Recover Lost Word Document?

Hi there folks,

A friend of mine was completing a twenty page Word document for his science class, saved the document and closed out of Word. Later on he was working on a similarly named document, and after he was finished working on the new file, he somehow opened the save dialog and replaced the twenty page finals paper with a similar name! http://i.dslr.net/v2/lite/emotionless.gif

Is there a program that can restore the previous version or some type of tweak that is available for recovering the older file? As you can imagine, he's at wits end trying to figure out how to restore his composition, if there is any suggestions you can offer towards resurrecting the file, he would be very appreciative.

He's currently using an HP laptop with Windows ME. I'm going to call him back right away and see if there is any more info he can release about the Office version etc., anything that you might find helpful, as outlined in the "Read Me First" sticky.

I know my first post in this forum might seem like I'm leeching information, but this friend of mine is at wits end! I'll try and see if there is some easy questions that I can answer in the mean time, just in case anyone knows how to tackle this toughy.

P.S. He doesn't have any backup software on his pc (yet). I've been trying to get him to buy some for awhile, but it looks like he just might have to learn the hard way.

 

I am unaware of any way to recover a file that has been overwritten like that.
Perhaps someone else has an idea.

 

Here's to hoping, perhaps a professional could open up his hardrive and extract the data?

 

If he has not rebooted the computer it could be in temp files. I cannot remember recovery process. do a search for *.doc and look for ~ile.doc to compare to file.doc Other wise it will be long process to change file.

 

Definitely check there.

If he has "Always Create Backup Copy" enabled in his Save options, and if he hasn't saved the new file AGAIN, then Word will have a backup of the original as "nameofhisfile.bak"

 

As an aside, MS's method for backup files in Office is the worst thing inflicted on us since WinME. There's hardly any documentation for it, no configuration, and not instructions. It tries to "automatically recover" which I've never seen work. Not even once.

Personally, I'd like the program to save every 5 minutes to similarly named backup files, and keep the last 5. This cache of bakup files could have a max limit like, say, IE's temp cache (but actually managed). 10MB for backup files with humanized filenames. Give me a purge option and I'm good-to-go.

All you hafta do is make it configurable for people with security issues (like DOD deletion requirements) and bam! Life gets easier for the rest of us.

But what do I know? I'm just a user.