GORDON BELL  Any customer who purchased Data Rescue 3 earlier can contact Prosoft directly to get a new boot DVD download link for free (if you paid to have a Data Rescue 3 DVD shipped to you, Prosoft will re-ship you the latest DVD this time at no additional cost---Just contact Prosoft sales (check prosoft website for contact info)..

Cheers,

Gordon from Prosoft-  
(Version 3.0.1)

UART.TV  i must say that Data Recovery sounds and looks great, however, I am not having as much luck as i would like to be having recovering data from my LaCie d2 500 GB, so far it has taken 13:32 hours to scan one block in deep scan mode. i guess what i am looking for is someone to tell me that is fine it is just taking a while and will all be Ok, unfortunately i am beginning to believe that my disc may be beyond data recoveries reach. Typically the only info i need from the drive is my current video project, oh how i will be backing things up in the future.

Uart.TV  
(Version 3.0)

GORDON BELL  Boot from the DVD if you need to recover your main boot drive (or, if you have one, you can boot from a secondary bootable drive that has Data Rescue loaded as an application)....

Run as a regular application if you're scanning anything other than the main boot drive....

Cheers,

Gordon from Prosoft  
(Version 3.0)

ICONZ113  Do you guys that own data rescue have it installed on your computer? or do you just boot to the DVD when you need it?

Also did you guys purchase drive genius with data rescue? or do you use an alternative harddrive application?  
(Version 3.0)

DADAMA  I have to say that Data Rescue is a damn good piece of software. Got in a bundle last year but didn't have much use for it until disaster struck recently. I tried this, as well as almost every other file recovery program out there (e.g., Stellar Phoenix, R-studio, Mac Data Recovery, File Salvage, to recovery my files from 2 reformatted hard drives. By far and away, Data Rescue, was the most reliable and most successful at recovering my lost data. I now consider Data Rescue a must have utility along with Disk Warrior, iPartition, and iDefrag.   
(Version 3.0)

GORDON BELL  Hi Tank,

I just replied to another similar post on another site so i'll use the same message I posted there. Your feedback is very appreciated but I did want to reply to you as we love to interact with our customers...

First off, thanks for looking at Data Rescue 3, as a current Data Rescue II owner.. We know that most customers use Data Rescue typically once or twice and then they put it away, maybe reaching for it again many years later. So we know that for most customers, upgrading isn't really something they're interested in. They used it when they needed it, but don't need it currently and therefore don't need or want to pay for an upgrade...With that said, we do have some staunch followers that always want the latest and greatest version around and we thank them for that continued support--

We could've released Data Rescue 3 as the only version that would be Snow Leopard compatible simply by never releasing Data Rescue II with the Snow Leopard compatibility built in, but that's just not our style ;-) We wanted to have all our Data Rescue II users get a Snow Leopard compatible build before we came out with Data Rescue 3.. I think that's pretty generous and I'm proud we did that, to be honest..

We launched Data Rescue II back in September of 2005 and we've done lots of builds since then.. We added support for Intel Machines, support for Leopard and then Snow leopard, all as free updates to Data Rescue II... I think that's probably a record (4 years of development and updates with no paid upgrades...). That's something I'm pretty proud of too...

So we've been giving away a lot of updates and stuff for free over the years.. This is our first paid upgrade since 2005... But we still know that most customers will only care about what version is available now, buy it, use it once and that's it... For those that want to keep on using Data Rescue II, of course it'll still work, but we're excited about the new features, power and performance increases in Data Rescue 3...

We'll have a new Data Rescue 3 down the road that will be 64-bit, and that'll be a free application update to any owners of Data Rescue 3 .. Making it 64-bit is indeed a substantial change and one that will take quite some time.. But it's on the radar for sure... In the meantime, this new version really is a substantial effort of engineering, worked and perfected over the past few years... We're excited about the new performance features like FileIQ® and improved scans and additional files supported.. It is a huge improvement over Data Rescue II, plain and simple..

We appreciate your thoughts and we know that for some, Data Rescue II will serve them just fine if they already own it... Down the road they may look to upgrade to Data Rescue 3 and we'll be there for them when they do...

Thanks again for the support and please contact us if you need anything--

Gordon from Prosoft--  
(Version 3.0)

TANKKNIGHT  I love this product and I think the company is excellent. That said, I think that $65 to upgrade from v2 to v3 is too much. I have a PPC G5 so I'll stick with v2.  
(Version 3.0)

E10TORI  My experience with Data Recovery was a huge snort of fresh air, after what I experienced with Boomerang. I have tried multiple times to communicate with Boomerang. I paid my money, they took it and apparently have left the country. I have yet to receive any human feedback and this point would be amazed if someone actually tried to communicate with me. I purchased their product and it did not work. Never used the activation key. Was told I was not entitled to a refund (via an automated response). Never even had any benefit with their product. I was left feeling stupid and not having the educational background to navigate through their computer landscape. I was on the verge of sending my computer to a facility to accomplish the task of recovering my data. Then I discovered Data Rescue II. Data Rescue II and their company were perfect. I cannot begin to express my deep, heart felt gratitude for their product AND the general energy on their website. Two months ago I deleted some very precious video clips of my 1 year old girl, from my MacBook Pro. I have been incredibly bummed out since. I was recommended to use Boomerang Data Recovery. As mentioned, their product did not work, at all. But more than that, there was a complete lack of customer service. No where on their site is there any phone number. And, when a customer attempts to communicate, their system (Boomerang) is set up, apparently, to frustrate the individual until their customers give up and simply go away. Their company has all the signs of an entity going into the dark abyss where all companies that lack integrity go. The Data Rescue company on the other hand I believe is going in the a better direction. A direction in which it is acknowledged and appreciated that the customer is an important part of the business relationship equation. Eternal gratitude to Data Recovery for saving my data and for creating a quality company. And shame on Boomerang for their   
(Version 1.2.2)

ACCOUNTCLOSED  DRII retrieved over 30,000 files for me from a formatted drive, all in their original, usable format. The product outperformed its nearest competitor by a long shot. If you need serious at-home data recovery, I'd encourage you to download the trial and give DRII a go.  
(Version 1.2.2)

OKDA  Today I have all of my files back from a 200G failed external firewire drive. Although everything was already backed up a few days before the crash, I lost a 3 days of work on a critical InDesign file. Disk Warrior wouldn't see the drive, Disk Utility wouldn't see the drive, but Data Rescue found all of my files, just using the Quick Scan feature. That was worth the money. A big Thank You!  
(Version 1.2.2)

DFERRELL  Data Rescue II worked very well in recovering data from a damaged hard drive that would not mount. Their tech support was available and very helpful when I was trying the product as a demo and continued with the same fast response when I was convinced that it would work for me and purchased the full version. Features were easy to use, recovery was nearly 100%. It took only a matter of a few hours to scan and recover my data. Prosoft gets 5 stars from me.   
(Version 1.2.2)

SILIZIUM  Unbrauchbares Scheissding! Wollte schon etwa 3 mal Files recovern die ich gerade eben im Papierkorb gelöscht habe. Keine Chance. Systemmüll kommt zum Vorschein aber das was man braucht... nicht zu finden.  
(Version 1.2.2)

KENNEWT  My girlfriend died 2 years ago from Breast Cancer. Before she died she had recorded her voice using Apple's Garageband software. She wanted to put together an audio book where she read a book her sister had written. (Her sister is a well known author, and a National Book Award winner). Unfortunately, she was only beginning the project when her deteriorating health prevented her from continuing the work of reading. She was also trying to do a great job, so there were only a few chapters recorded that she was happy with, and the readings that she was unhappy with, she deleted.

