Everything deleted off computer!!

Kettle316

Can Anyone please help??

My nephew got his hands on my computer and accidentely rebooted my computer (its as if i have a brand new computer in front of me!!)

I have a lot of college work on there that has been lost that i will need in the coming weeks for a project i have due!!

Does anyone know if there is any way of undoing what has been done?? Or getting the files back that i have lost??

Thanks in advance!!

Dave D

Do you mean he formatted it? Is the operating system still on it Eg. windows or linux?

Timistry

How do you mean rebooted. did he just log in as another user?

Kettle316

Dave D wrote: »

Do you mean he formatted it? Is the operating system still on it Eg. windows or linux?

I've a fairly basic knowledge of computers, apologies if i dont use the proper names for things!!

Yeah windows is still on it but whatever he did it went back to as if i had a new computer!! When i turned it on i had to put in all the time settings and default languages (like i did when i 1st got the computer)!!

Keano

Is there a My Computer icon on the desktop? Click on that and then click C: ?

Dave D

Try Recuva Its a program that designed to recover deleted files and such.

Kettle316

Keano A Legend wrote: »

Is there a My Computer icon on the desktop? Click on that and then click C: ?

yeah done that!!

had a look through the folders there's noting in them except sample music and sample pictures, every other folder is empty??

Keano

Kettle316 wrote: »

yeah done that!!

had a look through the folders there's noting in them except sample music and sample pictures, every other folder is empty??

When the computer starts up is there a number of different users to select from?

wolfric

Try asking him what he did... It's not exactly simple to wipe a hard drive. You'd need to use a windows install cd. The most important part now is not to use the pc. Get onto this site via friends computers, internet cafe or a library. Usually with a quick format what happens is basicly the index file is overwritten but the files still stay there. Any new files just go straight over the unindexed ones though. That could be as simple as the pictures that pop up on a website that are temporarily downloaded to your pc. So as i said use your pc as little as possible.


Download a file recovery program to a usb stick or cd and run it on your computer to try recover the files. If you know someone computer savvy get them to take your hard drive and put it into their pc. That'll decrease the risk of overwriting your files even more.

Here's one that i use http://www.snapfiles.com/get/filescavenger.html

Webmonkey

It sounds to me he entered the recovery partition and restored back to factory/day one

What age is he? - I doubt you could do something like this accidently.

Keano

Webmonkey wrote: »

It sounds to me he entered the recovery partition and restored back to factory/day one

What age is he? - I doubt you could do something like this accidently.

:eek:

Kettle316

Keano A Legend wrote: »

When the computer starts up is there a number of different users to select from?

There was my account and then there was a guest account but when i turned the computer on just there i didnt have to log into either of them it just went straight to the desktop screen??

Mr. Presentable

click on start button. What account is there for logoff? Go to settings/control panel/user accounts. Is your account still there?

Kettle316

Webmonkey wrote: »

It sounds to me he entered the recovery partition and restored back to factory/day one

What age is he? - I doubt you could do something like this accidently.

He's 11!!

He said he pressed a button when the computer was starting up (it was 1 of the f buttons, he thinks it was f10 or f11) the computer went into some sort of loading process that he couldnt get out of!! (Again apologies if i haven't made it very clear)

Anyone have an idea of what he did??

Webmonkey

Yep my theories are correct unfort. Your computer sounds like he entered the recovery parition. There should have being a big "Are you sure" but he probably clicked yes. It sounds like there's no going back to me unfort.

Kettle316

Webmonkey wrote: »

Yep my theories are correct unfort. Your computer sounds like it has being restored to factory settings

The files are gone then are they??

No way of getting them back??

Webmonkey

I don't think so sorry

That was very unlucky. I hate to say it, but you should always back up things (email it to yourself etc).

Kettle316

Webmonkey wrote: »

I don't think so sorry

That was very unlucky. I hate to say it, but you should always back up things (email it to yourself etc).

Yeah yeah i just learned that lesson the hard way ha ha ha!!

Ah well sure its no the end of the world!!

Thanks very much for all the help lads i appreciate it!!

Webmonkey

No probs, best of luck.

Strangely enough, that restore thing does take time, it doesn't happen in a matter of seconds. Could take 30 minutes. Did he leave it run for this long.

mp22

Kettle316 wrote: »

The files are gone then are they??

No way of getting them back??

as posted earlier download recuva install it and scan the c drive it will find the files you are looking for you need to recover them to another disk cd dvd or usb

Webmonkey

mp22 wrote: »

as posted earlier download recuva install it and scan the c drive it will find the files you are looking for you need to recover them to another disk cd dvd or usb

Yeah worth a go anyways. With a bit of luck, the area where your files once sat, did not get over written by the restore.

Overheal

I always strongly advise keeping important **** off the System Drive. But yeah, thats ****in harsh.

The files may be recoverable using a physical scanning utility. But be advised, the process could take days and the files you recover may not be named or sorted - the program will pick up an image file, and store it in an output folder and call it jpeg1. And it keeps going like that.

I cant remember who suggested that option to me. let me search for the thread. .....

Thread is here

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055447853

I passed on the option. The files werent that important as far as i was concerned. They were videos of my brother's dog when she was a pup, but, tbh, it wasnt worth tying up my system for the better half of a week.

Capt'n Midnight

get an external hard drive beg/borrow/steal

install as little as possible to prevent space being overwritten

use photorec to restore deleted files to it www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

then when finished search for keywords that were in your files

mark renton

Is this for real - he's 11


if he really reformatted your pc to fresh install in quick time then he's already employable - ive seen IT support take a full day to do the same thing

sounds like you just logged back in under an alternative profile