Content:
Recuva, a lightweight freeware applet by Piriform, is one of the world’s most effective solutions aimed at reviving deleted data. The usefulness of file recovery tools revolves around things like human error, hardware malfunctions, as well as incidents where a Windows computer has been compromised by malicious code.
In particular, certain fragments of data may vanish from the hard drive due to accidental manual deletion by the user, sudden system crashes, or the impact of crypto ransomware. The latter scenario has been on the rise over the past several years – when a ransom Trojan attack a PC, it encrypts one’s personal files, keeps these scrambled objects on the HDD, and deletes the original entries. No matter what exactly caused a file or multiple files to disappear, Recuva is likely to be able to handle the predicament and restore the information that seems lost for good.
This application is capable of reinstating erased items on different types of media, including local drives, external hard drives, memory cards, USB memory sticks and MP3 players. When it comes to file recovery from damaged or newly formatted disks, Recuva fares better than most of its competitors. This product is included into the feature set of CCleaner Professional Plus, another immensely popular tool by the Piriform vendor.
Recuva is very user-friendly, so it doesn’t take a tech-savvy user to fully benefit from its functionality. To its credit, it runs scans and recovers selected entities in a matter of seconds. Let’s have a detailed insight into how this tool operates and how efficient it is.
To give Recuva a shot, download its 5.2 MB installer from the official website and launch it. Before installation proper, consider clicking the Customize link on the wizard to toggle some preferences regarding desktop and Start menu shortcuts, additional context menu options, and automatic updates. By default, the setup client is configured to also install CCleaner in the bundle, so be sure to deselect this offer if you don’t want it. Then, go ahead and click Install.
The product will display several Recuva Wizard dialogs with radio buttons for different file types to recover, as well as file locations. You can opt out of this preset by clicking Cancel, but generally it’s quite useful for defining your scan preferences from the start.
Recuva then starts a scan of the drives or directories that you previously selected. In case you didn’t indicate any specific paths and file types, the tool will check all hard disk volumes for a totality of potentially recoverable data.
The scanning routine is amazingly fast, so the program will shortly present the results in its main pane. The time span is usually on the order of 20-30 seconds for a 500 GB hard drive. The list is structured by filename, path, the date that the file was last modified, the size and state of each element. The top section of the GUI is occupied by the product version, the operating system it’s installed on, as well as hardware details of the machine.
To reinstate a file of interest, a group of files or all of the detected entries, just put a checkmark next to the item (items) and select the Recover option. The same is doable by right-clicking an element and selecting the appropriate option in the context menu.
In order to toggle the program’s settings, hit the Options button in the upper right-hand part of the interface. Switch between the General, Actions, Advanced, Drives, and About tabs to adjust Recuva to your preferences or upgrade to the Pro version.
Piriform Recuva has got the mere essentials of data recovery under the hood. This isn’t a shortcoming, though, because these types of applications are not supposed to deliver a bevy of features. The main objective is to identify items that are recoverable and reinstate the selected files to their original location or a new path manually defined by the user. Here is the list of features that Recuva accommodates:
No forensic product is immaculate in terms of reinstating deleted files, because some or most of them may be completely corrupted or overwritten multiple times. The efficiency benchmark in this case basically boils down to recovering what’s recoverable. Piriform Recuva handles this task commendably, with the restoration success rate high enough to revive recently deleted files as well as some data obliterated weeks or even months back. However, the app was able to display very few file previews during the evaluation. To its credit, though, the application can do a great job restoring objects that underwent crypto ransomware impact.
As opposed to the Recuva Professional edition, Recuva Free doesn’t go with built-in tech support. The customers who use the freeware version, though, can visit the vendor’s Support page by clicking the Online Help button at the bottom of the application’s interface. The knowledgebase on the website includes general walkthroughs regarding the use of the product, a Frequently Asked Questions section, and a link to the Piriform Community Forum that contains a separate Recuva Discussion thread. Recuva Professional, in its turn, additionally features premium support through live chat with the company’s representatives.
In summary, Recuva by Piriform is an easy-to-use and CPU-friendly application that restores deleted files from different sorts of media, including hard disks, digital camera cards, USB sticks, MP3 players and external drives. Its lightning fast scans for erased data and the recovery speed are commendable.
Furthermore, the product features intuitive controls that allow users to get extensive file details and complete the recovery job within a single pane. While a lot of entries are flagged ‘red’, hence unrecoverable, there are plenty that can be restored to their original state. In the face of the continuously growing scourge of crypto ransomware, Recuva can make a great instrument for risk mitigation.
Exposure management is changing the way we assess risk, but not everyone is out in… Read More
Introduction: Navigating the SOCaaS Revolution In today's hyperconnected digital landscape, where cyber threats evolve faster… Read More
The Middle East and Asia are fast-growing hubs for both digital innovation and cyber threats,… Read More
In Europe, digital forensics and incident response firms operate within a complex landscape shaped by… Read More
The United States is home to many of the world’s leading digital forensics and incident… Read More
Third-party vendors have transformed operations for many entities. Tasks like payroll, shipping logistics, and IT… Read More