Data Recovery Software not recovering hard drive data. HELP!!!

[thamikestab0y56]

I'm trying to recover my data from a broken Samsung 640gb 2.5" hard drive. I've tried everything. I used data recovery software (icare, 7data, testdisk, etc.), I even bought 7data, but they just skip straight to 100% and find nothing. Now it shows the drive as a RAW drive. I'm debating if I should do a quick format on it. But I'm concerned about permanently losing everything on the drive even if I try to recover them from format. PLEASE HELP!! My data is on the line!!

 

[S Haran]

Do not format the drive. It will only make recovery more difficult.

Get a Linux Live CD and try to take an image of the drive with ddrescue.

Then aim your recovery tools at the drive image.

But attempting to take the image is not without risk so if the data is high value send the drive to a data recovery lab.

 

[popatim]

if the drive is raw you will need to recover the partition before several of the file recovery software would work. testdisk can do this.

 

[fzabkar]

Once you have an image of your drive, and if your data recovery tools find nothing, I would suggest that you examine the file system with a disc editor in readonly mode. I can help you do this.

A good freeware disc editor is DMDE:
http://dmde.com/

 

[Stan Sandel]

Hy!
I think companies that recover your data, can't completely recover all of it. You can allways try different softwares, the internet is full of them, free or paid. I use this software, from www.goshareware.com to recover deleted, corrupted, missing files. Works pretty darn good.

 

[thamikestab0y56]

Sorry for the late response guys, but thanks everyone for the suggestions. I managed to find some good working data recovery software called Recuva. It works flawlessly!!