Disruptor wrote on 2023-11-25, 13:38:

1) do NOTHING with that drive, treat it READ ONLY 2) use a program like "Recuva" or "File Scavenger" and do a long search on you […]
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1) do NOTHING with that drive, treat it READ ONLY
2) use a program like "Recuva" or "File Scavenger" and do a long search on your disk
3) you need an extra disk where you can park your restored files
4) you will probably lose some files, deal with it

dionb wrote on 2023-11-25, 11:19:

- the partitions don't have drive letters associated - have they been formatted with a file system? If not, how are you sure there is still any data on them in the current state?

that's a good status. at least it cannot be made worse now. as there is no file system detected, no one will write to unassigned/unformatted partitions

Thank You everyone for the help and advice 😀
I really recommend "File Scavenger" A LOT 😀

I started a format of a new Seagate Expansion 6Tb 2.5" disk last night at about 19:40...
Its still running at 04:51 the next morning, I dont expect it to finish today, though it might finish in the wee small hours the day after.

NTFS

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2023-11-30, 04:52:

I started a format of a new Seagate Expansion 6Tb 2.5" disk last night at about 19:40...
Its still running at 04:51 the next morning, I dont expect it to finish today, though it might finish in the wee small hours the day after.

NTFS

Do you remember the times when an entire hard disk format has been finished in less than 2 minutes?

If that's shingled (SMR) drive, doing a full (non-quick) format means a whole bunch of unnecessary writes...

Disruptor wrote on 2023-11-30, 11:40:

ElectroSoldier wrote on 2023-11-30, 04:52:

I started a format of a new Seagate Expansion 6Tb 2.5" disk last night at about 19:40...
Its still running at 04:51 the next morning, I dont expect it to finish today, though it might finish in the wee small hours the day after.

NTFS

Do you remember the times when an entire hard disk format has been finished in less than 2 minutes?

I do. I still use some in my retro machined.
Good days.

jmarsh wrote on 2023-11-30, 15:09:

If that's shingled (SMR) drive, doing a full (non-quick) format means a whole bunch of unnecessary writes...

Yes it is SMR, its rare to find a new cheap high capacity spinning disk these days. Especially when you consider this cost £28.99. New including delivery.

Yes it does mean a lot of unnecessary writes, but its so large that I dont really feel good writing so much data to a disk without knowing Im going to be able to access it. So I dont mind waiting 3-4 days to format a disk, because if I dont Ill never use it anyway.

ontrca wrote on 2023-11-25, 13:14:

I've Googled quite a bit and I don't think there is a way to get my data back 🙁

And the drive was almost full too 🙁

NO!

Use a copy of Testdisk run from a USB stick. Tell it to deep scan for partitions. It scans for the actual filesystem signatures, and can reconstruct the screwed up partitions.

This assumes that nothing tried to reformat the data though. A "quickformat" only messes with part of the volume, not the whole data area, which is why it is "quick."

You can get it all back in just a few hours.
When I get home ill send you some old software I use to use when the company I worked for did professional data recovery.
As long as its on a HBA not a RAID controller it will see and recover anything in an NTFS partition.