Windows wiped my partition in an update!

[Ajsmith595]

After an update came up, I accepted to restart my PC to actually apply the update or whatever. It took about 20 mins to update before I went back on my PC. First pop-up: This PC Files/Desktop is not available - my Desktop had been cleared. I then checked on file explorer: the drive all my files were on did not show the capacity - only 'NTFS'. I soon realised some permissions were messed up and I simply changed them so that I had full access. Then I checked back: 500GB free of 500GB. Windows had deleted all the files off the partition!
I'm currently running recovery software to find the files but so far it has found hardly any. Is there an explanation for this? Can it be corrected if the recovery software does not find it?

FYI, I have checked in the 'Windows.old' on my OS partition (Same drive, different partition as the one that got cleared) - it does not have any of the files that were on my original.

 

[ebm9000]

If you were able to boot Windows and it claims the C: drive is empty, that's an issue. Clearly, it's not empty but everything besides the important system files were wiped. I would recommend putting the drive in another machine and scanning for lost files.

^Even if Windows is broken, it still booted. Basic background tasks will override some of the data.

Curious question: do you have more than one hard drive/ssd in your computer?

 

[Ajsmith595]

If you were able to boot Windows and it claims the C: drive is empty, that's an issue. Clearly, it's not empty but everything besides the important system files were wiped. I would recommend putting the drive in another machine and scanning for lost files.

^Even if Windows is broken, it still booted. Basic background tasks will override some of the data.

Curious question: do you have more than one hard drive/ssd in your computer?

Ok I think I must have not explained this sufficiently. My first drive is an SSD split into two partitions: C and A. C has my OS and some of my programs installed. A has most of my programs, games, documents and downloads. A is the one that got wiped. C was unchanged. I do have another drive in there, a 2TB SSHD which contains some irregularly used programs and games, along with my game recordings.

 

[Bscull12]

Sounds like Windows got a bit confused.

I do not know how to recover data, but I can tell you what happened.

Windows must have updated the C partition but strangely ran into the A partition mid-update. It probably didn’t recognize anything inside and decided to simply remove it, thinking that the A partition was a part of the C partition as well.

I hope you find a fix, but that is what must have happened.