Maybe it was a simple mistake while browsing your gallery, or something odd happened with your memory card, but when photos are deleted from your Android device, the truth is that Google's operating system doesn't help much. The best option is to remove the card and put all the files into external tools, which are much better prepared to analyze their state and bring back from the beyond the lost photos. Today we'll teach you how to use one of those tools.
Nobody likes losing information, especially when we know very well that we haven't done anything wrong. Inevitably, hardware will fail, and the price to pay will be made up of documents, system files, and even images. When the problem occurs on an Android device, the user's options are even more limited due to the closed hardware profile. Some tools can work directly on the device's memory, but most of them require root access, and in essence there is no generic guide to enable it. Fortunately, a good number of smartphones prioritize storing photos on the microSD card, and when files are deleted from it, it's possible to recover them with something as simple as Recuva, a cousin of CCleaner:
- Turn off the device.
- Download and install a copy of Recuva. The program is very lightweight and has a portable version to run from a USB drive.
- Remove the microSD card from the smartphone and use an adapter to connect it to a USB port on your computer. If your system can read cards directly (many laptop models have their own readers), the adapter won't be necessary.
- Run Recuva, and with the help of its wizard choose the option Pictures. In the next menu you must select On my media card or iPod, or specify the path to the memory card.
- Finally, order the image search. Recuva has a special mode called Deep Scan. If no photos appear in the first pass, it's recommended to activate it for a deeper inspection of the card.
- Recuva will present the results. When the detected images have a preview, their recovery potential is very high. For more details, click on the button Switch to advanced mode. If the color next to the file name is green, you can try to recover it.
The rest comes down to selecting the files, clicking Recover, and specifying a location for the files. Use your hard drive as the destination, don't save the images back to the card. In fact, it's advisable to replace it with a new one. Its relatively low cost on the market makes it not worth the risk of losing photos again. One more thing: although this tutorial takes an Android smartphone as a reference, the same procedure can be applied to other devices, such as Windows Phone phones, cameras, USB drives, and external drives. Good luck!