I kept her computer, disappointed that there was so little of her voice left for us, and searched the computer many times hoping to find more files. There were none, and that is when I realized she had deleted her readings if she wasn't happy with them. Two years later, I discovered Data Rescue II and decided to give it a try, to see what might be recoverable.

My initial attempt to recover files, was successful, but also disappointing, as there appeared to be no way to unlock the "packages" that the Garageband software created when it stored an audio file.

I contacted Prosoft support, and within a few days, they got back to me with specific instructions on how to find and open the .aif files that had been recovered.

Thankfully, it worked, and I was able to recover files that had been deleted, and initially seemed unrecoverable, and now her friends and family can have these recordings to listen to any time they wish.

I can't express my gratitude sufficiently to Prosoft for creating this incredible program, and for working with me in finding a way to recover files that initially appeared to be not recoverable.  
(Version 1.2.2)

DJFK2000  Data Rescue is the best program you can get for file recovery on a corrupted drive. Much better than DiskWarrior 4 or FileSalvage, the program's Thorough Scan feature not only found all my files but it recovered all their metadata, such as names, creation and modification dates, folder structure, permissions, etc. Most helpfully, the company offers a demo so you can see exactly what you're getting before spending your money. Truly excellent product, highly recommended.  
(Version 1.2.1)

PRISS HOWELL  Our issue was small compared to a total crash, but was extremely valuable to get resolved. We over wrote a detailed drawing, created in MacDraft that would have taken at least 40 hours of work to recreate. I tried a program that was recommended by our local Mac person to try to retrieve it, but to no avail. They said it would be at least a two week delay in order to build a file for MacDraft. They did give me the name of Data Rescue II as a possible source for further investigation. I talked to Data Rescue's support team several times and sent them sample files of drawings created with MacDraft version 5.5.11. They were able to build the necessary files in 15 minutes to enable Data Rescue II to recognize the files I needed to retrieve. I got the file I needed and the support team was great to work with. I appreciated so much that they sent me detailed instruction on what to do and how to do it. Their expertise was invaluable. I wish I had started with them, but now I know where to go for top notch support and retrieval if I ever need it again.  
(Version 1.2.1)

DOUG S.  I could tell you about my 1TB drive and how it died, but there are plenty of stories like that in the reviews already. Instead I will simply say it works better tan you'll expect it to.

That and that to do a data recovery service it will cost you anywhere from $800-$4,000 if you're doing a 1TB drive. Suddenly $99 for an application you can use time and time again doesn't seem so expensive, does it?

I've seen this program recommended on many websites and in many magazines as well as one rather enthusiastic recommendation from an Apple Genius.

When a drive dies it's a heart-wrenching moment. You fear you've lost everything and you'll never get it back. There are certain programs out there that will help you solve those problems. Data Rescue II is on that list and near the top.

—

For anyone who's reading these reviews as a result of a recent failure, my condolences. I know what you're going through there and have been there myself. Try these following programs and one of them will be able to fix it, or at least allow you to get your data back:

1. Disk Warrior.

2. Drive Genius.

3. Data Rescue II.

I usually use them in that exact order as well. The first can fix any, and I do mean any, directory-based issue and can almost always find all your files if a directory is corrupted beyond repair. Drive Genius will help you diagnose exactly what's wrong with your drive if Disk Warrior doesn't work. And finally, Data Rescue II will get your data back.

Even if you buy all three of these programs you've spent less than you would had you paid for a professional service.  
(Version 1.2.1)

FRANKPIERSON  This is a long story, perhaps useful only to non-gurus, so be warned. But if that's you, then maybe worthwhile. As with most learning curves, the learning accelerates when a problem you've never dealt with and are untrained for, suddenly floors you and your survival instincts get an adrenaline kick. So here's the story of a long time non-guru Mac user suddenly in distress, now what? My LaCie Quadra d2 500GB external drive, following a six week long RV trip rattling around over some rough adventure trails, but never used during trip, upon return home did mount on my MacBook Pro OS X 10.5.5 desktop for a few seconds, then promptly disappeared without a farewell. It was later speculated that static electricity generated in a bag might have been the culprit, but nobody really knows. Anyway, no more Quadra icon although, ear down, I could hear it purring smoothly, And I still had my older smaller LaCie Porsche backup running properly. The Quadra, however, had lots more photo/video files than the Porsche could store, which is why I bought it last March.

My 13 steps to recovery:

(1) I found/learned that whereas my Apple Disk Utility could "see" the Quadra, it could not do anything with it.

(2) LaCie Tech Support, requiring very long waits for contact over long distance line, segued me into establishing a "Ticket" and talking back and forth over several days via email, trying routine potential fixes by checking possibly faulty cables and such to no avail, then authorizes a warranty return/repair or replacement of drive within 30 days, but, BIG BUT...

(3) Data recovery should/must be completed prior to sending in drive since they can only replace mine in one way or another, most likely without any of my old files still there or intact, and they initially refer me to Drive Savers as a likely data recovery answer, so...

(4) I call Drive Savers to learn that whereas they can almost promise recovery, the cost would be from $500 to $2000+, most probably $2000+ (several hundred plus), so...

(5) that being out of my league or some such, back to LaCie, this time choosing to bite the telephone wait bullet in order to talk live with somebody without going through more of the very time consuming email exchanges, and I wait for 40+ minutes which, after a long review of matters garnered a lead to try something much cheaper, specifically Prosoft's Data Rescue II.

(6) I call DR II and their initial news sounds promising: "If Disk Utilities can see your belly up (my term) drive, then DR II can see it", thus permitting it to go to work at possible recovery, plus, why don't you try our free trial download?

