Summary: Did you accidentally delete files from your hard disk? Do you want to retrieve them free of charge? We’ve provided some easy ways to retrieve deleted files from your hard drive for free in this article. We also mentioned a trusted, free tool that can be used to recover deleted or lost files from your hard drive.
Internal and external hard drives are used to store documents, photos, videos, and other data. Sometimes, data can be lost from your hard drive due to corruption, malware intrusions, bad sectors on the drive or formatting.
There is no need for panic if you have lost files, photos, audio or videos due to deletion. Download the software below to retrieve your files from your hard drive for free. However, by using free data recovery software, you can recover free data up to 1 GB. This article provides three simple and effective ways to retrieve and restore files deleted from hard drives.
Free Methods to Get Deleted Files Back from Your Hard Disk
[Method 1] Restore deleted files from the Windows Recycle Bin
Files are temporarily saved in the Recycle Bin folder when you delete them from a Windows computer. Follow the steps below to restore files deleted from Recycle Bin.
- OpenRecycle binFolder on your Windows system
- Search for deleted files
- You can find deleted files if you can locate them.
- Right-click on the selection and click restore. You will get the deleted files back to their original locations on your computer.
You can check this: Best Free file recovery for deleted file recovery
Windows Recycle Bin Limitations
Recycle Bin data cannot be restored under certain circumstances:
- You can’t convert files deleted by Shift+Del keys.
- You can’t undo the Recycle Bin process and not restore deleted files if you have.
- Recycle Bin does not retain files deleted from external hard drives.
- The default retention period for deleted files in Recycle Bin, which is 30 days, means that you may not be able to find them after this time.
[Method 2] – Use Windows “Previous Versions” to restore deleted files
These are the steps for restoring files deleted from previous versions:
- Right-click on the folder containing the deleted files and click restore older versions
- The date of modification will show all previous versions.
- To find the version containing deleted files, open folder versions
- You can find deleted files in any folder version. Copy the files and place them at the desired location.
Limitations to “Previous Versions”
This method, while efficient and free of any limitations, is not without its limits. This method only works if the following settings have been previously configured on your Windows system before you delete them:
- System Protection is ON. System Restore Point or File History are created.
- Volume Shadow Copy Service is “Started.”
[Method #3]: Recover deleted files using a free file recovery Software
You can use a trusted, free data recovery software such as Stellar Data Recovery to recover deleted files from hard drives.
The Key Benefits of Stellar Data Recovery Software:
- Free recovery and storage of up to 1GB of deleted files
- Free and safe file recovery software
- Recovers files lost due to deletion, formatting, HDD corruption, etc.
Steps to recover deleted files using the software
- If external, connect the hard drive to Windows
- Install the software free of charge on your computer, then launch it.
- Select the desired option from the main interface Data Click here Next
- Click on the volume you wish to select and then click take a look at the scan to begin the scanning process
- After the scan is complete, a list of all recoverable files will appear. Click on the files that you wish to recover. Recover
- BrowseClick on the desired folder to be saved, then click save Now
You can now save deleted files, videos, photos, audio, and other files. You will find the destination you want.
Conclusion
The manual methods in this article can be used to recover files that have been deleted from your hard drive. The manual techniques are not perfect. Stellar Data Recovery is a reliable and safe software that can recover deleted files without any charges. This DIY software is the best for file recovery. It can also save you time and effort by recovering your data from a hard drive in just a few steps.