Deleting a folder from an external hard drive either accidentally or knowingly, and later realizing that the deleted folder was very much needed, can be a stressful experience. Whether it contains important work documents, cherished memories, or crucial files, the loss of a folder can disrupt your workflow and result in significant data loss. However, still there is a hope of recovering deleted folder from external hard drive. In this article, we will guide you through manual methods and software solutions to help you recover a deleted folder from an external hard drive. By following these steps, you can increase your chances of retrieving your valuable data and restoring it to its original state.
Before we talk about the recovery of deleted folders let’s have a quick look over the possible reasons where folders from external hard drive may get deleted. The following are some common ways where you might end up in deleting folders from your external hard drive.
Manual Methods to Recover Deleted Folder from External Hard Drive:
Method 1. Check The Recycle Bin Folder: When you delete a folder from an external hard drive connected to a Windows or macOS system, it might be temporarily stored in the Recycle Bin or Trash. Start by accessing the Recycle Bin (Windows) or Trash (Mac) and look for the deleted folder. If found, right-click on it and select "Restore" or "Put Back" to return the folder to its original location on the external hard drive.
Method 2. Use File History or Previous Versions (Windows): If you have enabled the File History feature on your Windows computer, you might be able to recover a deleted folder from an external hard drive. Right-click on the parent folder where the deleted folder was located, then select "Restore previous versions", and choose a previous version that contains the deleted folder. Copy the folder to a different location to restore it. This method relies on having created backups or enabled system restore points.
Method 3. Look for A backup: If you have a backup strategy in place, check your backup storage for a copy of the deleted folder. This can be a physical backup device, cloud storage, or another external hard drive. If a recent backup exists, restore the deleted folder from the backup to your external hard drive.
Method 4. Use Undelete Folder Software: If you are not able to get back your deleted folder/s with the above three manual methods, then the last option is to use a reliable data recovery software. Undelete Folder is the most reliable and effective recovery tool that can retrieve deleted & lost folders from external hard drive with utmost ease. The tool comes in both Windows & Mac edition (Compatible with all the versions of Operating Systems), and is available for free download. Just download the software, and follow the instructions given below and get back your deleted folder from external hard drive.
Steps to recover deleted folder from external hard drive:
Step 1: Download and install the software. After launching this tool choose "Recover Files" from start window and then choose “Recover Deleted Files" option from second screen.
Figure 1: Main Window
Step 2: Select the external hard drive from which you need to restore folders. Once the drive is selected then click on next button to starts scan process, after completion of scan all folders will be retrieved.Figure 2: Select External Hard Drive
Step 3: You can preview all recovered folders using preview option as shown in figure 3 once the recovery process is done.Figure 3: Preview Recovered Folders