(7) OK, now downloaded and following DR II's onscreen instructions, I start what turns out to be a SIX DAY scan of the 360+GBs on my bad drive: sometimes it would go fast, but then hit error bumps and, one night I remember, it scanned only about 1.5GBs during 12 hours. But then a puzzlement that I did not understand but did not question at the time: my little Porsche had only 20 some GBs available to accept the 360GB scan, and while I could not imagine how that could work, it did, and the scan was completed showing a listing of some 150 folders on the bad drive. However, when I tried to open any one, I found "zero on disk", which I figured explained things.

(8) By now I'm thinking I'd better face up to need for a second equal-size backup drive to go with my first bad one when replaced, so why not now? I call LaCie, they give me a seemingly good price, $130, considering my loyalty, many problems, and patience, so shortly thereafter I have a new FedExed Quadra d2 and decide to try DR II scanning once more, this time into a drive with plenty of storage to accept not only a listing of content but also the real thing, actual content. Another several days pass, maybe only four or five this time because now I'm hooked up with 400/800 Firewire cables rather USB2, which meant 400 speed at best though I understand these days 400 is really not much faster than USB2. Guess what, I end up with my second scan looking just about the same as my first, a listing of lost files, but another empty listing.

(9) Back to Prosoft Tech Support, by now I've had two or three conversations with "John", and he gives me direct number so maybe we can cut down on wait-or-get-back times, and he also has the suggestion of one more thing we could try: ALLOCATION BLOCKS. John explains, and here I translate with my non-guru explanation, that allocation blocks act as something like the keys to the kingdom, your lost kingdom. John refers me to the Expert menu in the DR II menu bar, and the pulldown to "Allocation Blocks". That brings up a listing of several‚ choices 1,2,3,4,5, etc. John says for me to work my way through these choices one at a time, preferably selecting a singe sample jpeg file from my empty Scan Results listings, and see what happens. Then try another. I do this complete run-through of allocation blocks once without results, but I'm tired and no longer have much hope or confidence in anything, and have long since begun to suspect my judgment and everything else about my computer prowess even when carefully following instructions. So I sleep on it, and, being stubborn, during the night decide I'll give it one more try before calling John again. A rested, refreshed, and very careful try. Next morning I hit number 2 choice, no luck, then I hit 3 and voila, amazing, there pops a photo in its full glory, reemerged from oblivion! I try another jpeg, hit 3 and voila! I go for a video clip, 3, voila! A second video clip, 3, whammo! So now I'm finished with sampling and ready for the real thing, the complete go-through.

(10) But before I can do that, since DR II's free trial version permits recovering only a few MBs, just enough to prove out some real gold from the claim, I must purchase the full DR II package at $99 for immediate online download, disk to follow by snailmail. Done.

(11) Now I create a new folder, give it a EUREKA! name in hopes of success, select all the empty listings in Scan Results, hit 3, and sit back. Time goes by, a few hours, AND FINALY THERE IS ALMOST ALL OF MY STUFF, rescued by Prosoft's Data Rescue II along with some handholding by John. There are some files highlighted in red, which means they are bad though possibly rescuable if I twang some more with the allocation blocks or something else, but what the hell, I decide they're not important, likely dupes anyway, I'm happy as a lark, I'm finished. Oops, almost...

((12) On checking recovery results more closely, I note there are lots of items with gobbledegook (to me) names and small or no content, aside from the files I recognize and want, but which I don't understand and don't have a clue about. Back to John. He says that most or all of what I'm seeing and confused by is likely just Mac computer stuff not necessary for present purposes, and he suggests a simple though tedious way for me to sort through, organize, and make sense of it all prior to deleting anything. Following his lead, I create yet another empty folder and carefully work my way through the recovered files, dragging only those I really want‚ mostly naked and without any of the gobbledegook items‚ into it and leaving the rest behind. Along the way as I go, I check each file to make sure the content opens and works before moving on. All this took about another day, and, after one more sleep, I felt good enough about things to take the last step, probably forever separating me from any chance of further recovery. Incidentally, I still haven't deleted the separated gobbledegook, but I expect to, as they say, shortly...

(13) Last week I finally dispatched the bad drive to LaCie for repair/replacement.

This learning curve‚ and the doing of each step‚ occupied me from time to time for a little over a month, but it finally worked. Slow learning to be sure, but then, I didn't know much to start with when I found myself suddenly belly up. Oh, and I've also learned quite a bit about backup. Good idea. Sorry for the long read, but my hope is that these five or so minutes of reading may help somebody out there‚ not a guru‚ while also maybe saving some part of a whole month and a lot of dollars, like the month plus $99 it took me to get here from nowhere. Good luck.  
(Version 1.2.1)

JANICE  I have been working on Apple computers for approx 15 years. I run into all sorts of issues in the course of troubleshooting and repairs. One of the most devastating for any computer user is the lost of data. No matter how much I harp, scold, cajole, there are still clients that never backup their computers. I had one such case this past week. A G4 iBook for one of my doctor clients. Without any warning, the hard drive on this computer refused to mount. I tried all the standard things: Disk First Aid, Disk Warrior, TechToolPro, etc., nothing would work! DataRescueII to the Rescue! It retrieved every single piece of information from their hard drive! The client couldn't have been more excited to hear this news!

I've been using Data Resue since it first came out. Not once has it failed to do exactly as it is promoted to do. That is amazing! I cannot recommend this piece of software strongly enough (right along with backing up your data on a daily basis!)

Prosoft, you have me as a lifetime client. I thank you. My clients thank you.

Janice Kempf

Clear Link - Clearlake, Ca.  
(Version 1.2.1)

DDCULLEN  Data Rescue II for MAC has proven to be a life saver! Not only did the application recover deleted files that I sorely needed, they were also recovered completely and with out corruption. The staff at Data Rescue were very helpful when I needed some extra assistance and their patience and professionalism has proven invaluable. Thanks again John! Cheers!

David  
(Version 1.2.1)

DION HAWLEY  I had a WD External Hard Drive that had an Invalid Journal Content, whatever that means. I tried the disk utility on my Mac Book Pro to no luck. So I googled my problem and found this software popped up repeatedly. Reluctant from being burned by other companies, I gave it a try. Holy Smokes. It worked, on the first try, while I slept. Easy to use, The support was unbelievable, answered all my emails within minutes, (during business hours), and most of it all it allowed me to transfer my files from a corrupt hard drive to a fresh one, with the file names and folders still in tact. It also organized my files and media in a separate file that I could choose to transfer if I like. So in a sense, it not only repaired my drive, but organized it as well. I wasn't even expecting that. I was able to reconnect my media to my timeline and go on like nothing happened. Price this against a data recovery shop. There is no comparison, and you will be up in a lot less time! To the staff a huge thanks, from myself and my client, that didn't even noticed we skipped a beat.

