USB flash drive not detecting/corrupted(?)

[Algophiliac]

Basically, I was selling my computer to buy a Surface Pro for uni and wanted to back up all my photos.
Was in a rush so only backed them up to my USB Flash Drive (SanDisk Ultra 3.0 64GB), it's about 2mo old and not very often used. Was about 30GB of photos and understand how much of an idiot I was being by not backing them up elsewhere too. Now I've ended up losing the vast majority of the last 5 years of my family and daughter's life, besides the few we had on phones and printed.

A couple days after I'd bought my new computer I plugged in the USB and it started installing the drivers and gave a 'Device not recognised' error. On Device Manager is was showing as 'Unknown USB Device (Set Address Failed)'. It also did the same on my mother's laptop.

I tried my partner's work one and it finally recognised it, but then shortly after it vanished from "This PC". I can still navigate manually to F:, but it's empty and if I go into properties and then 'Error checking' it says Windows can't access the disk.

When I first loaded up Disk Management it showed as unallocated space, then changed to 'Disk 1 | Removable | No Media'.
DiskPart can also detect it and states 'Size: 59GB, Free: 59GB'. I'm assiming I can create a partition through DiskPart, but that will require formatting the drive? Or is all the data already lost with no chance at recovery?

I'm starting to think that my only option would be to get in contact with the buyer of my original PC and see if I can recover the photos using software, although I'm not entirely sure whether that'd work as I formatted it and it's probably been overwritten by now.

Any help would be greatly appreciated as I really don't want to lose these pictures and can't afford the £100+ to get them professionally recovered.

 

[R2D2_WD]

Hi Algophiliac,

I know that not getting access to the most important files can be very disturbing. The good news is that the USB drive is actually recognized by the PC. It seems empty but if you haven’t copied new files to the drive, you may actually have a chance to recover part of the information (or all of it).
Firstly, do not use the drive. Search for a Linux Live version online. You may find some easy to use and free versions. Download one of those and burn them in a bootable USB. Boot from it and Linux should load. No installation is needed. Once Linux is up, connect the USB with your photos. There is a chance that Linux may recognize them and you may be able to back them up. It is worth the shot.
Another option is to search for data recovery software. There are some free versions that may be quite useful. If one utility fails, try with another one. Do not try to format or partition the pendrive.

Please, have in mind that trying to recover the files by yourself, you may make future professional recovery attempts really hard. So, if you plan to use a Data Recovery Company, you should go straight to that.

Check the topic below for some software suggestions:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/267620-32-best-data-recovery-tools

I really hope you will get your files back!

Hope this helps

 

[DR_Luke]

Best option, contact Sean at PCImage (a UK based data recovery lab that I trust and who have reasonable rates) and see if he can recover your data within your budget. Alternatively, download the demo of R-Studio and try to access the connected thumb drive, taking note of the log entries. My guess is that you will get read errors only, as it is probable that the controller has gone stupid and is no longer giving actual access to the storage space on the NAND.

My analysis, based on your description is that there is nothing you will be able to do on your own.

 

[Algophiliac]

Firstly, do not use the drive. Search for a Linux Live version online. You may find some easy to use and free versions. Download one of those and burn them in a bootable USB. Boot from it and Linux should load. No installation is needed. Once Linux is up, connect the USB with your photos. There is a chance that Linux may recognize them and you may be able to back them up. It is worth the shot.

I think I'll try this one first as it seems risk-free and if I can't get access I'll have to send it off as I'd rather that than risk losing the pictures.

Best option, contact Sean at PCImage (a UK based data recovery lab that I trust and who have reasonable rates) and see if he can recover your data within your budget. Alternatively, download the demo of R-Studio and try to access the connected thumb drive, taking note of the log entries. My guess is that you will get read errors only, as it is probable that the controller has gone stupid and is no longer giving actual access to the storage space on the NAND.

My analysis, based on your description is that there is nothing you will be able to do on your own.

I've sent a message through their online form so hopefully they come back with some good news!

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Thank you both, I appreciate the time you've put into answering. Luckily I have a bit of knowledge and didn't jump ahead with partitioning/using the drive as knew it reduces the chances of actually recovering data.