Fix a broken hard drive by getting your files back.
Fix a broken hard drive by getting your files back.
Hi. I bought an M.2 drive that used to have a 1 TB hard disk inside and run on Windows 10. Then I put my new NVMe stick in place instead. When I ran the Windows 10 setup from the USB, the installer showed two options: the old NVMe (which had Windows) and the old HDD. I accidentally selected the wrong drive for my data and formatted it all. Now I have to go back to the original M.2 slot that still has Windows installed. In Disk Management or Mini Tool Partition Wizard, the hard disk shows up without any partitions on it. Since the drive is fine and working, I think I can recover my files with a special recovery program. Do you know any good software for this? Or do I just lose everything now? I am trying out Stellar Data Recovery, Disk Drill, Hiren's Boot CD tools, and Mini Tool Data Recovery. But Mini Tool says the drive is locked by BitLocker because it doesn't show up when I search in Control Panel or Settings. It seems weird that searching for "BitLocker" gives me nothing even though I see an option to turn it on. Thanks so much!
I've tried using Recuva before for recovery, and I got some success. There was still some messed up bits left, but most files stayed okay. That's a great reason to keep backups of all your important stuff. Big hard drives and even SSDs have gotten cheaper in the years coming.