Recovering data from a compact flash card?

[sanpablobay]

is their anybody who knows how to do this or can help me? i made mistake & started formatting the card when i didn't want to. i ejected it before it was done formatting, but when i put it back it says the card is not formatted correctly.

any ideas or suggestions would be great.

luckily what i'm missing was taped by somebody else as well. but, i would really like to get mine back if possible.

time to do some googeling.

EDIT:
and an other question. i have another cf card with files on it that when i try to copy i get an error saying it will copy file because parameters are incorrect. what?

[bot]

What part of "Formatting Will Destroy All Data" didn't you get ?!

[xavier242]

Formatting normally only wipes the file allocation table and leaves the file data in the sectors alone.
Since you aborted the format, now the card is in a state the the OS (and data recovery programs) may not be able to recognize.

Try formatting it again to allow the OS to see the card, then google for data recovery tools. I've used GetDataBack successfully in the past for harddisks, and if the compact flash is installed into a compact flash to IDE adapter, GetDataBack should see the compact flash as a disk drive and should work. There are also dedicated flash media recovery tools (I haven't needed one in years so don't remember what I used, so google).

[sanpablobay]

Originally Posted by xavier242

Formatting normally only wipes the file allocation table and leaves the file data in the sectors alone.
Since you aborted the format, now the card is in a state the the OS (and data recovery programs) may not be able to recognize.

Try formatting it again to allow the OS to see the card, then google for data recovery tools. I've used GetDataBack successfully in the past for harddisks, and if the compact flash is installed into a compact flash to IDE adapter, GetDataBack should see the compact flash as a disk drive and should work. There are also dedicated flash media recovery tools (I haven't needed one in years so don't remember what I used, so google).

thanks for the tips.

i've found one program that found the files. but, for some reason it's saying the files are only 32mb a piece. i saved the files & tried opening one in wmp. it says the file 32minutes which is right for what it should be. but, it will only play the first minute or so. which would be about 32mb. i'm thinking their is a file size limit in this program. at least i know the files are there.

i'm going to hold off on finishing the format like you suggested though. as they were found with out doing that.

[sanpablobay]

I got everything back!

[mooncusser]

phew! that was a close one!