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Accidentally deleted voice recordins and videos

Lisa Rowley

Newbie
Feb 12, 2018
10
1
To clear up space on my Samsung S5 phone and store them on SD card, I researched and found that it can be done through my files and selecting them then I moved them to my SD card, which seemed successful. After the transfer was complete, I then deleted my extremely important voice recordings and then did the same with my videos. Of course when I was completely satisfied with the amount of space I now have, I looked on the SD card and don't see them at all! I'm so upset because at this point I need them back! Someone please help me restore these files. Thank you!
 
When you were using the My Files app to copy over those files, did you copy them into an existing folder or a folder you created with My Files? (... and yes this is in complete hindsight but when you're copying over files from one place to another, always confirm the destination.)

One thing regarding what may be just a glitch is to restart your S5. If you still can't see your files on the card at least you've determined this isn't a one-off problem.
Another thing to try is if you have access to a Windows PC/laptop, take the card out of your phone and put it in the PC (using a microSD card adapter or if the PC already has its own integral card slot). Run the 'chkdsk' utility on the card, and then do a thorough visual search of the card's contents to see if your files exist.

As for relying on any microSD card as a backup, that's not a very good solution. Cards in general are not reliable enough for any kind of long term archiving. They may shine as a tiny, portable way to transfer files but as a stable, reliable storage media they're also easily corrupted and have a comparatively high failure rate.
 
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When you were using the My Files app to copy over those files, did you copy them into an existing folder or a folder you created with My Files? (... and yes this is in complete hindsight but when you're copying over files from one place to another, always confirm the destination.)
One thing regarding what may be just a glitch is to restart your S5. If you still can't see your files on the card at least you've determined this isn't a one-off problem.
Another thing to try is if you have access to a Windows PC/laptop, take the card out of your phone and put it in the PC (using a microSD card adapter or if the PC already has its own integral card slot). Run the 'chkdsk' utility on the card, and then do a thorough visual search of the card's contents to see if your files exist.
As for relying on any microSD card as a backup, that's not a very good solution. Cards in general are not reliable enough for any kind of long term archiving. They may shine as a tiny, portable way to transfer files but as a stable, reliable storage media they're also easily corrupted and have a comparatively high failure rate.
Hi, yea def wasn't a good back up plan! No I didn't make a folder to transfer the files to either on the SD card. I will transfer my existing files on my card to my computer just in case the card becomes corrupt...
 
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When you were using the My Files app to copy over those files, did you copy them into an existing folder or a folder you created with My Files? (... and yes this is in complete hindsight but when you're copying over files from one place to another, always confirm the destination.)
One thing regarding what may be just a glitch is to restart your S5. If you still can't see your files on the card at least you've determined this isn't a one-off problem.
Another thing to try is if you have access to a Windows PC/laptop, take the card out of your phone and put it in the PC (using a microSD card adapter or if the PC already has its own integral card slot). Run the 'chkdsk' utility on the card, and then do a thorough visual search of the card's contents to see if your files exist.
As for relying on any microSD card as a backup, that's not a very good solution. Cards in general are not reliable enough for any kind of long term archiving. They may shine as a tiny, portable way to transfer files but as a stable, reliable storage media they're also easily corrupted and have a comparatively high failure rate.
I did take the card out and try it in the computer, there is files on there that are numbered, but isn't showing what's in them. There's no ext with these numbered files, so idk if they're the audio files or not. I'm going to transfer on my computer and see if I'll have better luck opening them.
 
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Those numbered files could just be random config files used by some app. If they were your media files that your copied over the names, and extensions, wouldn't change. You might be able to determine more by just looking at their file size. With the My Files app, long press on one those numbered files, and in the contextual menu that pops up select 'Details' and the file size will show.
(trivia - copying/moving files in Android will retain the same name, Apple and iTunes might be what you're thinking of. In order to prevent a user from being able to manipulate files in their own media file library, iTunes applies a coded I.D. to files, so when you view them using the Mac Finder the files names aren't recognizable as is. The conversion from actual name to coded name, or vice-versa when applicable, is stored within iTunes, a good incentive on Apple's part so you're always conditioned to just let iTunes maintain your media stuff.)
Getting back to your card issue, that doesn't bode well if those numbered files are indeed some kind of representation of the files you were copying over. That represents some kind of failed process. Are they actually located in the folder you were copying your files into, or in a different location? If in another folder or the root level of the card they're probably related to some other app so it might be best to leave them alone.
 
