My documents are gone?! Windows 8.1

[oo2k15]

I need help guys. This is the first time this happen to me. So I recently woke up to find out that most if not all of my documents are gone. All of my essay, pdf, powerpoint, notepad, excel, folders and other important documents are gone. I'm pretty sure I didn't accidently deleted them all or move them, pretty sure my computer weren't affected by viruses, no one went on my computer. So idk how it happen. Last thing I remember was doing a ccleaner, antivirus scan, malwarebyte scan, glary utilities 5 scan b4 I went to sleep. Not sure if those have anything to do with the disappearance of my document. Maybe the scanner accidently placed my document in the recycling bin and then another deleted it? But i've done that so many time and didn't have any problem till now.

I really need help retrieving my documents. Yes I didn't back up my files stupid of me. But at the same time I don't want this to happen to me again in the future, so if must I want to avoid it. If someone can help me out that would be appreciated.

[Bittenfleax]

I need help guys. This is the first time this happen to me. So I recently woke up to find out that most if not all of my documents are gone. All of my essay, pdf, powerpoint, notepad, excel, folders and other important documents are gone. I'm pretty sure I didn't accidently deleted them all or move them, pretty sure my computer weren't affected by viruses, no one went on my computer. So idk how it happen. Last thing I remember was doing a ccleaner, antivirus scan, malwarebyte scan, glary utilities 5 scan b4 I went to sleep. Not sure if those have anything to do with the disappearance of my document. Maybe the scanner accidently placed my document in the recycling bin and then another deleted it? But i've done that so many time and didn't have any problem till now.

I really need help retrieving my documents. Yes I didn't back up my files stupid of me. But at the same time I don't want this to happen to me again in the future, so if must I want to avoid it. If someone can help me out that would be appreciated.

Maybe you are right, You could of done the wrong thing on CCleaner and deleted your documents? It will also remove things from recycling bin if it gets to big (I think) so that might of removed them from there. 

 

Try and use EaseUS, I have never used it but I think it will work. 

 

Here is a link: http://www.easeus.com/datarecoverywizard/recover-deleted-files.htm

[vembutech]

Hi,

 

Use Remo software for windows.. 

 

http://www.windows8datarecovery.net/

[oo2k15]

Maybe you are right, You could of done the wrong thing on CCleaner and deleted your documents? It will also remove things from recycling bin if it gets to big (I think) so that might of removed them from there. 

 

Try and use EaseUS, I have never used it but I think it will work. 

 

Here is a link: http://www.easeus.com/datarecoverywizard/recover-deleted-files.htm

 

Hey I use the program. It show the documents that were deleted. But I need to purchase the full version to recover it. Thats bs. But hey atleast now I know I can recover my documents!

 

EDIT: Help! So I recover all the documents that went missing. But now I can't open any of it. When I open a notepad all the text are gibberish. When I open a word document it say this.

 

 

 

For photo is this

 

Powerpoint

 

I feel like the file are corrupted or misplaced. I need help getting my documents back.

 

 

 

 

 

[ShaithEatery]

This looks to be the work of a Cryptolock type virus; what they do is search for all of the types of file extensions you mentioned and makes them look like the screenshots you provided.  They typically do not delete the files though, so that part is a bit strange.  If this is a cryptolock type virus, they will typically insert a little picture file inside each of the folders affected that tells you that you need to pay them to unlock them.  If you haven't found anything resembling this, then it is probably just the recovery program not being able to recover the full file.  I have one other thought...

 

I've seen plenty of times a user profile will randomly get corrupted and make it so when you log into Windows with your user name and password, it creates a temporary user profile that will not show any of your documents in the normal places.  To see if this is what's going on, browse to C:\Users and see if there are any duplicate folders that have your user name as the name.  If there are, try to browse through them to see if that's where all of your documents are sitting.

 

If neither of those are the case, then I'd need to look at the PC myself or get some other background info.

