Question Data Loss After Attempt at Partition Move - DESPERATE for Help

[Nugget_Boy]

I honestly have no idea what else to do, decided to come here for help since ya'll so tech savvy, much more than me. This is a bit of a mess and more than one screw up, I'll try to explain the best I can and sorry in advance for the long read.

I have a 1TB SSD on my laptop, split into two 500GB partitions, C (for Windows, programs etc.) and D (for pictures, backups, documents, etc.). I had 200GB left on C and 100GB on D, and wanted to move some of that space from C to D. On the Disk Manager, I could shrink up to 40GB, which I ended up doing (only 30GB). But then, I couldn't just expand D for the same amount, as, for what I understand (and what a friend of mine who is a computer engineer and was helping me with this explained), it wasn't continuous and so I couldn't just add it to D. Ok, fine, I ended up just putting those 30GB back into C.

When he came about to help me with this, we downloaded a tool to help move those 30GB, called Paragon Partition Manager 17 CE. So, with it, we shrank C for 30GB again, and then moved those to D. We left it running while I had lunch. When I came back, some error popped up, I don't recall exactly what, but basically it failed to finish (I have no idea why, seems like the SSD turned off in the middle of the operation - the pc didn't shut down or went to sleep, only turned the screen off from being away for like 30min, that's it). The result was me having a D partition in Disk Manager fully unallocated (all 500 GB of it).

After this it was a whole search for tools that could help me get my partition back, as he said it almost definitely has all the data there, just can't "see it". So I got EaseUS Partition Manager, he did indeed find the partition and that it was in good state for recoverability (and it showed that it still had 400GB used of 500GB total, which was 100% what I had before all of this mess). We hit recover, it recovered it, and gave it a new letter, F. All seemed good, although now I didn't have access to the disk, we just changed the security settings on it and, supposedly, I sort of got access. So, it seemed we fixed the issue. Well, not really.

After this, we got a couple prompts. One saying that the "Recicle bin of F was damaged. Do you want to empty it?". We got a bit confused, we denied it at first. Then we got another prompt from the notification bar saying there were some errors in F and that Windows needed to restart to fix them. We, changed the letter of the partition in Disk Manager from F to D to see if that would magically fix the issue, but nope. We didn't know what to do, if we could just ignore the prompts, I still didn't have access to the folders under D (even after letter change), but I feel it was because of when my friend tried to give me perms, something didn't get 100% right.

So, and now I feel like this was the real screw up, I think I hit "Yes" on the recicle bin prompt and then we restarted the pc. While restarting, on the 1st screen, it now showed "Scan and Fix: Stage 1/2" and went on to do "something" I have no clue what, but it basically screwed me over even more. After coming back, I went to see the disk on "This PC", and D was there indeed, but now showed "260GB free of 500GB, instead of the 100GB it should show. Seemed like data got deleted. Still didn't have access to the folders, but this time I tried to change the perms myself and what was missing last time was that I needed to ADD myself again in the security tab, so I did that and now I could access what was left in D. Indeed data was missing, a lot of it. We ran the Partition Manager again, and this time he couldn't find anything. On the Disk Manager, now C and D were right next to each other and somehow those 30GB were AFTER D (not after C and before D as before).

We decided to get some more data recovery tools, so we got Disk Drill and EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard. Ran both and both could find lost data in D, Recicle bin and that unallocated 30GB partition. We decided to merge those 30GB with D, since now I could (seems like the 1st program did indeed manage to move them after reboot/reboot finalized the move) and since it seemed like it had data from D anyway. Ran them again and indeed I think they found everything that seemed lost BUT it's a bloody giant mess. Nothing is where it's suppose to, most things have random names, etc. And the thing is, both of them, when I run them on D, they find 800GB worth of content to recover, which is around double of what I had (if I remove "existing data" it's around 700GB of recoverable data). Also, during the partition moving or whatever that stupid program/Windows did, I somehow ended up with C files in the recicle bin (which I only know because I ran the data tools on it, they don't actually show up in it).

