From the same guys who brought you CCleaner and Defraggler comes this really useful free tool that helps you restore lost files, whether you accidentally shift-deleted them a minute ago, or emptied through the recycling bin days before. Recuva is really simple to use and works fast.

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I have used this software with special thanks to the pros on this forum for recommending it.
It works really well.

While I don't mind the software these guys produce I had some major issues with Defraggler 'eating' my HDD space. Every 10mins of work I would lose another 4GB and I never got it back. So chances are I'm steering clear of them now...

If what you say is true, you have major issues you can't blame the software for...

How does this software work on networks, as I have some users that have very happy delete trigger fingers and It takes IBM ages just to do a restore of certain files.

I am not a fan of Recuva. I found the best recovery software is GetDataBack

http://www.runtime.org/

I can vouch for Get Data Back from runtime.org as being vastly superior to this.
However, Get Data Back is not free and this is.

I have used recuva in the past and it was probably 50% effective for me.

"Vastly superior" is quite a stretch. We use Recuva a great deal with some clients. It is remarkabley trouble-free, and it is free, compared to GetDataBack.
What is more, I clients like it for its simplicity, apart from the fact that it costs most people nothing.

We would not use Recuva, if we were being paid to recover the data, but we would not use GetDataBack either when paid to do our best work.

After 3 hours with Recuva , i got 3 files back.

Get Back Data, recovered over 1600 files just after 10min on same HDD.


Recuva is junk!

Well, I must say that with Recuva I've managed to recover a lot of essential files who were accidentally deleted with 100% rate of success. And I'm happy it's free!

I've been using Recuva (the portable version) for quite some time now. Great app!!!

I keep Recuva as a tool on my "tool stick" (a USB stick). I haven't had to use it for anything yet ... but I am ready if needed. If there were any other free tools like this, I would try it also.

this is a useful tool especially to those clumsy persons like me. i always "accidentally" delete some of my files because of my fast finger clicking. with this tool installed in my computer, worry no more!

in addition, it has also the deep scan feature that makes it more interesting to use. me myself still havent use this software for restoration, but once i already have my computer here in china, probably softwares like these are the once i will install first.

anyway, nothing still beats the power backup-copying. especially if you work to in a company the security is at stake, recuva tool will be a great help, but having a usb as a secondary storage device would be a great help sometimes.

We use Recuva upon occasion because it is free and quick to install. Handy for simple tasks.
But it is far from the best file recovery program. It is slow to very slow, and the results are sometimes incomplete compared to other file recovery software. It does recover a heck of a lot of stuff that was long ago erased. But we find it inconsistent.