Find All Of The Fragmented Data

When data recovery tools analyze deleted and unallocated disk space for lost and hidden files, disk fragmentation throws a wrench into the process.  Most Disk Operating Systems (like MS Windows) write files in consecutive sectors until they hit a populated sector, then they jump over the populated sectors in search of another unused sector.  This process fragments files and makes it more difficult to recover them.  Recovering deleted files has the advantage of knowing the original filename, size of the file and the sector where the file starts.  After recovering that first sector, typical tools continue copying consecutive unallocated sectors until they have reached the known file size.  They can't be sure that other unrelated deleted file sectors aren't mixed in with the recovered sectors.  It also doesn't help when some operating systems jump around when looking for unallocated sectors, rather than moving across the hard drive sectors consecutively.

On the cutting edge of advanced data recovery is Disk Carving (also known as File Carving or Data Carving).  There are many methods being developed to analyze recovered sectors in order to verify a recovered file's integrity.  Most methods are still limited by the assumption that a file's sectors will be stored sequentially.  Some research has been done in identifying what type of file each recovered sector belongs to.  With this knowledge, tools can more intelligently put file fragments together much like a jigsaw puzzle.  Unfortunately, this research has been limited to only a few file types known to use consistently structured file formats.

Forensic Innovations has leveraged the File Investigator technology to develop a Disk Carving solution far superior to any other product.  This File Harvester technology analyzes recovered disk sectors using multiple methods of pattern matching and signature analysis to reassemble deleted and unused disk space into complete files and partial files when some sectors have been overwritten.  We can even recover file types that we have never seen before.  No other company has the file format knowledge and technology that we're using.

Rename Recovered Files Automatically

Once you recover files from a damaged hard drive, or unallocated space on a good hard drive, you are often missing their filenames.  What can you do with a file if it has the wrong file extension for MS Windows to associate it with an application?  You can try renaming the file extension to some common types (like .xls, .doc, etc.), but with thousands of recovered files, no one has time for that.

File Investigator extracts the necessary file type, valid file extension and metadata for renaming the file's name and extension to something that both you and Windows will recognize.  After using File Investigator on your recovered files, they will have document titles, metadata details and file types as their names and the correct file extensions to be opened by their native applications.