Professional Undeleter

very good
key review info
application features
  • Hard Drives that have been formatted.
  • (9 more, see all...)

Accidental file deletion is the number one cause for losing your files and even if sometimes it seems like the only solution for recovering them is to start your work from scratch, you can actually push the envelope on this one as there are plenty of answers on the market. The category of file recovery tools, or file undeleters, is quite vast and prices are for every pocket.

Generally, recovery tools as cheap as dirt are for immediate use only as they cannot deal with formatted partitions and their capabilities are limited to recouping shift-deleted information. The golden rule in retrieving lost data is to restrict access to the drive you want to recover from as any scrap of information ulteriorly stored there may overwrite the files rendering them irrecoverable.

EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard Professional is designed with the sole purpose to help you get your lost files back in place. The application is a $79.95 solution for recouping shift deleted files, data on formatted partitions or even recovering entire partitions.

It comes with a slick interface, extremely easy to use even by a total noob. The application consists of three main menus designed for deleted file recovery, complete recovery that can retrieve files from formatted drives and partition recovery which is built to recover data from crashed file systems, deleted partitions or those affected by virus attacks.

Getting your files back using EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard Professional is an extremely easy operation due to the wizard-like interface. Immediately after choosing the module print screen, you will be faced with a list of drives the program can scan for deleted files and recuperate them. All you have to do is select and click next. The software quickly scans the drive and then displays the findings.

If Deleted File Recovery module does not do the job (it works only for shift-deleted files) crank up the level one notch by changing to Complete Recovery module. This one is more thorough and has better chances of getting you the data back.

Complete Recovery module is not too different from the anterior one and after a quick estimation, it will too display all the drives on your computer letting you choose the one to perform the scanning for lost data on. Intelligent Searching may take a while to complete as the engine is more diligent in its job. However, if you want to benefit from full power and increase your chances in retrieving files, you have to make a few settings and enable RAW files recovery.

The operation is achieved from the top left hand part of the interface, under Options. There, you can make the settings for FAT 12/16/32 systems, NTFS, enable the use of boot records and enable RAW file recovery. In the latter case, users can choose from six different categories the type of files EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard Professional should look for and recover. These cover everything from graphic formats, documents and archives to multimedia files, email data and database and financial file types. Each of the aforementioned sections can be expanded thus having the possibility to narrow the items down a bit and speed the scan process up.

However, it seems like the software has its limits: during our testing, it did great after quick formatting of the drives but encountered difficulties when it came to detecting data on full formatted drives. The tests were done on both NTFS and FAT32 systems with the same rate of success. With quick format though, the application did everything by the book and successfully recovered all the files with absolutely no problem.

Intelligent Searching window shows the user the progress of the operation and, besides the completion estimation time and the progress bar, it also provides details on the number of partition tables found, FAT and NTFS boot sectors, FAT folders and folder parts as well as a number of identified files and a total of files found on the drive.

The application sports very handy features designed to pull you out of the jam should something happen to important data on specific partitions. The purpose of Disk Image option, accessible from Complete Recovery and Partition Recovery module is similar to backing up your data as it creates a container with all the information on the assigned drive. The upside is that the size of the resulting will be slightly larger than the data on the partition and you can recoup it at any time by loading the image file and working with it as if it were a real drive.

Creating an image file is a piece of cake thanks to the guiding wizard that will help you at each step until the final end is achieved. The options provide you three compression levels and automatic splitting of the image into preset sizes (640MB, 1GB, 2GB and 4GB).

Partition Recovery, the third module of the application, deals with retrieving data from lost drives of your hard disk. Unfortunately, we could not create an environment to properly test the feature, but what we can say is that it will retrieve deleted data from an entire drive.

All in all, the application's three modules come wrapped in a professional interface whose topmost feature is ease of use. If you count on the golden rule of file recovery (never ever write new data on the partition you want to retrieve files from) and as long as the formatting damage is not too serious, EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard Professional will do a great job.

The Good

Everything is enwrapped in a straightforward interface that should raise no problems to users, regardless of their computer skills.

Letting your mouse slide on any of the three modules available will provide a brief description of the situation it should be used for.

The application allows users to create disk images for drives containing important data for protection against virus attacks or hardware failures and prevent an informational aftermath, just like in the case of creating a backup.

We successfully recovered data after shift deleting it and quick format could not stand in the way of the application either.

The Bad

First and foremost, the price is one of the greatest disadvantages of the program. Also, we were unsuccessful in retrieving data from fully formatted drives.

Unlike other software in the same category, EaseUs Data Recovery Wizard Professional does not display all encountered data and users have to make use of RAW files detection for the best results and this provides a limited number of formats without the possibility of enriching the list.

The Truth

In a real life scenario, the application will do its job and help you recover lost data. It has no problems with recouping deleted files and if you obey the golden rule in file recovery, you will find it most efficient.

However, the price is beyond the beautiful interface, the extraordinary ease of use and efficiency provided and this is the major downfall of the application.

Here are some snapshots of the application in action:

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user interface 5
features 4
ease of use 5
pricing / value 3


final rating 4
Editor's review
very good
 
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