7

I dragged a file to the recycle bin a few days ago. I have Windows 7 premium on a 245 GB partition, a 240 GB SSD, and a 250 SSD. And somewhere in the past few days I incidentally installed Delta Search. I know I should remove it right away, but I just switched to Windows on the partition of a 3.5 1 TB drive and would like to restore that file and deal with the malware after Christmas is over.

I'm pretty sure I know what drive that deleted files should be on, but what is the real name of the recycle directory and exactly where is it located? In other words, if I know the name of the drive what would the rest of the path look like so I can just paste it in my Explorer window and change the drive letter.

0

2 Answers 2

6
  • Open Explorer
  • Select Show hidden files, folders, and drives

Recycle Bin is located in a hidden directory named \$Recycle.Bin\%SID%, where %SID% is the SID of the user that performed the deletion.


For this to work you should go to Folder options -> View and then uncheck Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) and also unhide all the folders from Show hidden files and folders. This is because the Recycle bin folder is hidden folder so you need to unhide folders before this. by @Hunter

1
  • Same here Recycle bin is a system folder so you might need to follow the above answer too.
    – Hunter
    Dec 26, 2013 at 17:59
0

You will need to enable showing Protected File System files option in folder options.

  1. Open Control Panel
  2. Open Folder Options.
  3. Uncheck Hide protected operating system files (Recommended)

The Recycle Bin folders should now be visible in the root of the drive.

EDIT: You also need to check Hidden Files and folders -> Show hidden files, folders and drives.

1
  • 1
    For this to work you should go to Folder options -> View and then uncheck Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) and also unhide all the folders from Show hidden files and folders. This is because the Recycle bin folder is hidden folder so you need to unhide folders before this.
    – Hunter
    Dec 25, 2013 at 16:23

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .