Unable to find files on removed hard drive

**duckmouth** · 23-11-2009

Hi guys, I have a problem. My laptop motherboard fried, so I removed the hard drive and purchased a caddy. When I plug the hard drive in to my new desktop PC I am able to see that only 4GB of the 100 GB capacity is available (as should be the case). However, I cannot see any of my files on there (folders I had created on the desktop etc.). The only folders I can see are PerfLogs, Program Files, SwSetup, Users, Windows and two of my personal folders (both containing some photos).

I really need to find the rest of my files as I have 12GBs of photos and videos of my baby boy on there, and would be gutted if I cannot access them again (for obvious reasons). Nothing else is important. Please help me if you can. Thanks.

P.S. Both my laptop and my PC are Vista. If I need to provide any other info please ask. Thanks again. My personal email is smarty_j_shields AT yahoo.co.uk

**Rawko** · 23-11-2009

The symptom occurs because when autorun.vbs is created by trojan horse or virus. First run your system in safe mode, then go to your my computer properties and enable the system restore function. Windows files are stored on either a FAT system or an NTFS system Data stored on both of these systems is almost always recoverable. FAT or File Allocation Tables were the primary Windows hard drive division system until the creation of NTFS segmented hard drives. The virus normally loads autorun.inf file to root folder of all hard drive or USB drive, and then execute autorun.bat file which contains script to apply and merge autorun.reg into the registry, with possible change to the following registry key to ensure that virus is loaded when system starts:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon]
Userinit=userinit.exe,autorun.exe

**Maxforu** · 23-11-2009

Hi, I think you are getting this problem due to the new motherboard. I think your problem would be solved only by the use of HardDisk recovery software, so that it can perform some task and you can get your old data. As you are able view the size which is full due to existing data, I think your problem would be solved. You can make use of softwares such as Stellar Phoenix Windows Data Recovery, Stellar Phoenix Photo Recovery ,Windows Data Recovery Software V4.1, Recover My Files etc. You can simply use one of it and try to recover it.