2 My documents folders, deleted one, both gone! How to recover files?

I noticed I had two copies of the My Documents folder, one in my user folder where I want it, and the other buried deep in my pictures folder (I think I accidentally dragged and dropped it there once when I was trying to change the order of icons in the navigation pane). I deleted the one in my pictures folder, and both folders disappeared!

What happened?

I closed the screen out, re-opened "my computer," and see both My Documents folders back, but empty.

1) How can I recover my files? My last backup was last week, and I've written quite a bit since then. I was actually about to back up again when I saw the annoying second folder and deleted it, not realizing they were linked. The folder was too large and bypassed the recycle bin.

2) How can I fix the two folders issue? I have the same problem with my music folder also, and have had problems with the folders under my username seeming to disappear, reappear, and move for no apparent reason.

The computer has Windows 7 Professional.

Thanks for any help.

Hi,

Recuva from Piriform might be able to recover this for you.

Regards,
Golden

I've already tried Recuva and DiskDigger. Recuva found all the files, but most said "unrecoverable." I loaded them anyway but MS Word won't open them, saying they're corrupt/parts are missing, and in WordPad they just open as gibberish (I think WordPad can't open word documents though, so maybe there was no point to trying it anyway).
Any other ideas?

You have "Hide protected OS files" unchecked?

Sometimes there is a shadow copy of the files in question. Right click the parent folder, choose properties and check the Previous Versions tab. I would guess that if Recuva didn't help you might be out of luck. The couple of times I've used that software it worked pretty well.

Best Wishes,
Rªnce

Try a System Restore point before you did the deletion.

Always the easiest and quickest to try. Tutorial here if needed.> http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/700-system-restore.html

You can try Restoration |MG| Restoration 2.5.14 Download
(Run as Administrator)

One word of caution, though, this program will find just about everything that you've ever deleted from your PC, including files deleted from program uninstalls, so if you know the extension (DOC, MP3, etc.) of the file that you deleted, narrow your search to only files with that extension. Once you find your file select it, and then click on "Restore by Copying.

Click to expand...