On Windows 11, I accidentally formatted a WD Black hard drive to exFAT. Could you recommend a data recovery tool with a high success rate for recovering data?
Did you use “quick format”? Have to written any other data to the drive?
While I’ve never switched formats, Quick Format typical only writes the file table, not the files themselves. You can search for “free file recovery tools” and get one that will have the least restrictions. I use Recuva. Even the paid version isn’t too expensive.
Formatting typically only deletes the ”pointers“ to your files, while the actual content remains on the drive until new information overwrites it. You can download a data recovery tool like MiniTool Power Data Recovery to recover your lost data. I successfully recovered lost files from my Windows 11 computer using this tool.
I’ve seen other users recommend using MiniTool Power Data Recovery to recover data. I’ll give it a try.
Format Definition - What are the meanings of “format?”
Hope you’re able to recovery your data.
Stop using the WD Black drive right now and do not save anything to it. Since it was accidentally formatted to exFAT on Windows 11 there is still a decent chance of recovery if nothing new has been written to the drive. You can try Stellar Data Recovery since it has a solid success rate with accidental formats and partition issues and works well for formatted drive recovery on Windows 11.
Fortunately, I hadn’t written any new data to the WD Black yet, so there’s still hope for data recovery. I plan to try the tool you mentioned.