[Bittenfleax]

This looks to be the work of a Cryptolock type virus; what they do is search for all of the types of file extensions you mentioned and makes them look like the screenshots you provided.  They typically do not delete the files though, so that part is a bit strange.  If this is a cryptolock type virus, they will typically insert a little picture file inside each of the folders affected that tells you that you need to pay them to unlock them.  If you haven't found anything resembling this, then it is probably just the recovery program not being able to recover the full file.  I have one other thought...

 

I've seen plenty of times a user profile will randomly get corrupted and make it so when you log into Windows with your user name and password, it creates a temporary user profile that will not show any of your documents in the normal places.  To see if this is what's going on, browse to C:\Users and see if there are any duplicate folders that have your user name as the name.  If there are, try to browse through them to see if that's where all of your documents are sitting.

 

If neither of those are the case, then I'd need to look at the PC myself or get some other background info.

@oo2k15 if this was a Crypto-lock virus, then it would make you pay to unlock your files... (and I think he would know if it was a virus because he would obviously not pay)

[JustinBieber]

Right click your documents folder, go to "Restore Previous Version" and restore a previous version  

[oo2k15]

This looks to be the work of a Cryptolock type virus; what they do is search for all of the types of file extensions you mentioned and makes them look like the screenshots you provided.  They typically do not delete the files though, so that part is a bit strange.  If this is a cryptolock type virus, they will typically insert a little picture file inside each of the folders affected that tells you that you need to pay them to unlock them.  If you haven't found anything resembling this, then it is probably just the recovery program not being able to recover the full file.  I have one other thought...

 

I've seen plenty of times a user profile will randomly get corrupted and make it so when you log into Windows with your user name and password, it creates a temporary user profile that will not show any of your documents in the normal places.  To see if this is what's going on, browse to C:\Users and see if there are any duplicate folders that have your user name as the name.  If there are, try to browse through them to see if that's where all of your documents are sitting.

 

If neither of those are the case, then I'd need to look at the PC myself or get some other background info.

Nah there's nothing like that. That's what I thought at first too that my profile could've been corrupted but I don't see any indication that say other wise.

 

Right click your documents folder, go to "Restore Previous Version" and restore a previous version

Where is that? I don't see that option.

[GoodBytes]

Lesson 1: Backup. Please please please do backups! Windows 8 has this cool feature called File History. You point it to a drive, and it not only backups all your personal data, but also keep versions of them, where it can do backups ever hours, or 10min, or 5min even (it's pretty cleaver, it backups the bits that has changed only, so you can have years worth of 5min backup all fit not even half a 1TB data drive. Of course it depends on how much data you have. And it is flexible, you can tell it to store a last version of files on disk for easy access by you on the same or other system (important), and clean old data by saying to only keep the last month, or 6month or year.

 

I use it, and I faced with 0 performance degradation (then again I am on an SSD. But the backup is done on the HDD).

Beside that, every now and then I do disk level backup.

 

I strongly suggest for next time to look into it. I have lost data before. I guess that is how we all learned to start doing backups

 

Anyway,

 

Back to your problem.

Go to C:\Users\<ACCOUNT NAME>\

Do you see 1 or 2 "Documents" folder?

 

If you see 2, check both, is your data inside either?

If you see only 1, Right-click on it, click on Properties, Then select the "Location" tab. From there, you should have  a button called: "Restore Default". This will restore the location of your Document folder, Click on Apply, OK. And now open Documents folder, and see if your data is there.

 

If you see NO "Documents" folder, that is because you told Windows to locate it on a drive (See "Location" tab by Right-click on it, click on Properties on the folder), that is is unplugged. Make sure that the drive is plugged in properly. Restart the system.

[JustinBieber]

Nah there's nothing like that. That's what I thought at first too that my profile could've been corrupted but I don't see any indication that say other wise.

 

Where is that? I don't see that option.

