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I had my external SSD with data and exFAT file system accidentally deleted, and created a new partition on top of it with the exFAT file system within the disks tool in Ubuntu Live.

I mounted the drive and dismounted it immediately, so there should be no data overwritten.

I tried to recover the old/ deleted exFAT file system with testdisk, but it did not find anything. (At least it was not useful.. I had way earlier 3 partitions on the drive, and testdisk just found stuff on that).

I now have PhotoRec running, but just learned that the names and folder structure are gone.

Is there anything I can do to recover the folder structure and with that the data, instead of only the data?

Erbond12
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1 Answers1

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So I found a solution. I did not test it yet, so not 100% sure, but the dmde tool did seemingly recover the file system, and I may not need to go and find the connections between files from the PhotoRec tool.

I also need to check if it is possible/feasible to do it for free, but so far it seems promising. Hope this helps someone else with a similar problem!

Edit: DMDE found all the data, but I was unable to restore the file system or partition, so I had to manually restore the files it found. This was still better than PhotoRec, as it could still recreate the structure of the files. If you are willing, you could also pay for the cheap (in contrast to other offerings) license, and DMDE would then pull the data automatically with the whole folder structure for you.

Erbond12
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