So, the thing now is, I have no idea what to do/if there's a way to revert this/get the files where they are supposed to be, with the names they are supposed to have. I have an external HDD with 1TB where I have a backup of D at 100% and some things from C (game save data, etc.),but its' from September (yes, I know, that's awful, and I have no idea why it's been so long since I did a backup, I really thought I had one from March or so, since I do one after each semester). So, with it, I can just copy over everything from it to D, but I'm afraid that I will actually lose stuff if I do it before recovering things, since I'll be adding data to it. I decided to order another 1TB external HDD just so I can recover things into it. But now I'm not sure if I should use EaseUS or Disk Drill (although I'm tending more into EaseUS), or if I, for example, use one to recover things, copy them over to the new HDD, and then use the other to scan things again, to make sure I got everything. can I do that? What happens after the first recovery (basically does it move the data into the HDD or copy it?)?

Basically, my idea was to recover the data into the new HDD, copy back everything from the old HDD that has the September backup (it has 305GB worth of data in the D backup; my SSD only has 190GB on D at the moment), and then run through those 800GB and copy over whatever is left (which would be around 95GB, since I had 400GB at the start).

I also ran AOMEI Partition Assistant and got some damaged sectors on both partitions (more on the D partition). I'll try to leave pictures of that (not in english, but I think everyone can easily understand the important parts). I know it can happen over time, just not sure if this fast/this many or if it could have been caused by this mess (I got the SDD in September +/-).

Now, is this the best option? Is there a way to basically "reverse" what we did and the several screw ups (like move the partition again, etc., I don't know)? When I recover the data, is there a way for it to be organized again/recover the paths/names of the things so I can just copy-paste everything back into D (many files/folders are "organized", but most aren't)? And regarding the C files in the "lost" recicle bin, Should I retrieve those as well into the external HDD and the copy them over? I feel like that bit is going to be a bit hard, since many files (system files) I have no idea where they belong. I feel like the final solution would be to get all the data possible out of the laptop and then just fully format it, C and D. Ah, also, the recicle bin prompt still shows up when I open folders in D, and if I run a disk check for D the notification that tells me to restart the pc to fix the issues shows up again, so now I don't even shut down my laptop, just put it to sleep.

Any help/explanation is MUCH appreciated. I find this so absolutely stupid and unfathomable how it happened. Besides my and my friend's screw ups, and not having a good backup from a more recent date, I feel like both the program and Windows did a major "opsi" that I really would like to revert.

Sorry for the long read, I had no idea how else to put his, besides explaining it properly to give the best picture of what happened/what's left, so somehow someone can help me out with this.

Thanks in advance to everyone! You're all awesome!

 

[USAFRet]

1. Having a good backup at ALL times is simply an essential part of responsible computer ops. Backups on all my house systems are never more than 48 hours out of date.

2. Creating a Full Drive Backup just before any partition manipulation (or other major hardware/software change) is also a required operation.

3. Repeated messing with this single drive and the only copy of your data is a Bad Move.


Now, moving on....

What is the pain level if all this data is lost? Anything life changing? (Job loss/divorce/similar)

Stop messing with this singular drive. Create a full forensic level clone off to some other drive, and attempt any data recovery on that.
HDDSuperClone, for instance.
http://www.hddsuperclone.com/sitev1/hddsuperclone

Or the forensic option in Macrium Reflect.

 

[DSzymborski]

Recuva is another thing to try.

However, I have zero confidence in my ability to deal with this remotely given how many things have been done to this poor drive now. The largest mistake (of many!) was not cloning the drive to a new drive and trying to work on the clone. Instead, you did a lot of things to the only copy. That's literally the first thing you should do when trying to recover data.

The best lesson learned is one of backups. Backing up to a single drive a few times a year is not remotely a good backup plan. There should be an automated backup routine -- and there's a lot of software that can do this, I personally use Bvkcup2 -- that regularly check and backs up data to multiple places. Treat valuable data as if it's valuable.

 

[USAFRet]

Additionally, this being an SSD makes any 'data recovery' MUCH harder, if not impossible.

Since it continued to be used and written to/reconfigured, the TRIM function effectively killed off large parts of it.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

1. Having a good backup at ALL times is simply an essential part of responsible computer ops. Backups on all my house systems are never more than 48 hours out of date.

2. Creating a Full Drive Backup just before any partition manipulation (or other major hardware/software change) is also a required operation.

