How to get files back from Found folder in Vista?

Question

A friend of mine lost all of her pictures, when she connected her camera to the pc, that runs Vista. It said, that the files are now in the Found folder. Could anyone point to a solution how to get those pics back, or where the folder is located?

Thanks!

Answer 1

The disk check (chkdsk) Found folders (usually similar to "FOUND.000", "FOUND.001", etc.) are created in the root of the drive the files were recovered from:

These folders are hidden, and by default Windows won't show you hidden files/folders.

Bleeping Computers has a nice tutorial on how to turn on viewing hidden files in Windows Vista here, if you don't know how to turn them on already. :)

Answer 2

Found is a folder that use used when the files system can no longer tell where they should rightfully be due to corruption. I would open that Found folder and copy them to another location.

After that, if that folder is on her computer, I would open a command bod and run this command: chkdsk /f and answer yes to doing it on reboot. Reboot the computer. I would do this at least twice.

If the Found folder is on the camera's memory, I would copy all the files off, and then format the removable memory card.

This is a cautionary tale to ALWAYS copy your pictures off the camera and eventually to a DVD or other secure place.