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Data Recovery on Mac OS X

My worst nightmare occurred at the beginning of this week. I had arrived on Oahu, Hawaii, where I shot photos at Kailua Beach Park, Kaena Point State Park, Ko Olina, and several other places. These photos were shot with my Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX1 and Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3. After copying the photos to Mac OS X (10.5.8), I accidentally deleted all the photos. Mac OS X runs on top of Darwin, a UNIX variant. On UNIX, it is impossible to undelete file. Frantically, I started looking for data recovery software on the Internet.

The data recovery software I decided to try was FileSalvage 7. It costs $89.95 for a CD or $79.95 if you download it from its web site. I promptly bought a copy and downloaded it to my hotel room. File Salvage 7 works by analyzing your hard drive (or other mass storage device) for data files that it recognizes. It recognize a whole list of file types; JPEG being one of them. Sadly, FileSalvage 7 does not recognize Panasonic RAW file types. Fortunately for me, I shot photos in both RAW+JPEG formats.

It took FileSalvage 7 about three to four days to scan my entire 160 GB hard drive in byte-by-byte mode (the faster block-by-block mode could not find all my JPEG photos). During this time, I did not use my computer, in order to reduce the risk of new data over writing the deleted data. After four days, I found around 4500 photos, which I asked it to salvage. Just briefly looking through the photos, I believe it recovered most, if not all of the deleted photos for this Oahu trip.

I am quite grateful for FileSalvage 7. There are quite a few photos that are not replaceable no matter how many times I go back to those destinations. And with FileSalvage 7, I didn't have to go back. Even though I lost all of the RAW files, I recovered the JPEG files.

Chieh Cheng
Fri, 25 Feb 2011 18:32:10 +0000

Well, this kind of suffering really hit those camera lovers here and there. It seems accidental deletion cases has never been reduced(Probably it's time for those digital device manufacturers to re-think about the design, whether to put a Recycle Bin function with cameras or camcorders. hah, just personal suggestion.) But with data recovery software, most files can be rescued if users take right steps.

To recover deleted photos on Mac OS X, there is another good program that may have more good performance than FileSalvage 7. Here is the link and hope Chief allow me to share. http://www.anysoftwaretools.com/data-recovery-for-mac.html

I tried it with My iMac 10.6, it only takes me about 12 hours to finish scanning my 500GB Macintosh HD. Moreover, it has a function "Save & Resume Scan" which means users don't have to wait for a whole day before those deleted items (photos, videos or documents) are recovered.
- M.S.

Michael.S
Thu, 25 Aug 2011 02:23:17 +0000

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Title: How can I recover deleted photos with my Mac machine?
Weblog: Camera Hacker
Excerpt: Because it's on a memory card, which is likely formatted with FAT or FAT32 (both Windows format), you'll have better luck with a Windows computer using a freeware like "Restoration": http://www.snapfiles.com/get/restoration.html If your photos are on the Mac hard drive, rather than the memory ca . . .
Tracked: Tue, 31 May 2011 17:04:56 +0000

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