive since to give me peace of mind. Good luck for Monday

Heat damage.
Here's an old-timers' trick that I've used to recover data off a dead hard disk. I have no idea whether it would work with a USB, it's not guaranteed and it is a last resort.
Pop it in a plastic bag and freeze it. Give it an hour or so, then try reading it again.
Even if it works, you will not be able to use it again afterwards.
With 'destroyed' memory, there's often only one tiny damaged sector - the part that contains info about what's on the drive.
So I would try other, less physical methods, before freezing.

Ok, doesn't sound software related then.

Best bet will be to try and recover from the PC if you can't risk confidentiality.

You can format a hard drive 7 times before data is really gone so it's possible. I have software that would go as far as to perform a raw recovery. It's very in depth but loses file names in the process. For example if it recovered photos it would relabel them as 1.jpg, 2.jpg, 3.jpg etc so you would have to relabel them if u wanted but they would be recovered.

Let me know if you are interested in doing this.

Is that software I can use at home or would it require sending the usb off?

oh sorry, I realise that's recovery from the pc not the usb. Yes. Still interested

I could send you the software but you need to be fairly technical to use it.

Alternatively you can send me the hard drive and I'll do it for you.

The software I use for data recovery is called GetDataBack. You'd need the FAT version, not the NTFS version, for a memory stick. You can download and install it and run a test before you buy to see whether or not you can recover the files from the stick.

Assuming the stick powers up and GetDataBack can view it, it'll be able to retrieve your data.