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Those numbered files could just be random config files used by some app. If they were your media files that your copied over the names, and extensions, wouldn't change. You might be able to determine more by just looking at their file size. With the My Files app, long press on one those numbered files, and in the contextual menu that pops up select 'Details' and the file size will show.
(trivia - copying/moving files in Android will retain the same name, Apple and iTunes might be what you're thinking of. In order to prevent a user from being able to manipulate files in their own media file library, iTunes applies a coded I.D. to files, so when you view them using the Mac Finder the files names aren't recognizable as is. The conversion from actual name to coded name, or vice-versa when applicable, is stored within iTunes, a good incentive on Apple's part so you're always conditioned to just let iTunes maintain your media stuff.)
Getting back to your card issue, that doesn't bode well if those numbered files are indeed some kind of representation of the files you were copying over. That represents some kind of failed process. Are they actually located in the folder you were copying your files into, or in a different location? If in another folder or the root level of the card they're probably related to some other app so it might be best to leave them alone.
Yea they def aren't them, because I did name my audio files....hmm ok I'll go back onto the my files area and see what they are. In the mean time do I have to buy a package to recover these files? I can only imagine that they did move successfully. I installed everything on the SD card onto my computer in hopes I'll be able to see them there, but still can't locate them. Thank you for your help and info!!
 
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Yea they def aren't them, because I did name my audio files....hmm ok I'll go back onto the my files area and see what they are. In the mean time do I have to buy a package to recover these files? I can only imagine that they did move successfully. I installed everything on the SD card onto my computer in hopes I'll be able to see them there, but still can't locate them. Thank you for your help and info!!
I did what you said and took a screen shot of the info...it's def showing that is not an audio file but don't know wth it is lol
 

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Hmmm, the fact that the file is located in that 'LOST.DIR' indicates it might indeed be one of those files. Being 2MB in size, that's really tiny for a video but for something like a voice recording (basically mono and low bit-rate) that would make sense. But the LOST.DIR folder is specifically just a fall-back for files that get dumped there when there's some kind of significant error during some action (in this case, copying). When you were copying over those files, was anything of note happening on your phone around the same time? An odd pop-up message? Did your phone feel warmer than usual at the time?

As for using some kind of recovery utility, those are more about restoring deleted or otherwise missing files, not fixing corrupted ones (often items in lost.dir are going to be a mix of valid and broken files). And there's still the matter of the naming issue. If you there were only a handful or a dozen files involve you might be able to manually rename them accordingly but if there were a lot of them be prepared for a involved project. (File size and the last modified date might help with that.)
 
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Hmmm, the fact that the file is located in that 'LOST.DIR' indicates it might indeed be one of those files. Being 2MB in size, that's really tiny for a video but for something like a voice recording (basically mono and low bit-rate) that would make sense. But the LOST.DIR folder is specifically just a fall-back for files that get dumped there when there's some kind of significant error during some action (in this case, copying). When you were copying over those files, was anything of note happening on your phone around the same time? An odd pop-up message? Did your phone feel warmer than usual at the time?
As for using some kind of recovery utility, those are more about restoring deleted or otherwise missing files, not fixing corrupted ones (often items in lost.dir are going to be a mix of valid and broken files). And there's still the matter of the naming issue. If you there were only a handful or a dozen files involve you might be able to manually rename them accordingly but if there were a lot of them be prepared for a involved project. (File size and the last modified date might help with that.)
That screen shot was one of A LOT! The unfortunate thing is that I did delete them from my phone too prematurely, so with that, I'm hoping a recovery app can help restore them, somehow. When I was moving them (for some reason I chose to move them instead of copying them) I never got any message or warning, nothing. It showed them transferring, and the count down of time left. Then said successfully transferred....that's why I felt confident enough to continue with transferring my audio files. :/
 
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Hmmm, the fact that the file is located in that 'LOST.DIR' indicates it might indeed be one of those files. Being 2MB in size, that's really tiny for a video but for something like a voice recording (basically mono and low bit-rate) that would make sense. But the LOST.DIR folder is specifically just a fall-back for files that get dumped there when there's some kind of significant error during some action (in this case, copying). When you were copying over those files, was anything of note happening on your phone around the same time? An odd pop-up message? Did your phone feel warmer than usual at the time?
As for using some kind of recovery utility, those are more about restoring deleted or otherwise missing files, not fixing corrupted ones (often items in lost.dir are going to be a mix of valid and broken files). And there's still the matter of the naming issue. If you there were only a handful or a dozen files involve you might be able to manually rename them accordingly but if there were a lot of them be prepared for a involved project. (File size and the last modified date might help with that.)
On a side note, that modification date on that file I showed you was from 1980??? Couldn't even tell you how that's possible....
 