Sincerely,

Dion Hawley  
(Version 1.2.1)

ANDYHIGGINS  A catastrophic backup failure deleted three years worth of photographs from my external Lacie hard-drives so I urgently went in search of data recovery software. An initial Google search brought up Data Rescue II which was further validated by my local Apple store when I asked their advice. After an online purchase I installed and followed the step-by-step guide. The scan of deleted space of a 500GB drive took about 8 hours and categorised all the file types for recovery. All seemed to be perfect until....

Adobe DNG files (industry standard RAW digital negatives) were incorrectly identified as TIFFs of only around 200KB instead of their true size of 10MB+ This was a little alarming! I raised a support ticket via Prosoft's website who responded immediately with a fix - a file module designed for these types of files. Unfortunately it was only partially successful so I contacted Technical Support for advice. They requested 10 sample .DNG files to allow them to custom build, at no cost, a file module which arrived within a few hours. This was 100% SUCCESSFUL.

I couldn't ask for better service or a better product.   
(Version 1.2.1)

UNCAPHER  My drive containing my entire iTunes media library (2 terabytes of music, movies, and TV shows) crashed. I thought I lost it all but after running DataRescue II, I was able to recover every file and reconstruct my iTunes library. This is an absolutely amazing product!  
(Version 1.2.1)

YMUGMIKE  Despair over 'Raid' Remedy Dilemma

After totally misunderstanding how to create a Raid backup system, I managed to trash one of my existing external LaCie Firewire drives.

Thanks to Data Rescue II and the help of their staff, I have now recovered all 300 GB of information and can breath normally once more.

Great product. Great company. Great service.

Regards,

Michael Kitchen, UK  
(Version 1.2.1)

WALKI-TALKI.COM  I obtained this software initially to recover data from a failed hard drive. It recovered EVERYTHING perfectly.

Now, I am using it to recover a files that I accidentally deleted 8 months ago. It recovered so many other files!! This program is so good, in fact, that I am positively zeroing out my hard drives before ever giving them away. Data Rescue will recover ANY data hiding on your hard drive. This program is truly fantastic, and well worth the price.  
(Version 1.2.1)

MAC ADAM  When Data Rescue resue one hard drive on 10.5, it do not recover name of files, and mbox are unusable…  
(Version 1.2.1)

CRAIGINBMINOR  A week ago, my entire G-Tech hard drive (20,000+ iTunes songs) stopped mounting. The entire thing was finished. DiskWarrior couldn't even find it!

Then I found Data Rescue, which picked up the device, scanned my files, located them ALL (WITH ORIGINAL NAMES!) and recovered them. This company is absolutely fantastic; their customer service is A+ as well -- almost instant responses.

If ANYTHING happens to your HD, go with Data Rescue II.  
(Version 1.2.1)

DEREK SEAGRIM  Love it, as I said on Version Tracker comments. It does what it says it does on the box and that it is salvage deleted files on a lost HD.

My Mac ibook had a new HD installed but still didnt work because the logic board connector was broken. Too expensive to repair.

Bought a new Mac and a £12 Lindy caddy and installed the old HD in the caddy. The old HD had been seriously abused trying to get my picture images off it. Data Rescue was so easy to use. It found all my old files and very expensive, once in a life time holiday snaps. All saved. They deserve several medals.

Derek s  
(Version 1.2.1)

JAN13  If I can I would say, that David Coperfield must be encoded in this application ... Simply. This app is a magic !!!  
(Version 1.2.1)

NIKOLAY MILANOV  Great App!!! Saved 10 years collected designers portfolios from accidently formatted osx to ntfs drive!  
(Version 1.2.1)

JOE(Y)  This software saved my ass. I had 12 hard drives go down due to a power failure. 7 of the 12 couldn't even be mounted in Mac OSX. Data Rescue was the only thing that got them up and running, so I could move the data off and rebuild the drives.

Killer stuff! Thanks, gang.  
(Version 1.2.1)

PAULIEONBEACH  Data Rescue II - Mac is the BEST!

Found photo and music files from an external hard drive that had been reformatted twice!   
(Version 1.2.1)

JOHN SAWYER CJS  Flash1296: while it's true that some recoveries, with any utility, don't result in getting back the files one is looking for, my experience recovering hundreds of drives using Data Rescue and other utilities, is that most of the time (statistically), recovery is at least mostly successful, and more than half the time completely successful, but as you say, if someone is trying to recover deleted files, they need to try to recover them immediately. But the main purpose for utilities like Data Rescue is to recover files from crashed drives, rather than recovering trashed files, though it can often do that too if they haven't been overwritten yet.

And as you say, a good daily (or more often) complete drive backup is better than trying to recover data. I remember in years past when some people suggested that drive recovery utilities had become so good (even though they hadn't yet), that backups might not be necessary. I always wondered where they got that idea.  
(Version 1.2.1)

FLASH1296  After writing my earlier comment today - I realized that I had a folder of mixed files that just went missing.

The Quick Search found > 2 GB of 'stuff' - all garbage.

I tried the Expert Mode's "Full Scan" and "Deleted Files Scan"

The time consumed was reasonable - an hour+.

The results were not so reasonable.

Nothing of value was "rescued"  
(Version 1.2.1)

ROBK  For a FREE Open source solution, check out TestDisk -

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/27683/testdisk

But note TestDisk is a command line program that you use in Terminal. It actually comprises of two programs --

1. TestDisk to locate and repair damaged partitions and

2. PhotoRec to locate and recover deleted or damaged files (inluding photos, documents, archives etc). The name PhotoRec is misleading since it recovers not only photos but documents, archives etc.

But if you are not comfortable with the command line, you should check out Data Rescue II with its GUI.  
(Version 1.2.1)

FLASH1296  NOTE:

While this is very god software; the prospective purchaser needs to realize that recovery is a dicey and very tedious process - that generally fails. You may recover any number of files, [usually a huge number], but intact/useful/identifiable/openable ones ... well, there may be a lot or there may be none.

Generally the recovery will work well IF you are recovering files very very promptly after their creation / most recent modification.

The best bet is doing regularly scheduled back-up's using Leopard's "Time Machine" I use third party freeware to modify Time Machine to do a backup twice a day - in the background. RECOVERING an individual file , folder, etc. with Time Machine is elegantly simple in an absolutely revolutionary way, and more importantly, it ordinarily is VERY fast and will NOT fail.  
(Version 1.2.1)

SHOTGUNWEDDINGS  Excellent software, handy when you need to try and recover irreplaceable files.

Obviously the dimwit below is clueless what data recovery is meant for!  
(Version 1.2.1)

KALEENKA  DON'T BUY THIS SOFTWARE FOR FILES YOU COULD RECREATE.

If you are recovering wedding pictures, or something equally precious, go ahead and buy Data Rescue. If, however, you are recovering files you could recreate if you had to, don't waste your time. I recovered so many files that it would take me into next century to go through them all. No way is it worth my time.

