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I was using my pc and writing things on my .txt file where i store my everyday'' to-do '' like

  • clean the house
  • wash the dog
  • pay x bill
  • pay z bill

but the problem is the power was shut down on my PC and now I can't find the .txt file anymore. Only the "shortcut/path" for it, but the folder where the file was stored doesn't contain the file anymore.

I know it's still in the system, otherwise not even the path/shortcut would be showing. I tried the best recovery software already (Ontrack, Recuva, Easeus) and none of them could get it back because they don't have an option of scanning for missing files on selected folders only, but they search only entire HDs, and that's why they didn't help.

Do you know/or can help me with a recovery software that can search folder by folder specialized for missing .txt files, or some other method?

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  • Welcome to Superuser, please be aware "Questions seeking product, service, or learning material recommendations are off-topic" I would suggest removing the request for recovery software to remain on topic
    – 50-3
    Sep 19, 2013 at 3:35
  • You may try DiskGator dat recovery tool(windows) for recover the the file. Run the tool to that particular partition and after scanning file which want to recover. I personally used it form last 2 years its working fine.
    – Shailesh
    Sep 19, 2013 at 5:10
  • What exactly did the shortcut point to, the .txt file or the folder it was in? It’s probably too late now, but there’s a few things that may or may not work for this and in case it happens in the future depending on what exactly happened.
    – Synetech
    Dec 19, 2013 at 4:58

3 Answers 3

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Giving advice on searching for the file not for data recover

What you can do is perform a recursive search for the file

For instance I have file called win 7 mixer.png so from the command line:

C:\Users\Foo>pushd c:\

c:\>dir /b /s | findstr mixer.png

c:\Users\Foo\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Recent\win 7 mixer.png.lnk
c:\Users\Foo\Pictures\win 7 mixer.png

c:\>

So this will recursively search for from c:\ returning all results

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  • Hi, thank you. I think the command line is the way to go, since everything can be done through the command line i guess i could find the file through cmd. I tried to use these code you give me and also did some research on google using the keywords '' recursive search for missing folders and files'' But the only thing i found was discussions on programming foruns about javascripts and some other database tech stuff. But i are the only one who understood really well what i was needing. So to be specific what i really need is some kind of tool that can do this thing you said in folders Sep 19, 2013 at 17:38
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Try using a file recovery software like Recuva (free) - it can scan the hard disk and find all files reported "deleted" by the OS, that are still there. As long as the physical space of the file was not overwritten, you can still recover it.

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  • Hey, thank you i have tried all these recovery softwares, none of them work because they are not specific. thanks for your help. Sep 19, 2013 at 17:34
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This is a very late answer, but perhaps it will help others.

Make a partition dump

If the file missing is significantly important, the first thing to do is to make a so called 'dump' of the partition. A bit by bit copy of the entire partition. This requires that you have a different partition, eg on an external hard disk, that is bigger than the partition you are dumping. If your partition is 100GB, but it only contains 10GB files, the dump will still be 100GB.

All the tools that you can use to recover files can work on these images too.

I don't know how to make a dump in Windows, but in Linux it is a single line in the terminal.

dd if=/dev/hdx of=~/dump.img

If you don't need the files immediately, like if you have deleted holiday photos, you can save the dump for weeks, months or years, until you have more time or until you have money to pay a company to recover it for you.

Use testdisk

The open source cross-platform tool TestDisk offers a lot of things, one of them is "undeleting files". It lets you browse through the folders of the partition, but besides showing the "normal" files, it also shows deleted files in red. You then select which ones you want to recover.

Since you know which folder the file should be in, this might be the perfect tool for you.

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