It’s a horrible feeling when you cannot find an important file that you need. We have all been there; we have spent a lot of time creating an important document, where it be a school paper, proposal, bid, etc. And just when you need that file, you can’t find it. Before panic sets in, try these steps.

Recent Documents

First, open the program that you used to create the file and see if you can open “Recent Documents.” Many programs like MS Office keep a list of recent files that you have opened. Simply find and open the file.

My Recent Documents or Recent Items

In XP or Vista, go to Start and look in My Recent Documents (XP), or Recent Items (Vista) and see if your document is listed there, if so just open the file by clicking on it.

Recycle Bin

Check the Recycle Bin. By default the Recycle Bin is located on your desktop. Double click the icon and look for your document. When you find you document, you will need to right click on the file and select restore. Make sure you make note of the file location.

Search

Open Windows Explorer and use either the Windows Desktop Search, if you have it installed, or the Search Companion. You can customize the search criteria with things ling file name, date last edited, test in the file, and others. If you save your documents outside of your profile, expand your search to take this into account.

Lost Forever?

Maybe. If you haven’t found your file with the methods above, all is not lost. Some programs keep a temporary file of your work. Also, programs like Outlook keep a copy of an email file attachment that you open. To fine these files take a little more work. You will want to include hidden and system files in your search. Usually, the file name will not be the same, so the date of last opening or some text in the file will be needed to narrow your search. You may have to open the file in Notepad because it may not be saved in the normal file format.

Special Programs

You have one last option that you can try yourself; try to recover the document with recovery software. There is a free program called Recuva. Download Recuva from FileHippo.com.

Another program I like is Handy Recovery Download Handy Recovery here. The program is not free, but the value of you missing files may make it worth the cost. I have tested this program extensively and it works just as good as a $2,000 program I use at work.

Last Chance

If all else fails, you can get my ebook, How to Recover Data From a Hard Drive, and I can show you how to recover you data. Or, you can send your hard drive to a recovery service like One Track. Be advised that these services are very expensive. We just used One Track about a month ago and it cost $1,450 to recover a hard drive.

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