No doubt there will come a time when you accidentally delete or ‘lose’ a file that is really important to you, and of course you will want to know about FAT32 data recovery. Therefore you need to know what steps you should take in order to try and do so, otherwise you could do something foolish and lose your files completely, forever!
FAT32 is a very common system of filing, used by all Windows users up to and including Windows XP. Although now it is losing popularity to the NTFS system, one plus point of FAT32 is that recovering lost or deleted files is often fairly straightforward to do.
Like many people, you probably won’t have the first clue about FAT32 data recovery or what to do in the event that your data is accidently deleted. The first thing you should do is follow these steps:
Step-by-step FAT32 Data Recovery
- Check that the file has really been deleted. You can start by double checking in the folder where the file was supposed to be, and then you can go through other common folders it might have been moved into, such as desktop, my documents and so on. Then you can use the search function in the ‘Start’ menu and enter the file name there to see if it shows up anywhere on your hard drive.
- Next, check the recycle bin. The file may well be in there if it has been deleted recently. You can sort the files out by date and then check, from most recent until later on. Usually, most recycle bins permanently delete files after 30 days. If you are lucky and spot your missing file, it’s very easy to restore it – right click on it and select ‘restore file’, and it will be automatically returned to its old folder.
- If you can’t find the file in the recycle bin, you might want to try using some free recovery software, of which there are many kinds available online. Whatever program you decide to use, make sure you choose the version for FAT32 data recovery, not NTFS. Essentially, most of these programs work in the same way. Install the software, run the program and then you can direct it to the folder or hard drive where the file last was. Select “search” and you should then be able to browse through recovered files that used to be in that folder and find the one you are looking for. If it turns up, again just right click and select ‘restore’ and it should return to the folder it was in before.
- Still no luck? Then you can always try ‘System Restore’. If you are using Windows, then there is a useful little tool that lets you return your computer to a previous state that it was in, back in time. Select a date not too far in the past; though make sure the date is before the time that you lost your file. Hopefully, after you reboot the system you should find the file restored in its old place.
- The most expensive option if none of the above work is to send your computer to a data recovery specialist and let them find it for you. However, it is only advisable to do this if you consider the file to be so important that you simply can’t live without it, as data recovery firms can sometimes charge thousands of dollars for their services.
Is it possible to recover the data myself?
If none of the above options work and you cannot afford to have a FAT32 data recovery specialist retrieve the lost files for you, it is possible to get highly technical and do it yourself, but this is not recommended unless you know what you are doing. All entries that are created within the FAT that came from the original file should still be in the file directory because it wouldn’t have been overwritten just yet. It should be possible for you to check whether any sectors that have previously had a file occupy them are marked as “used” or not in the FAT, so it might still be possible for you to recover any deleted files that are held in the FAT32.
During FAT32 data recovery, you need to make sure that there is a single uninterrupted sequence in the sectors of your disk where data is stored, so that means it can’t have been defragged. Do not attempt any defragging processes when you try to recover deleted files from the FAT32, unless you have first had the chance to look for your data. Doing this will see the chances of locating your data increase substantially.
However, it is possible that you could look forever through the vast number of FAT32 sectors on your hard drive and still not locate anything. The reason for this is that the name and appearance of your files may well have changed. Usually, the operating system will strip the identifying features deleted files, so you can’t rely on these to assist you in locating them. Therefore, if you can’t locate the files after scouring the FAT32 directory, unless you seek professional help you may have to just give the file up as lost.
