Where Do Deleted Files Go And How to Undelete Files

When you first delete a file on a computer, it is moved to the computer’s Recycle Bin, Trash, or something similar depending on your operating system. Desktop Recycle Bin is not an actual folder that could store files. It is a virtual folder that collects information about deleted file — their location, deletion date, and file size…then it displays this information to you in a user-friendly way so you can view and perform further actions like permanent delete or restore. When files emptied from recycle bin, they are not actually gone permanently from your computer. Instead, these deleted files will continue to exist in hard drives as raw data. It is the pointers in the address table that have been removed. This means these files are invisible to users and the system will view the space they used to take as free space that can be overwritten. It is way more efficient this way than erasing every file that got deleted by overwriting with new random data.

When a computer deletes a file, it is removing the reference to the file on the hard drive. Once the file header, or reference, is removed, the computer can no longer see the file. The space the file took up is no longer reserved for that file, and any new file can be stored in that location. What does this mean? The file is no longer readable by the computer. However, the file is still on the hard drive, at least until another file is saved to the same location. Because the file is technically there, it may be able to be recovered using data recovery software, designed to rebuild the file header and allow the computer to see the file again. This software only works if no other file or data has been saved over the top of the deleted file.

Data recovery software takes advantage of the mechanism of deletion. When we delete a file, the file system only removes the address pointer to that file. The computer just marks it as “deleted, can be overwritten”. If we put new files in, the computer may notice the newly freed space and cram the new file there. By doing so, the data of the old file, which is a complex combination of ones and zeros, will be re-arranged to form the new file data. That’s why overwritten files can hardly be recovered. As long as your lost files are not overwritten or physically destroyed, professional data recovery software such as H Data Recovery will be sufficient to scan, search and reconstitute these files and restore them.

We can easily perform the recovery from data loss on our own by using professional data recovery software such as H Data Recovery Software. According to your data loss situation, you may choose from one of the 6 modules this software has to offer. These situations include accidental deletion, emptied recycle bin, accidental formatting of drives, damaged or lost partitions, etc.

Step 1. Free download Data Recovery Software. Install and launch H Data Recovery Software, and select one module by clicking it.

Step 2. Select the partition where your files used to be before they get deleted. If you wish to recover files on Desktop, choose partition (C:). Click Next to start the scan process.

Step 3. When scanning is done, you will be able to see all the files that can be recovered. Check the files you wish to recover and click next to start the recovering process. If the scanning process failed to find your lost file, try our new feature “Universal Recovery”. It is a special module that conducts a thorough scan and tries to find and reconstitute every deleted file.

Step 4. Choose a directory or device to store the recovered files. Do not put new files into that partition in order to avoid deleted files being overwritten.