NOTHING will be named. It is sorted into folders (InDesign, Photoshop, JPG, etc.) but without names, the files are pretty much useless. Not that this is DR's fault. But reconsider your purchase if you don't have time to open everything.  
(Version 1.2)

THEAMAZINGDOGDAISY  I am in the process of recovering files (they are wedding photographs) that I accidentally deleted off my lacie external hard drive. So far, most of the files are being recovered. Although the directories it creates when it restores is a little confusing, I'm just happy to be able to see most of the files being recovered. I highly recommend this software.  
(Version 1.2)

MRMRJIM  Just want to say THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU! I am a longtime ProTools user and earlier this week my backup drive became corrupted. It would not mount, then it was re-initialized. I had no luck at that point retrieving any usable data. After downloading the DEMO of Data Rescue II and seeing the data listed, I have recovered nearly all of the 298Gig of Audio and Protools session files. I, so far, have been able to open and work with the sessions as if nothing happened. I'm extremely happy and grateful for this program. It did take approximately 4 hours to scan the drive (300gig)but, I'll be able to sleep tonight. YEH!!!

Jim  
(Version 1.2)

ELLEE H.  Disk Utility in Mac OS X (Leopard) didn't recognize the hard drive in my Powerbook. Based on the recommendation of a well-known Apple specialist store in NYC and the claim to rescue data and recognize hard drives that "other utilities don't" on the Data Rescue box, I purchased this applic. at full price and went home with my fingers crossed. I felt mightily snookered when Data Rescue II failed to see my hard drive and my subsequent look at the Data Rescue help file was met with "if Mac Disk Utility can't see your drive, we can't either." Well, why didn't you say that on the friggin' box? Now I'm out $99 and I am angry. My advice: run the demo. When your hard drive is still AOL, you'll be glad you didn't waste your money like I did.  
(Version 1.2)

GLOBETROTTERDK  Wow, Data Rescue II saved my bacon where DiskWarrior couldn't. The HD couldn't be saved, but most of the info on the HD could, thanks to Data Rescue II.

One quirk with Data Rescue II is that cloning an HD does not seem to use the info from a recover info scan, but rather seems to just clone the already defective disc to another disk. In my case, this meant that the disk I cloned didn't seem to have any recovered info on it.  
(Version 1.2)

MARS919  My 12" PowerBook's harddrive died and I had no recent backups. After trying to recover files MANY times with Disk Warrior (I canceled the scan after running it for four or five days) I finally tried Data Rescue II and it worked like a charm. It scanned and recovered the whole 40 GB drive in about 2 hours. Not recoverable files count less than 15. Absolutely fantastic! Thanks!  
(Version 1.2)

VLNTX  OK... I accidentally replaced my iTunes folder (8000+ songs plus TV shows & music videos) with a folder containing 2 (count 'em... 2) TV shows. I immediately stopped using the storage disk in question & began to search the internet for solutions (I run MOSX 10.3.9 on a Mac Mini G4 & store my music on a separate disk). Data Rescue II kept coming up so I went to the site & downloaded the demo version & there were most the files! I purchased the full version & began recovering my music files without any problems (added bonus... I double-click on the file in Data Rescue II & it downloads directly into iTunes... it couldn't be easier!) KUDOS & my undying loyalty!  
(Version 1.2)

MFC  I recently purchased an used MacBook Pro and then upgraded the operating system to the new Leopard. Unfortunately there were some valuable photos lost during the data transfer prior to the purchase. We were at a loss as to how to recover at that point. We learned of Data Rescue II and made the purchase. I required technical support and the technician was patient, tenacious, always returned calls, and eventually we completely recovered all the lost information. Unbelievable support! Unequaled in my experience.

Would not hesitate to recommend this product and company for your data recovery needs.  
(Version 1.2)

DOILOOKLIKEA-MACUPDATE  Wow.

Do you use a computer? Then buy this app. It is quite simply TE most wonderful thing. I hope that you never have to use it as it will only be brought out when your heart has stopped beating and a few internal organs seem to have arrived somewhere in the vicinity of your mouth.

So there we have it..yup...I forgot to back something up and this application came trundling to the rescue. My hard drive wouldn't even mount...but Data Rescue came to the.....er....rescue.

It found everything when my Mac said that the drive was unreadable and would I like to initialise it?

Come on, stop reading this..buy it. It really does work.  
(Version 1.2)

SHK747  after troubles with leo installing, the only programm to reach the previous-system to get data again ..

BEST, thanx data rescue II.  
(Version 1.2)

DIGITDROPPER  I downloaded 110 - 10megapixel Olympus raw photo files to an external harddrive, verified they were there, imported them into Lightroom (Lightroom manages them in their original location), then erased my 2Gig compactflash card in preparation for shooting the next day. WARNING: I found out the hard way that Olympus cameras' erasure is destructive and data cannot be retrieved afterward! To be safe, I decided to copy the files to a second external harddrive, but I must have done something wrong, because they disappeared!

After staying up all night trying to make something work, I began calling software manufacturers and was ultimately referred to ProSoft. I downloaded the Data Rescue II demo, read through the manuel and ran a quick scan. No luck. Convinced that I had no choice but to reshoot all my images, I went ahead and did a thorough scan anyway. It took over five hours, but when I looked at the results, all my images were there! I went back to the website and paid for the software, got my serial number, plugged it in and rescued all my files! ProSoft, you saved my bacon!!  
(Version 1.1.3)

LSWEET   A week ago I turned on my 5 yr old IMac and was presented with the blinking question mark-face. Nothing I could do would restore it to working order. I used the Disk Utility program on my MAC OS10.4 Installer Disk to try to correct the problem, but the program was interrupted with accompanying error messages. The HD could not be mounted and I was told that I had a bad SUPERBLOCK, whatever that is. I tried other software, but nothing would resolve the issue.I contacted two drive saver companies and both quoted me fees of $600-$1600 to restore the data on my hard drive.

I contacted Apple Computer and the technician there was most helpful with suggestions involving UNIX methodology. After two hours we were still unable to fix the problem.

After much frustration, I contacted a local computer store and they informed me that for $300 they would try to transfer the data to a new HD.

As a last effort the next day, I instituted a Google search to see if I could find software that would permit me to retrieve my data from the old HD.I was lucky enough to discover this software,Data Rescue II. I downloaded the trial version and it worked like a charm. I purchased the software and in the past few days have been able to restore everything from my old HD. This is a GREAT program . It is easy to use and works marvelously.

I found it easier to use the Quick Scan instead of the Long Scan. The results of the Quick Scan more closely resemble the directory on my old HD and are more easily referenced.

I would give it 5 Stars  
(Version 1.1.3)

QUICKBEN  I recently awakened to find a Maxtor 500gb internal SATA drive making weird clunking sounds (less than one year from manufacture date). The drive wouldn't mount with any s/w I had so I traveled down to the local Apple store and picked up this app. Long story short, it failed to do anything constructive. I wrote the company and informed them the product was a bust for me. I also mentioned that before I ran a scan using the product I could see how much used/free space was on the disk, but after the scan all I could see was zero data used/remaining. I suppose the tech support folks got in a snit about my email because they didn't respond to a subsequent email I sent asking the the meaning of certain error codes the program showed, and whether or not attempting a reformat followed by another try with their product would increase the probability of recovering data. Bottom line: $100 wasted.  
(Version 1.1.3)

DREMWKR  I have (and has used) other data recovery apps available for Mac. Data Rescue worked when all others failed. Compared to the big bucks required for a pro shop to recover a disk it is a bargain Xtreme. It is easy to use, and its features work as advertised. And it works without a hitch or bug.  
(Version 1.1.3)

SHOTGUNWEDDINGS  First off it's only at version 1.1.3, there's a typo here!

And I love all of Prosoft's tools, top notch and very handy when an emergency arises!

Keep up the great work!  
(Version 1.1.13)

CARLAGUO  I have been using this product for years (always upgrade it) and on more than one occasion it has SAVED my life! It is absolutely the best solution for saving files from a damaged and/or unmountable hard drive. When nothing else works -- Date Rescue DOES!

Operating a computer and a hard drive without this program would be like performing on a trapeze or high wire without the net -- a "got to have" utility program!!! LOVE IT!  
(Version 1.1.1 )

BRUCE MENTZER  Recovered a G3 years back with this software and used it since to inspire other Mac users...so glad it's updated. Let you know what I think again soon.  
(Version 1.1.1 )

YESUAINI99  My external HD (Maxtor), failed to mount suddenly and I accidentally "reformatted" it (without secure overwrite).

Tried all different kinds of method to recover the data (over 200GB from all of my previous computers and work experiences).

Finally, kept reading different user group recommendations and downloaded the Data Rescue II.

At first, it couldn't find any file it can recover, after thorough scan of 15 days!!!! Yes, 15 days!! (Glad there was no power outage during this time). It finally showed a whole bunch (thousands of files) in different categories (doc, ppt, MP3, jpg, etc.).

I procrastinated. But I asked myself, why did I let it scan for 15 days if I had no intention of recovering the files? So, I decided to buy it and get the code immediately to activate it.

A buyer's note. Other World Computer has it on special for $60. (Prosoft lists it as $99). But you have to wait for another week to get it shipped and risk having the code not working with the downloaded demo version. To recover more than 5MB of file, you must activate it first.

Anyway, it is being recovered to a new external HD I bought today specifically for this purpose.

I will come back to update this note and document its performance.

I won't give any star yet....  
(Version 1.1.1 )

HARLAND  Shopped around but this was the only product that had a demo that was functional enough for me to be able to verify that it would work for my problem (none of the others did). So I bought it and so far so good. Be sure to at least try the demo before you buy anything else for data recovery.   
(Version 1.1.1 )

LSCHUC  I tried another brand of drive recovery, and it doesn't work as advertised!! Your software works quickly and is a pleasure to use! It searched a bad partition/drive that would not mount and could not be repaired, and I was able to copy all of my important files and photos to another drive.

Before using the other drive recovery software, I used Tech Tools, Apple's drive utility application, and Disk Warrior; all found bad sectors and directories and said the disk and partition was damaged, but none was able to repair the drive.

Data Rescue II analyzed my bad hard drive quickly and also quickly copied my data. That is more than I can say for another brand of software that claims to quickly and easily search a bad drive and recover, and which costs quite a bit more money! It searched and tried to copy for TWO DAYS straight, and never finished either searching the drive or finding and copying date.

Data Rescue II is Highly recommended!!  
(Version 1.1.1 )

MARK-WILSON  Like so many of the commenters/reviewers on this software, I screwed up. Operator Error. Re-initialised my external hard disk (and the backup disk) in another operating system.

I thought I'd have to re-rip my music collection and that the rest of my data was lost. Then I remembered my digital photos... I had some still on the camera's memory card and some on a DVD backup but there was a 4-month gap including my son's second birthday, my second son's newborn baby photos, and our first Christmas together. I had the memories, but the photos were irreplaceable.

I was too shocked even to swear.

After Data Rescue was recommended to me, I ran it in demo mode, successfully recovered a single JPEG file of one of my children, paid the $99, activated and set out with recovering the rest.

I can't tell you my success rate, because it's still in progress, but I can already see that it is very high (if not complete)... I'm really sorry for those poor souls who got very little back but as far as I can see, that is a limitation of the way that data is written to the disk, not of this software.

If $99 sounds steep, think of the cost of professional data recovery services. Then think about how much is your data really worth?

More details of my experience with Data Rescue II (v1.1.1) are at http://www.markwilson.co.uk/blog/2007/05/recovering-data-after-destroying-the-mac-os-x-partition-table.htm  
(Version 1.1.1 )

MACJONT  Relatively speaking, I am a computer ignoramous. The hard drive on my Powerbook crashed and, having been less than diligent backing up my data, I felt that sinking feeling one gets when things of importance are apparently lost forever. To my rescue came Data Rescue II. As far as I know, all my data of any significance was recovered via this easy to use data recovery program. It was a product simple enough for me to use, and effective in its results.   
(Version 1.1.1 )

1212  Saved us a huge problem when we really needed it.

Performed as advertised and definitely recommended.  
(Version 1.1.1 )

ESPIRIDION  This is one program that I hope I never use, but if I ever need it again I’m glad I have it.

I purchased it back in August 2006 when other programs failed to recover one of my hard drives. I was impressed with the results. Even though I was unable to recover an exact duplicate of my drive, I was able to recover my information.

By the way, I also got my copy from OWC. I had purchased Drive Genius from them, so when I needed Data Rescue that’s one of the first places I considered.  
(Version 1.1.1 )

DAVID.ACORD  I'm a bit suspect. Yesterday I saw the same comment about saving $xx by going to suchandsuch website and throwing it into the basket...

...either you DO work for them, or you're so overzealous about it you're doing it for every product you can find on macupdate.  
(Version 1.1 )

F4DEVILDOG  Local drive recovery service wanted $350.00 minimum to attempt to recover files from an unmountable drive. DR II did the job for $99 in about 1.5 hours. Works well with OS X. Fast, polite support from ProSoft. Unconditionally recommended.  
(Version 1.1 )

VIDEOBYTAMMYLOVE.COM  Today my external Lacie 500Mb bit the dust. I had so much work and jobs on the Lacie. I called many data recovery services and they asked for around $3,000.00, wow, I was crushed.

