I never realized the past three articles would provide me with so much email from readers. So today I will close out the series with one final shot at discussing things people want to know most from me.
One follow up to last week. I did not recommend the $49 version of various tablets and I listed the reasons. One person wrote to tell me they had one and it was fantastic. I am happy for them and for anyone who would like to use one of the more inexpensive tablets. However, I stand by what I said as far as features, speed, available apps and capabilities. If it is your first tablet and you are enjoying it please continue. If you compared it to one of the more expensive models you would be astounded at the difference. I was also asked for prices of tablets. In regard to Android only the better ones start around $150 and top out around $600 depending on brand and capabilities.
Wendy and several others have written recently saying something similar to, "I accidentally deleted 1,000 pictures from my SD Card from vacation…can I get them back?" Well the answer is usually, but not always, no. Here is how you can try.
The company Piriform has several utilities I have recommended in the past. First and foremost is CCleaner followed up closely by Defraggler. The third is Recuva (piriform.com/recuva). One warning: there are many "fake" Piriform products out there so make sure you always download them from Piriform.com to get the real things.
Recuva is quite easy to use. Download it. Install it. Run it. It will ask you first what type of files you are looking for; All file types? Photos? Music? Select what you need. Next it will ask where to look for them. This is where you can choose your SD card (if plugged into your computer), a specific folder on your computer or my favorite, the Recycle Bin. Next it will ask where you would like to restore the files. If you are searching an SD Card I would select somewhere on your computer’s hard drive for the restored files. Then start it and let it run. The number of files it has to search for determines how long it will take. I have found it to be very successful in recovering deleted files for me.
There is an essential caveat that you should be aware of for "undeleting" files. This is that you do it soon after deleting the file.
The way windows computers work when you delete a file, it really doesn’t delete it, even when you empty the recycle bin. The operating system actually puts a mark on the file which tells the system that if this space is needed to store another file, it can be used.
So the file is there but it will be overwritten if/when needed. The longer you wait the more chance there is that it will be partially or fully destroyed. Think of an old cassette tape. You can record something and then rerecord over it, making the first recording useless.
So if you know you have deleted a file on your SD card, pull that card out of your camera and use another one…now. Then your chances of getting those beautiful vacation pictures back are greatly increased.