 

Your not right clicking the folder then you must be right clicking the shortcut on the start menu

[oo2k15]

Lesson 1: Backup. Please please please do backups! Windows 8 has this cool feature called File History. You point it to a drive, and it not only backups all your personal data, but also keep versions of them, where it can do backups ever hours, or 10min, or 5min even (it's pretty cleaver, it backups the bits that has changed only, so you can have years worth of 5min backup all fit not even half a 1TB data drive. Of course it depends on how much data you have. And it is flexible, you can tell it to store a last version of files on disk for easy access by you on the same or other system (important), and clean old data by saying to only keep the last month, or 6month or year.

 

I use it, and I faced with 0 performance degradation (then again I am on an SSD. But the backup is done on the HDD).

Beside that, every now and then I do disk level backup.

 

I strongly suggest for next time to look into it. I have lost data before. I guess that is how we all learned to start doing backups

 

Anyway,

 

Back to your problem.

Go to C:\Users\<ACCOUNT NAME>\

Do you see 1 or 2 "Documents" folder?

 

If you see 2, check both, is your data inside either?

If you see only 1, Right-click on it, click on Properties, Then select the "Location" tab. From there, you should have  a button called: "Restore Default". This will restore the location of your Document folder, Click on Apply, OK. And now open Documents folder, and see if your data is there.

 

If you see NO "Documents" folder, that is because you told Windows to locate it on a drive (See "Location" tab by Right-click on it, click on Properties on the folder), that is is unplugged. Make sure that the drive is plugged in properly. Restart the system.

 

 

 

 

 

No I do not see documents folder on my C:\ drive. I move it to my secondary HDD which is where my document are. I made it so everything I save will go to my E:\ drive.

 

Currently I have

 

1.) Local Disk (C:) 120GB SSD where I install my OS

2.) Storage (E:) 3TB HDD

 

The documents that were lost were in Storage (E:) drive.

 

If you are referring to this, than yeah that's where my document used to be.

 

[GoodBytes]

No. It is for a reason I put it on bold.

Maybe I should have underlines as well: C:\Users\<ACCOUNT NAME>\

 

I think your documents are still in your E:\ drive. Just Documents doesn't link there anymore.

[Kherm]

-Snip-

Okay, could you show us this: 

on one half of your screen, have C:/Users/-user-/Documents, and on the other half of your screen have E:/Documents

 

That would help us tell if CCleaner messed up where your Documents link is pointing to.

[oo2k15]

Your not right clicking the folder then you must be right clicking the shortcut on the start menu

Yeah I still don't see that option. I'm right clicking the "Documents" folder. Right clicking it from start menu. From "Library". "This PC" and Storage (E:). Theres no such option. I also right click>properties nothing there as well. I know what you are talking about. This is the option right?

 

Well I don't see it anywhere. I'l even show it to you.

[oo2k15]

Okay, could you show us this: 

on one half of your screen, have C:/Users/-user-/Documents, and on the other half of your screen have E:/Documents

 

That would help us tell if CCleaner messed up where your Documents link is pointing to.

Here

C:/Users/-user-/Documents

 

E:/Documents

[Kherm]

Well okay, in your E: Drive, where it says "documents" shouldn't you be able to click on that and see all of your documents there?

[oo2k15]

Well okay, in your E: Drive, where it says "documents" shouldn't you be able to click on that and see all of your documents there?

 

Yes that's where all my deleted files were now they are all gone. I can retrieved them using EaseUS Recovery. But Like I said above I can't open any of those files that were deleted.

 

I'll show you all my documents that were deleted on E:Drive.

Before

 

Now

[ionbasa]

Use TestDisk to get your files back: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk

 

Tutorial: http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/Undelete_files_from_NTFS_with_TestDisk

[GoodBytes]

"Previous Version" Options does not exists in Windows 8. It was removed, for a better implementation: File History.

[JustinBieber]

"Previous Version" Options does not exists in Windows 7. It was removed, for a better implementation: File History.

 

When was it removed? I just reinstall win 7 ultimate on a new build and it has restore previous versions enabled by default as do a lot of my other clients, do you mean win 8?

[GoodBytes]

Heuu yes typo. Windows 8. Sorry. Fixed

Thanks