3. Repeated messing with this single drive and the only copy of your data is a Bad Move.


Now, moving on....

What is the pain level if all this data is lost? Anything life changing? (Job loss/divorce/similar)

Stop messing with this singular drive. Create a full forensic level clone off to some other drive, and attempt any data recovery on that.
HDDSuperClone, for instance.
http://www.hddsuperclone.com/sitev1/hddsuperclone

Or the forensic option in Macrium Reflect.

Recuva is another thing to try.

However, I have zero confidence in my ability to deal with this remotely given how many things have been done to this poor drive now. The largest mistake (of many!) was not cloning the drive to a new drive and trying to work on the clone. Instead, you did a lot of things to the only copy. That's literally the first thing you should do when trying to recover data.

The best lesson learned is one of backups. Backing up to a single drive a few times a year is not remotely a good backup plan. There should be an automated backup routine -- and there's a lot of software that can do this, I personally use Bvkcup2 -- that regularly check and backs up data to multiple places. Treat valuable data as if it's valuable.

Thanks for the speedy reply. Like I said, I'm not the most tech savvy person in the world, I know the very basic stuffs, not my day-to-day thing. I usually backup everything well enough for my needs as I don't create/change things in my pc that much (notes from classes, for example, I upload them to Google Drive after every new class I watch; same with uni work). And yes, I know, it was stupid and we rushed things without giving them a proper thought, as we just thought it would be a pretty swift thing. That's on us, but it still sucks. My friend did mention for me to get some sort of program that would do that, automatically backup things from time to time to an external drive (which, right now, I'll end up using my new one after all this mess is sorted).

Now, regarding the importance of the data. Well, it's not life-threatening, no, but it's really important to me. And as I said, o the 400GB I had on that drive, I can recover easily around 350GB (305GB from the external HDD and the rest from my phone, since I did a backup of it like a month ago and it has a lot of new things that weren't there before). Of the remaining 50GB-ish, I can still recover a lot of things with the recovery tools, at least it seems that way (they found the files etc., it's just all messed up). I can dump the recovery data into the new external HDD I'm waiting to get.

Regarding that SuperClone, Macrium Refect and Recuva, what exactly will that do/can I get out of it?

And since the data is actually still in the drive (again, it seems so), can I recover it "neatly" as it was organizes or at this stage that particular outcome is 100% impossible to achieve?

Thanks for the comments!

 

[USAFRet]

The tools I mentioned were to simply clone this whole thing to a different device.

100% as it was originally?
Highly unlikely. After the first fail, you did several destructive write operations.

That "remaining 50GB-ish "...only counts when that data actually exists on some other drive, with its full functionality.
The regular consumer recovery tools are great at showing you a list of contents that it has found.

For instance, the Table of Contents of a book.
Pg 42 = This
Pg 85 = That

But when you actually flip to pages 42 and 85, you find someone has torn those pages out, and put them through the shredder known as TRIM.

Again...rebuilding that drive back to 100% original condition? Unlikely, leading to impossible.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

The tools I mentioned were to simply clone this whole thing to a different device.

100% as it was originally?
Highly unlikely. After the first fail, you did several destructive write operations.

That "remaining 50GB-ish "...only counts when that data actually exists on some other drive, with its full functionality.
The regular consumer recovery tools are great at showing you a list of contents that it has found.

For instance, the Table of Contents of a book.
Pg 42 = This
Pg 85 = That

But when you actually flip to pages 42 and 85, you find someone has torn those pages out, and put them through the shredder known as TRIM.

Again...rebuilding that drive back to 100% original condition? Unlikely, leading to impossible.

I see, so even when EaseUS giving me the option to recover those 800GB into an external drive, many could be corrupted even after it 'recovers' them (so even if I open X Word file and read through it, there could be errors in what I wrote, etc.?)? And this would be the same as what you're mentioning, cloning the data into another drive, or it's not the same thing?

Since this happened I've refrained from doing anything on the pc, besides just opening Chrome and closing, no new files, no downloading things, nothing. (I know there'll always be some new writes in the background, ofc, but I haven't touched D).

