It’s a disaster when losing data from your computer, cameras, memory cards and smart phones. All the precious memory, like videos and pictures, as well as important documents disappear right away. I’m not trying to scare you. It’s the fact. Any computer system errors, hard drive formatting, hardware failure, virus attack can cause data loss from computer and devices. Luckily, when facing this situation, there are still workarounds to recover the deleted files. And some ways are free. Let’s explore them.
1. Check out recycle bin/recently deleted folder
For computers, no matter Windows PC or Mac, there is recycle bin. All the deleted files are put to the recycle bin temporarily. If you do not empty it, then the deleted files will be saved there for at least a month and available to be restored. You just need to open the recycle bin on your computer > find the needed files > select them and click “Restore”. After then, you can check them in the folder where they were originally.
For smartphones or cameras, you can also check out whether is a “Recently Deleted” album on the device. It is the place to save deleted photos and videos. Just like computer recycle bin, if you haven’t emptied them, you can select the previous deleted photos and videos, restore them to the device again.
2. Check out backup file on computer
A backup file is very important to keeping your computer working. Windows PC has built-in Restore Point feature and macOS has Time Machine backup feature. If you have backed up your computer regularly with the computer operating system built-in feature or enabled the automatic backup feature, then you can restore the deleted files from the backup.
For Windows PC:
- Type in “create a restore point” in the search box at the bottom left and click “System Restore”.
- Find the one you need from the System Restore Point list and click Next.
- Carry out the restore process and finish it.
- Restart your computer and you will see the previous version of the system, which contains the previous deleted files there.
For Mac:
- Click System Preferences in the Apple Menu, and choose Time Machine.
- Check the box next to Show Time Machine in menu bar.
- Click it and then click Enter Time Machine.
- Check out the backed-up files there by time line.
- Select needed files and click “Restore”.
3. Make use of free data recovery software to recover deleted files from computer and devices
If you can’t find the deleted files anywhere on your computer and devices, and there is no backup file at all, then the only workable way must be using data recovery software to recover deleted files. And to maximize the chance to recover deleted files with free data recovery, you must follow the right steps and tips.
Important thing first, stopping use the partition or device where deleted files were. Any further operation on the partition or device will cause data deleted permanently. All the deleted files are there, but physically inaccessible and marked as useless files. When new data is written in, then the deleted files will be replaced by new data, causing data loss permanently.
Use a professional data recovery. Luckily, there are some freeware tools available on the internet and they’re good enough to help you recover deleted files from computer and devices. iBeesoft Free Data Recovery is one of them. It’s able to recover deleted files from Windows PC, USB flash drives, SSD, HDD, memory cards, and more. Besides, it’s able to repair corrupted videos, pictures, and documents. Here are the steps for how to use to recover deleted files from computer and devices.
- Connect the device with your computer if it is an external hard drive for your computer.
- Download and install the free data recovery software on your computer. After then, launch it.
- In the first window, hover your mouse over the partition and device list. Click “Scan” button beside the one where you have deleted files.
- Wait for the scanning process to finish. After then, you can open and preview the recoverable files.
- Select needed files and click “Recover” to save them to a new location on your partition or device.
That’s it! It’s very simple, easy, and efficient to recover deleted files from computer and devices with the free data recovery software.
Summary
Whenever files are deleted accidentally from your computer and devices, calm down and try the useful ways to retrieve them. First, check the device itself. Next, look for backup file. And last, try free data recovery software to recover deleted files. The sooner the better result you will get. There is a data recovery success rate for data recovery. If you do not want to lose any data when an incident happens, the best way is to make a backup of the important files. Regular backup is the best.