Did Zune kill my Radiostar?
October 29, 2010 7:53 AM   Subscribe

Massive unintended file deletion? I had almost my whole CD & LP collection digitized on a Maxtor OneTouch 750Gb drive. Last week, I installed Zune software on my Windows 7 PC, and all of a sudden, those files are gone, daddy, gone from the drive. Hope me recover my files!

I had about 400Gb on this Maxtor, of which I have about 250Gb backed up elsewhere. All of it is missing, including tons of recent eMusic downloads, and about 100Gb of hard-to-replace live shows I've collected. Two recent changes to my PC. 1) I added MediaMonkey, but that's been working well for over a month, and posed no conflict with iTunes. Then I got a 32Gb Zune given to me. I installed the software & started to build playlists. The Zuneware asked me if I wanted to associate my libraries at other drive locations with the Zune library, swearing it would not move or copy files. I said, sure, yeah, and left for work. I went to play music later that day using iTunes, and all of my music was missing. I looked at the Maxtor drive directories, and NOTHING in my music files (nothing else on the drive was touched or missing). I've looked through online forums for Windows, Windows 7, Zune, iTunes, and I am getting cold sweats. I plan to use a file recovery software solution if they work. Right now I am pissed at myself, at Zune, and yeah, I plan to dtmfa. One weird note--the total "used file size" on the drive is still the same size, roughly 500Gb used, 200+ open. Makes me think I can recover the files, I just don't know how.
posted by beelzbubba to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)
 
Is it possible the software moved the files somewhere else on the drive?
posted by gjc at 7:56 AM on October 29, 2010


Do a search for the file types - mp3, etc. They may have been moved by the Zune evilness.
posted by Threeway Handshake at 8:13 AM on October 29, 2010 [1 favorite]


Just restore from your last backup. Seriously.

--

First of all do not do anything that might alter anything on the drive. Nothing.

Secondly, right-click the drive and see how much space is used. Is it loads (as in is your music still there but hidden) or not much? If you run a Search on the drive for everything what do you find?

Your next step would be to make an image of the drive to another location. Once you've done that, go have a look at PhotoRec. Please read that page thoroughly.
posted by devnull at 8:15 AM on October 29, 2010


ya, the options in the zune sw are a little weird with regard to file management. but the files have likely been moved into a folder literally called "zune". seconding a massive file search for *.mp3

good luck!

ps sorry Zune Effed you, i've been using it for years and its been pretty good to me.
posted by chasles at 8:17 AM on October 29, 2010


What operating system are you using? I have vista and it gives me the option to "View Previous versions" of folders, so if something gets deleted you can actually open up previous versions of the file system. This is vista "business" edition, though. I'm not sure that option exists on my laptop (which is running home premium or something)
posted by delmoi at 9:07 AM on October 29, 2010


Response by poster: Windows 7 Ultimate
posted by beelzbubba at 9:39 AM on October 29, 2010


Best answer: Now, after 2 more days of struggling and cursing, I have my drive and my music back. Zune--as far as I can tell--changed or rather eliminated permissions on the drive, making it unreadable except if/when the Zune was plugged in. I know of no such command that I gave the Zune in setting up libraries.

I tried a couple of the suggestions above. The files were not moved nor were they visible, though the drive size & usages were correct. There was no massive folder called Zune, and the only .mp3 files were the ones that were not touched by Zune or added afterward. FWIW, I have nothing against the Zune player--it is pretty sharp all in all--I just won't be using any Zune software to manage it, at least not from this PC.

FTR, I right clicked on computer, manage, then added the system and this PC as owners of the drive, At that point, I could see the drive and contents in dos window, but not access it. I added in my user profile and there it is!
posted by beelzbubba at 9:08 AM on October 31, 2010


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