Basically what you're saying is to try and get everything out of this drive with any recovery tool and then wipe it clean? What about C? since some files got dumped into a "lost" recicle bin, would it be a good idea to just reinstall windows from scratch as well (and the programs I have on it)?

 

[USAFRet]

The clone is only to (hopefully) create a 100% exact copy, and work on the COPY.
The more you mess with this one drive, the farther away you are from recovering anything.

Running it at all, even just opening Chrome...destructive.
The drives firmware garbage collection is continuously shuffling data around, as it should. But making any "recovery" much much harder.

That Word doc may be listed as something that can be recovered.
And then the 'recovery' is actually 500 tiny text files. Not a valid original Word doc.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

The clone is only to (hopefully) create a 100% exact copy, and work on the COPY.
The more you mess with this one drive, the farther away you are from recovering anything.

Running it at all, even just opening Chrome...destructive.
The drives firmware garbage collection is continuously shuffling data around, as it should. But making any "recovery" much much harder.

That Word doc may be listed as something that can be recovered.
And then the 'recovery' is actually 500 tiny text files. Not a valid original Word doc.

Got it. So it would be better to use that clone tool rather than the recovery tool (EaseUS in this case)? And when you say "work on the copy", I could access it normally on the external HDD and see all its files like a normal drive with folders and files on it?

I see. The thing is, since I got the recicle bin popup and the other security popup, I'm afraid to even just shut down my pc and then when I turn it on it goes into that "Scan and Fix" nonsense and screw me up even more. Putting it to sleep, could that help?

Regarding that thing about the example of the word file, what you say applies even if, for example: Many of the files I find, I can click and preview them, I can actually see the contents of such pdf/word files and see that's it's all there inside that one file as it should be; does this mean that these particular files are fully recoverable? Or even if it shows them like this, can that "fragmentation" that you mention happen after I recover them into the external HDD?

Really appreciate your help/patience with this!

 

[USAFRet]

Clone and recovery are two completely different things.
Ideally, you create 2x clones.
1 to work on, 1 for when that work clone goes bad.
The original drive is completely offline and disconnected, until all efforts at data recovery on the clones is complete.


Clone, then attempt "recovery" on the clone.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Now, is this the best option? Is there a way to basically "reverse" what we did and the several screw ups (like move the partition again, etc., I don't know)?

There's not much, you can do. Too much wrongs have been done.
Restore drive D: from a backup. That's it.

Partition move and partition merge are two most dangerous operations. You should avoid them at all costs (or have backup of your data before doing it).
Failed partition move messed up your partition. And then you run partition merge on top of that.
Most likely any data, you can recover, will all be corrupted and unusable.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

Clone and recovery are two completely different things.
Ideally, you create 2x clones.
1 to work on, 1 for when that work clone goes bad.
The original drive is completely offline and disconnected, until all efforts at data recovery on the clones is complete.


Clone, then attempt "recovery" on the clone.

My issue right now is, I do have a few HDD laying around but they are all full with stuff and none of them can fit this D partition in it. Although my HDD with the latest backups still has 505GB left in it, I won't even think about touching it or putting anything in it right now. I'll get my new 1TB HDD on Tuesday. I still have the old 1TB HDD I took out of this laptop (which I replaced with the current SSD), I never touched it since I took it out, but perhaps if I delete the C on it and clone this D into it, that would be ok to work with? Or I could use it as a clone backup and then work with the clone on the new HDD?

I'm a bit lost on what would be the better course of action. It's also a bit complicated because I can't just go around and buy a dozen external drives to sort this out, already Spent 40€ on this new one.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

There's not much, you can do. Too much wrongs have been done.
Restore drive D: from a backup. That's it.

Partition move and partition merge are two most dangerous operations. You should avoid them at all costs (or have backup of your data before doing it).
Failed partition move messed up your partition. And then you run partition merge on top of that.
Most likely any data, you can recover, will all be corrupted and unusable.

I'm pretty sure that'll be the case but.. I feel like at least I have to try to recover it and see what I can do with it.

 

[USAFRet]

My issue right now is, I do have a few HDD laying around but they are all full with stuff and none of them can fit this D partition in it.

And that speaks to other issues.
No backups of any of this.

