Retreive an over-written file

[l2aw]

Well yeah, the topic pretty much says it.

I accidently over-wrote a text file on another. And obviously, the original text file vanished.

Is there anyway to recover the original text file? It was quite important. I tried system restore (on different restore points) and it always says something about an incomplete restoration.

Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks!

 

[l2aw]

Okay. Nevermind. Don't answer that

I looked up google and there is hardly any chance to recover an overwritten file. But I assumed there would be some way out as it's only a text file. And PERHAPS I'm not even sure I overwrote it.

Nevertheless..

 

[Nodsu]

You could use any program that gives you raw access to the disk and search for some phrase from the text file. Who knows? Some bits of the thing may still be somewhere, even in the swapfile. Of course, you have to realise that every write operation - even installing a program - can potentially destroy more data.

In a proper OS (not Windows) you would also be able to search the system memory..

 

[Tedster]

had you had something like GOBACK, you might be able to recover it. But generally, once files are overwritten, they're gone forever. Important files should ALWAYS be duplicated. The duplication to another drive or device.