[SOLVED] What to use to recover folder structure of formatted HDD

[Nobody-Important]

I was trying to repair my win7 install earlier this week and because the HP recovery disks didnt bring up the option to do a repair install i went searching for an executable through the console. Unfortunately the one i found didn't bring up that option either and instead started by formatting the c drive. Despite being stopped immediately it was already too late and the drive is now empty.

The question now is: is there any way to get the actual folder structure back somehow? The important things on this drive were mostly projects that rely heavily on the folder structure instead of singular files.
Since this was a full 500GB drive i doubt that everything could have been erased in the two seconds the formatter ran, but how do i actually recover them?

(I also don't know if this strictly belongs in the hardware section but it's where it fit the most)

 

[fzabkar]

In order to recover the file/folder structure, the $MFT (an NTFS metafile) must be intact. Unfortunately this metafile is reset by the formatting process. I would try DMDE. It may find your original partition during its initial scan (a few seconds), otherwise you may need a full scan. The MFT is typically located at around the 4GB point, so it shouldn't take very long for DMDE to find it.

 

[USAFRet]

Please try...

Please don't dredge up threads almost a year old.
And with a solution that does not address the initial problem.