DiskDigger Features

DiskDigger can recover deleted files from most types of media that your computer can read: hard disks, USB flash drives, memory cards, CDs, DVDs, and floppy disks.  (Note: DiskDigger cannot recover data directly from Android or iOS devices plugged into a USB port on your PC. To recover data from an Android device, please use the DiskDigger app for Android.  And if your Android device uses a microSD card for storing the data, please remove the card and connect it directly to your PC using a card reader, so that you can scan it directly using DiskDigger for Windows.)

DiskDigger has two modes of operation which you can select every time you scan a disk. These modes are called "dig deep" and "dig deeper." Here is a quick list of features for each mode:

Dig Deep

  • Undelete files from FAT (FAT12, FAT16, FAT32), NTFS, and exFAT partitions.
  • Recover any type of file.
  • Filter recoverable files by name and size.
  • Sort recoverable files by name, size, date, and directory.

Dig Deeper

  • Scan (carve) entire disk for traces of specific file types.
  • Supported file types include:
    • Photos and images:
      • JPG - Pictures stored in digital cameras and on the Web (Joint Photographic Experts Group)
      • PNG - Portable Network Graphics
      • GIF - Graphics Interchange Format
      • BMP - Windows and OS/2 bitmap image
      • TIFF - Tagged Image File Format
      • ICO - Windows Icon
      • ANI - Windows animated cursor
      • CR2 - Canon raw image
      • SR2 - Sony raw image
      • NEF - Nikon raw image
      • DCR - Kodak raw image
      • PEF - Pentax raw image
      • RAF - Fujifilm raw image
      • RW2 - Panasonic/Lumix raw image
      • LFP - Lytro raw image
      • MPO - Images from 3D cameras (Multiple Picture Object)
      • DNG - Adobe Digital Negative
      • SVG - Scalable Vector Graphics
      • HEIC/HEIF - High Efficiency File Format image
      • PSD - Adobe Photoshop image
      • RAS - Sun raster image
      • PSP - Paint Shop Pro image
      • Thumbcache - Windows thumbnail cache
      • IFF - Amiga images and other media
      • ART - AOL Art images
      • WMF - Windows MetaFile
      • EMF - Enhanced MetaFile
      • WMZ, EMZ - Compressed MetaFiles
      • DICOM - Medical imaging format
      • WEBP - WebP images
      • PCX - ZSoft PCX images
      • CDR - CorelDraw images
      • INDD - Adobe InDesign documents
      • CP - Adobe Captivate documents
      • AI - Adobe Illustrator documents
    • Documents:
      • DOC - Microsoft Word document (2003 and below)
      • DOCX - Microsoft Word document (2007 and above)
      • XLS - Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (2003 and below)
      • XLSX - Microsoft Excel spreadsheet (2007 and above)
      • PPT - Microsoft PowerPoint presentation (2003 and below)
      • PPTX - Microsoft PowerPoint presentation (2007 and above)
      • VSD - Microsoft Visio document
      • PDF - Portable Document Format
      • XML - eXtensible Markup Language
      • HTML - HyperText Markup Language
      • RTF - Rich Text Format
      • WPD - WordPerfect document
      • WPS - Microsoft Works document
      • PUB - Microsoft Publisher document
      • XPS - XML Paper Specification
      • WRI - Old Windows Write document
      • ODT, ODS, ODP, ODG - OpenDocument formats
      • DPP - Serif DrawPlus document
      • PPP - Serif PagePlus document
    • Audio and video:
      • MP3 - Audio format widely used in digital media players (MPEG layer 3)
      • WMA - Windows Media Audio
      • AVI - Audio Video Interleave
      • WAV - Wave audio
      • MID -Musical Instrument Digital Interface
      • FLV - Adobe Flash Video
      • WMV - Windows Media Video
      • MOV - QuickTime video
      • M4A - MPEG-4 audio
      • M4V, MP4 - MPEG-4 video
      • 3GP - Third Generation Partnership video
      • F4V - Adobe Flash video based on MPEG-4 Part 12
      • RM - RealMedia video
      • RMVB - RealMedia video (variable bitrate)
      • MKV - Matroska video
      • MPEG - Motion Picture Experts Group
      • AU - Sun Microsystems audio
      • MTS, M2TS - MPEG2 Transport Stream
      • R3D - RED Video Camera video
      • APE - Monkey's Audio file
      • OFR - OptimFROG lossless audio
      • PPM, PGM, PBM - Netpbm images
      • WEBM - WebM videos
    • Compressed archives:
      • ZIP - Widely used compressed format developed by PKWARE
      • RAR - Roshal ARchive, used by WinRAR
      • 7Z - Compressed format used by 7-Zip
      • GZ - Compressed format used by gzip
      • SIT - Compressed format used by StuffIt for Mac
      • ACE - WinAce archive
      • CAB - Microsoft Cabinet archive
      • SZDD - Compressed files created by COMPRESS.EXE from MS-DOS
    • Miscellaneous:
      • ISO - Images of optical media, such as CDs and DVDs
      • EXE - Windows or MS-DOS executable file
      • DLL - Windows or MS-DOS dynamic-link library
      • MDB - Microsoft Access database (2003 and below)
      • ACCDB - Microsoft Access database (2007 and above)
      • PST - Microsoft Outlook Personal Folders file
      • DBX - Microsoft Outlook Express data file
      • XAC - GnuCash data file
      • KMY - KMyMoney data file
      • DWG - AutoCAD drawing
      • DXF - Drawing Interchange Format
      • CHM - Microsoft Compiled HTML Help file
      • TTF, TTC - TrueType font
      • CLASS - Java class file
      • KMZ - Google Earth location data
      • FIT - Garmin activity file
      • WALLET - Armory Bitcoin wallet
      • WALLET.DAT - Bitcoin Core wallet

Common Features

  • Works in Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP.  Both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows are supported.
  • Also works in Linux.
  • View recoverable files as a list, or as thumbnail previews.
  • Thumbnails will show previews of image files, album art from MP3 and WMA files, and icons from executable files!
  • Selecting a recoverable file brings up a full preview of the file (insofar as possible). For image files, it will show the image (with pan and zoom). For document files, it will show a text-only preview of the document. For certain audio files, it will allow you to play back the sound.
  • Previews of JPG and TIFF files will show EXIF information (camera model, date taken, sensor settings, etc.).
  • Previews of MP3 files will show ID3 information (artist, album, genre, etc.).
  • Previews of ZIP files will show a list of files contained in the archive.

Advanced Features

  • Able to scan virtual disk image files:
    • E01 and EWF files (Expert Witness Format)
    • VMDK files (VMware disk image)
    • VHD files (Microsoft Virtual Hard Disk)
    • VDI files (VirtualBox disk image)
    • Direct binary disk images (acquired with <code>dd</code> or similar tools)
  • When digging deeper, ability to start scanning from a specific location on the disk.
  • When previewing files, the program optionally shows the first 4K bytes of the file as a hex dump.