Data that exists on only one drive may be said to not exist at all. It can go away quick easily and quickly.


The level of $$ and effort you put into this recovery is proportional to the level of pain if it were to go away.

If you do indeed have a second copy of 'most of it', I'd be inclined to cut your losses and go with what you already have.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

And that speaks to other issues.
No backups of any of this.

Data that exists on only one drive may be said to not exist at all. It can go away quick easily and quickly.


The level of $$ and effort you put into this recovery is proportional to the level of pain if it were to go away.

If you do indeed have a second copy of 'most of it', I'd be inclined to cut your losses and go with what you already have.

When I said "stuff" I meant older backups. They are full of older backups, not just random stuff that only exists said drives. I've been getting new external drives with the years and putting newer backups into them.

I'm trying my best to get the most data out of this mess, but I. Need. Help. I'll say it again, I can get myself around some tech stuff, but some areas are really bare bones in terms of computer knowledge. I've had incidents in the past regarding other things and I've learned from them. I have some contingencies regarding a few things, yes, but not all sadly. And I'd love to just go and buy another 2 or 3 drives to help me get around this, but I just can't. And just because I can't spend another X amount of money on this doesn't mean that it doesn't pain me to lose this data as much as it would if I did spend that money. It pains me A LOT, but I'm still in uni and can't really go around and ask 200€ to get external drives. I do have most of my data yes, but still would like to recover as much as possible, because there are many things I don't even know I lost.

At most, another option I have is to just take my laptop to a tech shop and have them look at it, but I'd like to make a clone/recover the data prior to data, just in case something else goes south with them.

Like I said, if I grab this laptop's old HDD (1TB), just delete C stuff that doesn't matter to have on it (OS, system files, etc.) to get some space, could I safely clone his D drive into it and have that as a clone backup/work on that clone? And then use the yet to arrive external HDD to make another clone into it and work on that one/recover the files from the programs I mention into it?

Thanks.

 

[USAFRet]

I do have most of my data yes, but still would like to recover as much as possible, because there are many things I don't even know I lost.

What you currently have is probably all you will get.


But....whatever drives you 'clone' to WILL be wiped out. Whatever data is on it...gone.
Tread carefully.

 

[hang-the-9]

When I said "stuff" I meant older backups. They are full of older backups, not just random stuff that only exists said drives. I've been getting new external drives with the years and putting newer backups into them.

I'm trying my best to get the most data out of this mess, but I. Need. Help. I'll say it again, I can get myself around some tech stuff, but some areas are really bare bones in terms of computer knowledge. I've had incidents in the past regarding other things and I've learned from them. I have some contingencies regarding a few things, yes, but not all sadly. And I'd love to just go and buy another 2 or 3 drives to help me get around this, but I just can't. And just because I can't spend another X amount of money on this doesn't mean that it doesn't pain me to lose this data as much as it would if I did spend that money. It pains me A LOT, but I'm still in uni and can't really go around and ask 200€ to get external drives. I do have most of my data yes, but still would like to recover as much as possible, because there are many things I don't even know I lost.

At most, another option I have is to just take my laptop to a tech shop and have them look at it, but I'd like to make a clone/recover the data prior to data, just in case something else goes south with them.

Like I said, if I grab this laptop's old HDD (1TB), just delete C stuff that doesn't matter to have on it (OS, system files, etc.) to get some space, could I safely clone his D drive into it and have that as a clone backup/work on that clone? And then use the yet to arrive external HDD to make another clone into it and work on that one/recover the files from the programs I mention into it?

Thanks.

Why do you keep buying new external drives instead of just updating one or two with current backups? Seems a bit wasteful. It's like buying new shoes every time you go outside.

 

[Nugget_Boy]

Why do you keep buying new external drives instead of just updating one or two with current backups? Seems a bit wasteful. It's like buying new shoes every time you go outside.

True, but it's just because they are a bit old and at the time I couldn't/didn't need to buy higher capacity ones. So I got an old 256GB and an old 500GB laying around. The one I actually use is a rather recent one with 1TB, which I intend to use for a while, since it has more than enough capacity for what I got to backup. Those old ones what I do is split between them what I need to backup, when I do a backup into the 1TB one, so I got an extra backup.