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upul007Flag for Sri Lanka

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Folder replaced with a folder with identical name and data lost

A user on our network had mistakenly okayed copying a different folder with the same name into the My Documents folder containing another folder with the same name. The original folders contents were lost and the replaced contents can be seen within the folder.

User is running Windows 2000 professional and the filing system is NTFS. There are no backups. Ineed to get a second opinion on the possibility of recovery.Maximum points to the answer with the best explanation and please do not post any links.

Thanks

Upul
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Irwin Santos
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Avatar of upul007

ASKER

Thanks chaps. I know it, my system admin knows it. Have to convince others.
perhaps in the future, you have some kind of backup plan in store?
cool. thanks!
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ASKER

back up plans are in place, facing a budget problem over here and hence, not implemented. Our friend at office had even shared his my Documents folder which is also forbidden. Sometimes I think I am dreaming.

You are most welcome. Dead On Arrival was not the expression I used to comment to the Guy who did it.
Ok..

How about WTF?

:-)
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ASKER

;-)
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NicoLaan

There is software available to search for old files that previously existed on the drive. Files that where deleted or got lost in some other way.
You have a reasonabe chance to get some of the old files back that way.
However the best tools for this also cost money I'm sure.

I had a harddisk crash and was able to recover loads of files using such tools.
Check my profile and my asked questions if you want to know more.
(you didn't want any links you said)

I know a harddisk crash is not the same as overwriting a folder, however there is a chance.
"I know a harddisk crash is not the same as overwriting a folder, however there is a chance."

The chance would be how much and how far in to the file structure the data was overwritten.

If the areas where the original file was overwritten....then no one on earth will help you except Superman (he can rotate the Earth on it's axis and turn back time)
http://www.ctrlaltdel-usa.net/yabb_2_1_superman/YaBB.pl

But I'm not going to work that hard to do this :-)
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ASKER

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your comments. We tried several tools. One tool even showed the proper path that the files were supposed to be in. How ever my co-worker at office had gone on a rampage of locating and saving the lost documents from applications used / email / Winfax.

What I managed to recover was only about a dozen doucuments where there were supposed to be hundreds. And these were corrupted.

When I posted the user was told not to do any work for a while, but being a service oriented person, he had tried to sort out a matter for a client and was already saving the stuff when I got there with the downloaded tools.

Frankly when I try to help somebody at office I wish they would have the decency to listen up to what being said. And once they help themselves to mess things up, IT support are are expected to perform miracles.

Forme old chaps, the case is closed.

best regards

Upul
In The Tiny Island Called Sri Lanka