So I researched and found Data RescueII and got everything back. For $100.00.

I couldnt beileve my eyes when I could see that it was working.

Unbeilevable!! AMAZING. Buy it! It works.

What is strange is that I asked all of the data recovery bussinesses if there was any kind of software that could help me.

They told me nothing of this software.  
(Version 1.1 )

GETSOMESAUCE  This is some good stuff! Don't pay full price though...you can get it from Other World Computer for about $34 bucks less (I don't work for them, but people should know how to get good software at a better price). Just go to http://www.macsales.com/prosoft and toss it in your basket for a mere $65. I don't know if/when this price will expire. Powerful program! Thank you, Prosoft!  
(Version 1.1 )

RAYLEPPER  I bought DRII without confirming that the particular files (SketchUp and Cheetah3D) I wanted to recover were within its capabilities. So after the first couple of attempts I was reallly frustrated. I asked Prosoft for my money back. Instead, they offered to build a custom module to try to find my files. I sent them a bunch of example files and, in a few days, they sent me a custom module.

While the module didn't recover every file I had deleted and while it did deliver many garbage files, it helped me recover many intact files of both types.

What I apppreciate was their willingness to make their product better for all of us. That's cool.  
(Version 1.1 )

MERCIFUL  Yesterday, I made a colossal mistake, and deleted an enormous number of client images that I thought I had backed up. Then, before I realised I made the mistake, I wrote to the drive for the afternoon.

After the initial horror subsided slightly, I set about finding a product to get the files safely back onto my Mac. DR II got me quite a number of JPEGs from one drive; but amazingly, recovered every single processed TIFF from the drive where they were stored a couple of months ago, even though the drive has been in daily use.

Worth every cent!   
(Version 1.1 )

ST00P!D M0NK3Y  Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You are are a true life saver. This stupid program I used that was supposed to add partitions without affecting the existing data wiped my drive. It even said it wasn't going to erase the data as it was erasing my data (stay away from VolumeWorks and use iPartition instead).

I had over 120GB of stuff and this Data Rescue program recovered it all (I used this program immediately after the drive was somehow made unrecognizable by the other program). Thank you so much! I had so much valuable stuff on my drive I cannot even begin to tell you. Year and years of photos, movies, etc. of my life, family, and friends, just gone in an instant and now they're back. You guys freaking rock and this truly is the best recovery program I've ever used! It took 6 hours to scan my entire drive thoroughly, but it found every single file. Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You!!!!!!!

5 Stars all the way!  
(Version 1.1 )

MYSTICALOS  I was sceptic at first when it was recovering files and they weren't working. trying to recover individual file seemed to fail (i deleted something i REALLY wanted to keep.) It kept bringing back a file with wrong file size even though search was showing correct. However when i told it to restore entire folder instead, it got the file size right by i guess combining it with all the other small fragments in that folder...then file came back normal...a true life saver..  
(Version 1.1 )

JUSTSAD  Worthless. Don't be fooled, these types (File Salvage, too) of programs appear to reveal files for you. Then you pay the money and you get gibberish. I reformatted 140gigs of info and got back 72gigs of gibberish. Software jumbled, MP3's with no name or artist, no iMovie files, no Word docs would open, just a bunch of junk. It just reminds you how much you really lost. Don't send the money, it isn't worth it.  
(Version 1.1 )

WOMPEDY  i've heard from friends who said it didn't work for them for whatever reason. but in my case i worked like a champ! saved about 120gb of data off a drive that disk warrior, disk utility, and tech tool pro couldn't do a thing for.

the 'demo' where you can see what is recoverable worked great, i was able to retrieve a single file, and it worked, so i forked over the money and within the next few hours i had 99% of the stuff on my drive back, and uncorrupted (other apps have done that to me where i recovered files that were unusable, but not this one)!  
(Version 1.0.1)

ET VOILà  Wow. Excellent piece of software. Helped me get all the files lost because of a hard drive failure.

Congrats dev!  
(Version 1.0.1)

SHANE  Data Rescue II is now my favorite piece of software...

My graphic arts/ music portfolio drive went down in a bad way around the time that Data Rescue X was out on the market. DR-X partially saved a ton of my files, but did so in a manner (via the CBR folder...because the drive data it found that was properly organized and named had corrupted/unopenable files) where most of the files didn't have correct names. Long story short, It was such a pain to try to match up everything again that a year later I was still sadly trying to put the pieces together.

Then I got Data Rescue II 1.0... it amazingly recovered everything exactly the way it use to be organized and named! I was floored and my day suddenly became happy and worry free. I had to poke around a lot to find the correct folders amongst what looked to be ghost files that DRII couldn't make heads or tales out of...but every file is selectable as to whether you want to recover it or not. I've never been so impressed with an upgrade. Thank-you ProSoft. PS - the search bar in DRII was really helpful. A nice small feature would be if you could hit a letter and have the list of files in the scan report jump to that alphabet section. I had a ton files to go through and when you use the dropdown to get back to root, it takes you back to the top scroll wise. Scrolling is for suckas.

Thanks again ProSoft - I love tools that really work well. DRII rocks!  
(Version 1.0)

JEEPEE  Great program! If there's nothing that can repair your partition or drive and you want your data back? If can be accessed, Data Rescue can get al your data and place it on another drive or partition. It now can also handle deleted files.  
(Version 1.0)

BACON SAVER  Well, I did it, I screwed-up, and in doing so installed a system over my backup files. Thankfully, there was a system already on that drive, so when I ran Data Rescue it retrieved my files. I must warn those who want to recover a drive about some certain mandatory requirements:

1) You will need another drive, and that drive MUST be larger than your current drive in capacity size.

2) It writes what is called "DataRescueTemp" folder that can be large so place this on another drive so that the drive you recover data to will have more space.

3) You really need three drives to get information off another drive 1: One with a system as a startup drive and that can temporarily house the "DataRescueTemp" folder" 2: A larger drive to recover data to unless you startup drive is for example a 500 GB and you are trying to recover a 250GB drive (the 500GB must have at least 300GB of free space) 3: The drive you are trying to recover.

