Hi,

Recently I stumbled upon software called GetDataBack for NTFS/FAT. Out of curiosity I got the demo and tried it on some deleted files.
I was surprised to see that it recovers waaaaaay less items than e.g. ease us recovery wizard or even DMDE.
Now I have an question, is it worth getting the license for it? Or should I stick with DMDE and/or ease us recovery wizard?

EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard: Several Severe Design Flaws, A Brief Review:

https://ww.reddit.com/r/datarecovery/comments/1925k1c/easeus_data_recovery_wizard_several_severe_design/

Here is a case where EaseUS scanned an entire drive and failed to find an intact $MFT:

https://www.reddit.com/r/datarecovery/comments/16eqyhg/does_this_prove_that_easeus_and_diskdrill_are_a/

What was the model of the HDD/SSD?

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Thank you for the info about the flaws. Never heard about them before.
The HDD is an WD1600AAJS which files where deleted with who knows what tool.

Were the deleted files recovered with their original file names?

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.

Most of them.

IDK. Perhaps GDB doesn't recover those files which it knows have been overwritten???

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.

FWIW, although you expect a file recovery tool to pick up deleted files, as a general test scenario I find deleted file recovery the least useful.

Oh and DMDE is goated.

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Joep - http://www.disktuna.com - video & photo repair & recovery service

I guess I'll run DMDE and see if it recovers the "SOFTWARE" file. Every other dr soft failed to recover an intact one.
One idea would be to get the "SOFTWARE" file, reinstall whatever windows was on another PC, swap the "SOFTWARE" files around and do repair of registry.

You've lost me, but whatever you do to waste time, have fun!

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Joep - http://www.disktuna.com - video & photo repair & recovery service

In simple form, I need to recover some license keys from an old install of who-knows-what windows. I found out that gdb exist so I tried it but turns out its far worse than DMDE and even easeus rw.

DMDE has found some "SOFTWARE" files but all of them aren't from config folder. Only one has unknown location, so I guess they are a lost cause.

Ah, I see. And those SOFTWARE files were deleted? How are opening the drive in DMDE? For deleted file recovery most efficient is to use Open Volume and then run only the quick scan.
https://youtu.be/sKpUiRDpLM8

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Joep - http://www.disktuna.com - video & photo repair & recovery service

I believe so. I select the drive, then enter the existing partition and do quick scan, but it now complains that it can't open any MFT's...

Never seen that. But then it seems there's bigger problems than deleted files.

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Joep - http://www.disktuna.com - video & photo repair & recovery service

Then I do wonder what did I do on this one... Partition is still there, can't recall if it was the original or other. Oh well.

So, run full scan.

_________________
Joep - http://www.disktuna.com - video & photo repair & recovery service