Windows

I hope that after formatting the HD you didn't write anything to it!
There is a command call unformat that my just save the day.
I couldn't tell you for sure if it's a DOS command, but I know that Norton Systemworks from Symantec and you can download a copy for trial and the license is 60.00.

However, chech the DOS diskettes first for this command, otherwise www.symantec.com
Unformat is the command!

Good Luck!

Assuming all you have done was just formatted the drive and did not copy anything else onto it yet - a program by powerquest called "LOST And FOUND" may also help. Thier website is www.powerquest.com!

Good luck!

Since it was formatted and the OS re-installed. NOPE not worth the money to even send out to a 3rd part to do. Create this person a Home Directory on the network and map them to it so when they are on the netwrok or VPNed into you they can up therefiles to the folder which is backed up on a regular basis.

From what I read data forenics experts can retrieve data off a hard drive even if it has been formatted up to seven times. By shipping it to a professional recovery firm you have a real excellent chance of recovering the data, the question is it worth the cost!

If you do not want to sent it out, you may want to check out this freeware package at the following URL:

http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10096-100-**0638.html?tag=st.dl.10001_103_1.lst.td

I have successfully used the Revival software several times to recover data, albiet never on a reformatted drive. Lost and Found from Powerquest is also decent, I believe you can download a trial version to see if you can recover the file, it does not actually recover the file untilyou purchase it. There are other file recovery software packages out there, my recommendation is try Revival and the Lost and Found trial version and see what happens.

If that does not work, I would contact two or three data recovery firms such as Ontrack at the f

I'm going to go against the grain here and say..."you're sol" on this one. Although there are utilities to recover file, I believe when you format, the file allocation table is cleared completely, so even though the data *may* reside somewhere on the HD, you can spend months trying to pry every piece of data off of it. While undelete and unformat will work on floppies, I don't beleive they will work with HDs.

The best advice was the guy who said to send it to a professional service, but that costs some $$$ nor is that a guarantee

what I do is ask these guys what kind of files they need, doc, xls, whatever the app and then do a xcopy /s *.doc <destination>, that way, if they forgot to tell me about something I can spread the blame alittle back to them :)

It's an unfortunate situation you're in and I hope it all works out for you. Good luck to you

Mark