Yes, this is all a bit complicated, and I ended up purchasing a third drive just to do things correctly, but it is a lot cheaper than losing valuable data. Besides, drive cost are falling and I love the new drive as it is much faster and of larger storage. I simply moved all my data around after the recovery and resumed my life again. You WILL NOT get this level of recovery for this price and using a professional recovery service (I advocate this if you cannot retrieve your data with Data Rescue) will cost substantially more in time and money spent. Thanks Prosoft Engineering.  
(Version 10.4.3)

ANONYMOUS  Hi There,

Data Rescue cannot write to the drive that it's scanning. Sounds like you have perhaps confused the two drives in question. Please give the Prosoft tech support team a call or email to see what might be going on--  
(Version 10.4.3)

ANONYMOUS  Well, they're not off to a good start. It can't seem to scan a drive that's being used as an external drive in target disk mode. Or rather, the program is stupid enough to (a) refuse to use any space on the actual startup disk for scratch space (even though the startup disk is not the disk being scanned), and (b) what's much worse, the program *will* let you use the target disk -- the one to be scanned -- for scratch space. That's a sure way to destroy the data for sure, and just the kind of thing that software should be designed to prevent. Nice job Prosoft -- try again.  
(Version 10.4.3)

ANAMARIA  Installing Tiger uncovered some problems with my hard drive and led to a non-bootable computer. Disk Warrior was not able to repair the disk and so I turned to Data Rescue to try to recover some of my files. After having purchased DW and getting no results I was really cheered to see Prosoft's trial software that would allow me to judge the program's utility before purchasing. Kudos for that. In the end, DR was able to successfully recover the vast majority of my data. Of almost 30,000 files recovered, only about 20 were missing data. My only complaint about DR would have to be the gui. When I first ran the app, I was a little unsure how to proceed and would have appreciated a little bit of guidance from the interface. In the end though, it did what it said it would and did it well.  
(Version 10.4.3)

ANONYMOUS  I want to buy but there is no way to do it. Come on guys, are you serious. I don´t want to write comments, I want to buy.........................  
(Version 10.4.3)

RON  Simply- brilliant. It is precise, simple to use and the only one you need. Forget the rest.

A remarkable software!!

Thanks to the genius who made it.  
(Version 10.4.3)

ANONYMOUS  I found that this program works really well. I had a number of files (tens of thousands) that needed to be recovered, and it did a superb and hassle-free job of recovering most of them. (Some of the data were corrupted, but I don't find this to be the fault of the program. Any data recovery program can only do so much.)

I originally had and tried Norton Utilities "unerase." It found the files, but when I tried to extract them, the program kept crashing. In desparation, I went online and found this program reviewed.

My only complaint is that it's limited on what kinds of files it finds. I had some missing .avi movie files, and to my knowledge, the program doesn't look for those. (If I'm wrong and not using the program correctly, please tell me.)

Other than that, I highly recommend this program if you need data rescued. It does what it says it does.  
(Version 10.4.3)

PHIL  I recently erased my system disk by error, reformatting another one.

Bought this software (10.4.2) and recovered everything... It works!

Thank to the developper, it would have been sooo long to reinstall !

Great, good investment.  
(Version 10.4.3)

MACMATH  While doing a transfer to a new computer for someone, I lost *their* data. I was beside myself. I bought a license to Data Rescue (they were so sweet over the phone, too) and it saved my bacon.

It has gotten a lot faster and better since then (two years ago last summer) and they still have not charged me for an upgrade. Version 10.4.3 is still free to registered users!!!  
(Version 10.4.3)

DAVE STEPHENS  Tried EVERYTHING.

Thought I lost EVERYTHING.

Stumbled across Data Rescue.

Got 90% of my data back.

Cried tears of joy upon seeing irreplaceable photos of my friends, some of whom had passed away.

Thank God for Data Rescue.  
(Version 10.4.2)

MATTHEW HARRINGTON  I recently had a dead drive that Disk Utility and Disk Warrior couldn't fix. It was my main Documents drive for work and I didn't have the good backups I thought I did. I was so desparate I even checked into drive recovery services (ouch!).

I spent the $89 for Data Rescue upon reading reviews and I've gotta say: that was the BEST $89 I have ever spent. I plugged in the drive, started up Data Rescue and the rest... is history... I got all of my crucial files back and intact. I am recommending this software to everybody if they ever get into an unfortunate pinch.  
(Version 10.4.1)

ANONYMOUS  Operator error (i.e. erased a FireWire HD)!

Data Rescue recovered ~120 GB of ~140 GB...the 20 GB where duplicate backups, old ones at that...

Worth the money? Yes!

Repeatable lesson? Hopefully NOT in this lifetime!  
(Version 10.4.1)

ANONYMOUS  I recovered a 120Gig HD that just up and unmounted itself never to mount again with this. It's worth every penny if you need to get data back and the initial expense is WELL worth it as a first attempt before moving onto the very expensive data recovery services.

Note however, that sometimes Data Rescue is excrutiatingly slow but it will recover 90% or more of your data. For me it was a bit worse as I had to manually recover nearly each file individually but I did get over 90% back. It took about a week of working at it in chunks each night but that's just it...it worked.  
(Version 10.4)

MARC GRAY  Complete utter abject failure. I ran this appl' in it's most thorough mode. It took the entire evening. It failed to recover ANY files - even those that had just been deleted - so that the HD space could not have been overwritten.  
(Version 10.4)

JAMES KATT  Data Rescue is CHEAP for what it does.

The other available DATA RECOVERY program charge you by the megabyte for data that is recovered. When I found that recovering only 20 gigabytes of data would cost me $400, I realized that Data Rescue is so much less expensive!!!!!

Data Rescue does not attempt to repair the hard drive, like Norton or Disk Warrior. It specializes in recovering data. It will recover data more completely than these other programs can do.  
(Version 10.3)

JIMI SWEET  This app saved my ass by recovering an 80 GB hard drive full of digital photos. It recovered files when DiskWarrior, Norton Utilities and Disk Utility simply shrugged and quit. Worth every penny and quite a few more!  
(Version 10.3)

ANONYMOUS  I agree it works great and that it is to expensive. There are plenty of good shareware programs to try first before you blow $89 on this.  
(Version 10.2.1)

ANONYMOUS  It is an amazing product. I had a HD that would not mount and neither norton, Disk Warrior, or Drive 10 would even see the thing let alone try and repair it. Apple's own disk ultitity was useless as well. Even running fsck on it (a non-boot volume so I had to manually tell fsck where to run) was useless.

It was a 120Gig drive with 111 writable space. One day it literally up and unmounted itself while I wasn't even touching the Mac, and that was it. Data Rescue not only saw the drive but after a VERY VERY lengthy inspection and some manual input on my part of the File Allocation Blocks I was able to recover everything I wanted from that drive.

Amazing.

For what it does it's CHEAP. If you think it's expensive give someone like drivesavers.com a call and get an estimate, you'll run back to Data Rescue.

Bottom line, if all else fails, and an expensive service like drivesavers.com is not an option try Data Rescue. It quite literaly saved my buisness by letting me recover the files on that HD.  
(Version 10.2.1)

JON  Works great but is just WAY TO DAMN EXPENSIVE! The demo version only allows you to recover one file and its $90 to register. Its not a disk utilitie, it just rescues lost files.

Since you can't use the demo more than once its hard to tell how reliable it is.  
(Version 10.0.4)