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That screen shot was one of A LOT! The unfortunate thing is that I did delete them from my phone too prematurely, so with that, I'm hoping a recovery app can help restore them, somehow. When I was moving them (for some reason I chose to move them instead of copying them) I never got any message or warning, nothing. It showed them transferring, and the count down of time left. Then said successfully transferred....that's why I felt confident enough to continue with transferring my audio files. :/
If you are going to be running any kind of recovery utility, before you start be sure 'USB Debugging' is enabled in your phone's Settings >> Developer Options menu.
https://www.howtogeek.com/129728/ho...menu-and-enable-usb-debugging-on-android-4.2/
Also note that if the computer you're running the utility from is a Windows or a Mac, you'll need to install some third-party software to add support for the ext4 file system, the file system used in your S5. While a Linux PC already includes support for ext4 natively, neither Windows nor OS X/MacOS do out of the box. Keep in mind you're digging around the internal storage media of your S5 so there are hazards involved, especially when you're doing it from computer that's running an OS with limited support to your phone's file structure. One thing if this is a spare phone, a different one if it's your only daily usage phone.
 
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On a side note, that modification date on that file I showed you was from 1980??? Couldn't even tell you how that's possible....
Perhaps at some point in its existence that file could have been residing on a computer or device that had its date/time clock set wrong. When a file gets created and modified it's just picking up the current date and time from whichever operating system is in use at that moment. Being the first day or the first month of 1980, that is a little suspicious though. Doing a quick search there were a surprising number of results, such as this one:
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/28098989/Robocopy-1-1-1980-timestamp.html

One quick question though. How big is your microSD card? I'm having a problem determining the exact size as some webs sites state the S5 can support up to a 128GB card, others 256GB. If you have your original documentation that came with your phone that would be more definitive. Anyway, if you have a card with a higher capacity than what your S5 supports that can be a problem, and a possible explanation as to what happened.
 
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Perhaps at some point in its existence that file could have been residing on a computer or device that had its date/time clock set wrong. When a file gets created and modified it's just picking up the current date and time from whichever operating system is in use at that moment. Being the first day or the first month of 1980, that is a little suspicious though. Doing a quick search there were a surprising number of results, such as this one:
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/28098989/Robocopy-1-1-1980-timestamp.html
One quick question though. How big is your microSD card? I'm having a problem determining the exact size as some webs sites state the S5 can support up to a 128GB card, others 256GB. If you have your original documentation that came with your phone that would be more definitive. Anyway, if you have a card with a higher capacity than what your S5 supports that can be a problem, and a possible explanation as to what happened.
SD card is a 32 GB...I called samsung support, will take this to a place on Sat. to try and retrieve the files...fingers crossed! Thank you for your help and suggestions. If anything else comes to mind, please share and I'll try it in the mean time
 
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SD card is a 32 GB...I called samsung support, will take this to a place on Sat. to try and retrieve the files...fingers crossed! Thank you for your help and suggestions. If anything else comes to mind, please share and I'll try it in the mean time

Just to clarify what appears to be a miscommunication (and if you're going to visit some repair facility it's a moot point as this is more so you're simply aware of what's what).
-- Short version, recovering files from your phone is a different process than it is from a microSD card.
-- Long version, recovering deleted files from your S5's internal storage is a different and more cumbersome task than recovering deleted files from a microSD card. Your phone's internal storage is using a file system, 'ext4', so accessing it from a PC over a USB cable requires a PC that actually has the ability to see into an ext4 file system.
Your microSD card has 'FAT32' as its file system. FAT, or File Allocation Table is a very dated, unreliable, and no longer supported file system from Microsoft. It was actually the default file system for Windows 98 and earlier. But FAT has a big plus to it in that is has universal support (from a consumer standpoint) included into other operating systems. So you can plug your card into just about any computer and it will just mount itself as another storage media.

Oh, and be sure to back up your files and such before your go there. (... and if there's anything of a personal or sensitive matter, best not leave it on your phone. Despite whatever privacy statement might be on a plaque on the front desk or in the service agreement, it's pretty much a given that unless strictly supervised the tech person working on your phone will be looking through its contents.)
 
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