I recently reinstalled Windows on my main drive, which is a 500GB M.2 drive. After the reinstall, I noticed that my second hard drive, which I use for data like games, pictures, and documents, only shows files that were created up to 2021. I disconnected this second drive while reinstalling Windows, and it was definitely not wiped because there are old files on it. However, none of my newer files are showing up. I've tried removing write protection and taking ownership of the files without success, and I'm currently running Disk Drill to recover them. Can anyone help explain what might have happened to my files?
2 Answers
It sounds like your older Windows installs might have had the setting to save files on the D drive. Since you reinstalled Windows, those settings could have reverted, causing any new files to be stored on the C drive. Here's a link to an article that explains how to adjust save locations if that's the case: [Lenovo Support Article](https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/solutions/ht513408-how-to-change-the-default-save-locations-in-windows-11).
Have you checked to make sure your newer files weren't accidentally saved on the C drive instead? It's weird for a drive to just lose files like that unless something went wrong during the reinstall. Sometimes Windows can default save settings to a different location after a fresh install.
I can assure you they weren't. I still see the main folder for my pictures, but anything from 2021 onward is just gone.
Yeah, that must be frustrating. I'm not sure how that happened, but it's definitely worth a deeper investigation.
But the files were definitely on the D drive. I used to navigate there manually, so I'm not sure this is the issue.