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How to Recover Data from Hard Drive

Updated on April 04, 2019 Preview 3.3K Preview 0
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No robots used, this article has been written and edited by our team under strict editorial guidelines.
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Written by Connie Yu
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Approved by JK Tam

When you permanently delete important files from hard drive by accident or the hard drive is unconsciously damaged or crashed during computer usage, and this will usually result in data loss. Therefore, how to recover data from hard drive becomes a matter of importance. And you can follow the guide below to recover files from hard drive of a Windows or Mac computer.

Why Can You Recover Hard Drive Data?

Hard drive data can be recovered as the deleted files are not erased permanently and they continue to exist on the hard drive. For example, when you delete a file on Windows, Windows will remove the pointer and mark the sectors containing the file’s data as available. From the file system’s point of view, the file is no longer present on your hard drive and the sectors containing its data are considered free space. So that’s why you can recover data from hard drive even after they have been deleted.

If you’ve accidentally deleted some important files, there are some things you should keep in mind:

You should stop using the hard drive: After you deleted files, stop making any changes to your hard drive immediately. If computer continues to write files to your hard drive, the chance of recovering the deleted files decreases.

You should recover the file as soon as possible: You should recover files from hard drive immediately by using a hard drive recovery program. And don’t install the hard drive data recovery software on the same hard drive where you deleted files.

How to Recover Data from Hard Drive

If you want to recover data from hard drive, it's important to find a safe and reliable hard drive data recovery tool to avoid further data loss. So here I will recommend you Cisdem Data Recovery.

Cisdem Data Recovery allows you to recover photos, videos, documents, emails, archives and more from a full range of hard disk drives. This includes internal and external hard drives like Seagate, Samsung, SanDisk, Toshiba, etc.

Cisdem Data Recovery can get files back under different data loss situations, for example mistaken deletion, formation, factory reset, virus attack, disk crash, etc. With it, you’ll never worry about hard drive data loss. It also received many good reviews from authority tech websites. It’s free for you to try and lifetime free upgrade is also supported.

Cisdem Data Recovery can be a lifesaver for many of us. Losing important files can be a big problem for us. Fortunately, this software solves this issue. Overall, this is a good data recovery software for Mac. — Shubham@TechGuru

Step to recover data from hard drive on Mac and Windows:

1. Download Cisdem Data Recovery for free trial.
Free Download macOS 10.15 or later Free Download Windows 11/10/8/7

2. Run the program.

3. Choose hard drive you want to recover. Cisdem Data Recovery will list all detected hard drives and external storage devices. Choose the hard drive where you want to recover data. Then click “Search for lost files” and this hard drive recovery software start to scan your hard drive.

scan hard drive

4. After scanning, you will see all found files listed in the left column. Click each file to preview. Then choose what you need and click "Recover" button to recover data from hard drive. Be aware of not to save data to the hard drive where data loss happens. This may cause data overwritten.

recover hard drive

About the authors
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Written by Connie Yu

Connie Yu has been a columnist in the field of data recovery since 2011. She studied a lot of data loss situations and tested repeatedly to find a feasible solution tailored for each case. And her solutions are always updated to fix problems from the newest systems, devices and apps.

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Approved by JK Tam

JK Tam is the lead developer at Cisdem, bringing over two decades of hands-on experience in cross-platform software development to the editorial team. He is now the lead technical approver for all articles related to Data Recovery and DVD Burner.

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