Reset cluster size on USB flash drive

I have an 8gb USB flash drive that I use constantly at work. Somehow, the cluster size got jacked up and now all the data is inaccessible/invisible even when using all the free recovery software available here at MajorGeeks. Windows reports the drive as being unformatted/unallocated and "do I want to format now?". One app reports "not default cluster size of 512bytes". I have even tried to use partition recovery software (like in Easeus Partition Master) and nothing seems to work. If I lost everything on the flash drive, it wouldn't be the end of the world, but it would be a pain-in-the-*** to replace everything that was on there.... any thoughts on how to recovery 7.3gb of data from a flash drive with a torqued cluster size?

Thanks!

 

Hi dlb,

Have you tried Minitools Power Data Recovery? It will only recover the 1st GB for free but it will give you an idea if it works.

PhotoRec has a pretty good record. You said all the apps on the link provided were tried. PhotoRec is separate from Test Disk so I am not sure if you tried that or not.

 

Thanks for the rapid response!

I'm sure I did, but I'll try it again . . . I've tried at least a dozen apps, and didn't keep track of what was what. :-o rolleyes

 

:dood So far it looks like PhotoRec is working! I have no idea where it's depositing the recovered files (I'll find 'em somehow), but it's reporting that it has recovered a BUNCH of stuff, and that there's about 5 hours remaining in the process.... fingers crossed!

Thanks tgell!!!

I'll report the end result once it's done . . . .

 

:banghead D O H ! ! !

I accidentally turned off the wrong power strip in mid-recovery and now have to start over 'cuz I have no idea what was recovered and what wasnt' - all I know is that it's about half of the 7.5gb...

However, it seems that the orginal file names and directory structure is not kept intact which is kind of a bummer. If the data on here was "life or death" then I wouldn't mind if the file names and structures were toast, but like I said earlier, it's not the end of the world, and 99% of the stuff is more-or-less easy to get back from other sources.

@ tgell - thanks for the suggestion! Now that I know how PhotoRec works, and I see that it does actually work (all be it kind of slow, but that's OK), I'll have to try it again sometime... thx again!