Were did the files go???

[Russ Fill]

Just was working with the new Build 16 and had about 50 clips on a drive and dropped them to the time line and wanted to get rid of some of them out of the time line, so I hit delete and it asked me if I wanted to move them to the trash which I clicked yes. Oops.. not the files I wanted to delete. So I tried to control Z them but to no avail.
So you would think they would be in the trash... nope and now the only thing I have on the drive is the S027_C015_0615BB.RMD, RMD files where the R3D files were.
Can any one tell me how to get them back... Oh build 16 promptly crashed after this situation of course. The drive still has RMD files for each clip and I havent hit the empty trash but I cant find where the clips went.. There is still the amount of space taken on the drive but in the mail folder that holds all the files the space seems to have changed.
Am I out of luck or are the files still somewhere .. seems like they should be still on the drive... maybe?
Anyone that can talk me out of this one will be my hero.
Oh MBP late 2011 2.3, i7, 16 gig RAM

[Cory Petkovsek]

First, stop using the system immediately. If they are deleted, any write to the harddrive could make them unrecoverable. If this is your only system, use it as minimally as possible. Don't check email, nor anything that will download or write to the disk.

1. If you have the r3ds on the camera media, just copy from there and be done with it. If you can check from another system that is ideal.

2. If you don't see any r3ds in the trash, check what is in your trash from the terminal:
- Run terminal (apps/utilities)
- type the following:
ls -l ~/.Trash
- Post the results. We're looking for a list of r3d files. If you don't see any, try this command:
find ~/.Trash
- This will list all files within subdirectories as well. If there are some, we'll figure out a way to get them out.

3. Download one or more of the following file recovery utilities. You don't want the download to write to your drive, thus potentially overwriting your deleted data. If you have a USB stick, plug it in and right-click the download links and use save as or download as feature to specify the download should go directly to the USB stick instead of your download folder. Then run the programs from there.

Some of them even have a bootable CD like prosofteng. The ideal would be, you don't touch this system again. Go to another computer, review the features and procedures of the various software packages, download a bootable CD and burn it to a disk, then boot this computer off of it. That will allow it to scan the whole harddrive without modifying it. If that is impossible, then download the file to a usb stick/drive as suggested above.

They all should have a free version where it will scan and tell you which files can be recovered, but you have to buy the software to actually do it (<$100). Compare their results. One may say it can recover 2 of your files, and another says it can recover 50. Look at the file sizes, filenames, dates and make sure it all makes sense. You are in corruption territory. Using the system may have overwritten some data. Even if you get the files back, some may be partially corrupt. When you have purchased and are ready to recover the files, it is best if you can recover them to another drive (like a usb drive). That way you can test out the results without modifying your drive. If the files fail to recover, you can possibly get your money back and try another software.
http://macosxfilerecovery.com/datare...recovery-guru/
http://www.cleverfiles.com/mac-file-recovery.html
http://www.boomdrs.com/?os=mac
http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php

Good luck.
Cory

[David Ibbitson]

Hi Russ,

There is only one place in RCX where you can physically delete a clip, and that is the browser. It will prompt you and then move it to the Trash should you select Yes. Are you able to verify that this is what occurred?

Thanks,
David

[Rob Lohman]

Hi Russ,

Sorry to hear about your trouble. Please always make backups and never work with a clip when you just have one version of it.

Are you sure you did not empty the trash? Cory has some good tips and links in his post.

Rob

[Russ Fill]

It did prompt me but I was in a hurry and didn't look to see that I had actually highlighted the wrong clips... all the ones to the right of the time line not the left...
Im sure I didn't empty the trash because as soon as it happened I was aware of my mistake and started to correct it, and yes now that you mention it it was in the browser I think. But the files should have gone to the trash, right?. Not blaming anyone but my impatient self here.

I have found the files using some of Cory's suggestions mainly the last software in the list http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php the reason I picket this one is it seemed the most up front and had a good user interface as Im not that computer savvy. even still I had to look and look in the files it suggested as a lot of them were still visible on the drive as normal.
I did try the terminal prompts but didn't have much luck there.

I did have a all ready rendered out copy of the files but wanted to make some tweeking and that is when the accident occurred so basically I was covered but still couldn't figure out why I could not just go to the trash and pick them out again.
Im in the process of sending the logs to you guys so you might be able to see what I did or didn't do right or wrong and help folks like me with even bigger safety nets then you have all ready installed.

Thank you all for your support and this is why we have a forum to post on.
A special thanks to Cory for giving me a call today to help iron out the issues a bit more.

Ahhhh the sweet sound of files clicking away from one drive to another....