Seagate Recovery Suite
Developer Website: https://www.seagate.com/services-software/recover/recovery-software/
- 2018
Overall Product Rating:
The program looks like it has been totally redesigned and redeveloped since its 2016 version. It has now a good wizard interface, excellent S.M.A.R.T. monitoring features, and file search and mark capabilities. On the other hand, its file recovery performance is very unimpressive, considering its developer is Seagate, a very well-known hard drive manufacturing company and the old version was #3 in our 2016 tests.
Interface and Features
File recovery using file signatures (raw file recovery): Compare
Supports raw file recovery with a pre-defined file signature set. File types to search for cannot be selected.
Deep analysis of disks (disk scan): Compare
Drive objects to scan can be specified. Already found files can be shown during the scan process. Scan results are saved automatically. Scan can be stopped and them resumed.
File search, mark for recovery, sorting: Compare
Individual file and file mask search. Sorting by file types and dates. Files can be sorted by clicking column names. Only Selected files can be shown.
S.M.A.R.T. : Compare
Two types of S.M.A.R.T. tests can be conducted, Short (Recommended) which is a fast S.M.A.R.T. test with most critical parameters, sampling the device and Extended – an extended version of the S.M.A.R.T. test that covers the entire device.
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Languages supported: English (US/UK), German, Spanish, French, Portuguese (Brazilian), and Chinese.
Recognized all tested localized characters in file and folder names.
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The built-in previewer can show Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat (pdf) documents, txt, graphic and video files. Only the beginning of files/documents can be shown/played back.
File recovery performance
Files Deleted without Recycle Bin (NTFS file system): Compare
After Simple and Quick scan:
All files, except 2 jpg and 1 avi files from the disk root folder, and 1 mkv and 2xlsx files from elsewhere, were found in their original locations with correct file and folder names. All were correctly recovered, except those files.
After Advanced and Detailed scan:
Those 2 jpg files from the disk root were found with incorrect names and correctly recovered. The 2 xlsx, 1 mkv, and 1 avi files could not be recovered.
Files Deleted without Recycle Bin (exFAT file system): Compare
After Advanced and Detailed Scan:
Only raw files were found. 6 docx, 1 mkv, 1 m4v, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 11 mp3, 2 xlsx, 1 avi files were not found. 21 avi files had the wav extensions. The all other files were successfully recovered.
Files Deleted without Recycle Bin (FAT32 file system): Compare
After Simple & Quick scan:
All files and folders were found in the original places with correct names, except that several files and folders had the _ character instead of their first letters. All files, except those from the device root folder and one mov file, were correctly recovered.
After Advanced & Detailed Scan:
The same results were obtained. All files from the device root older and one mov file could not be recovered.
Emptied Recycle Bin (exFAT file system): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files were found - 6 docx, 2 xlsx, 11 mp3, 1 mp4, 1 mkv, 1 m4v, 1 mpeg, 4 mts files were not found. All avi files had the wav extensions. Those files were recovered, the rest files were not found.
Emptied Recycle Bin (NTFS file system): Compare
After Simple & Quick scan:
Three folders and files from the root folder were found with incorrect names in Bin, the subfolders and files in them being with correct names. The _unknown section contained the rest of the files, except 1 avi and 1 mkv. All found files were correctly recovered except those avi and 1 mkv files.
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
The lost avi and mkv files were not found.
Reformatted disk (NTFS to NTFS): Compare
After Simple & Quick scan:
Nothing was found.
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Some folder with their files were found in their original names. They were correctly recovered. The rest of the files were found in the other section. The folder structure was partially recovered. Slightly more than half of files were recovered from raw files without their file names.
22 files were not recovered: 1 jpg, 11 mp3, 6 docx, 4 xls.
Reformatted disk (exFAT to exFAT): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files were found. The recovery could not be performed because the program threw a bug message: “Your internet connection is intermittent. Please contact us”, although the internet connection did work.
According to file preview, 1 mkv, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, and 2 xlsx files could not be recovered.
Reformatted disk (NTFS to exFAT): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files were found. The recovery could not be performed because the program abruptly dropped recovery.
Reformatted disk (exFAT to NTFS): Compare
After Simple & Quick scan:
Nothing was found.
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found in the raw file section, they were recovered successfully.
26 files were not recovered: 1 mkv, 1 m4v, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 11 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Reformatted disk (FAT32 to FAT32): Compare
After Simple & Quick scan:
Nothing was found.
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
26 files were not recovered: 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Damaged partition (exFAT): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the partition:
Nothing was found. The program threw the message “(No files were found, please try again)”
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the hard drive:
Only raw files with incorrect names (several mp3 files) were found, they were recovered successfully.
27 files were not recovered: 1 mkv, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Damaged partition (NTFS): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the partition:
Nothing was found. The program threw the message “(No files were found, please try again)”
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the hard drive:
Only raw files were found. Some of them could be viewed in the program viewer. However nothing was recovered when the program had finished the process and given the message about successful recovery. The output folder was empty.
Damaged partition (FAT32): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the partition:
Nothing was found. The program threw the message “(No files were found, please try again)”
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the physical storage device:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
26 files were not recovered: 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Damaged partition (exFAT – memory card): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the partition:
Nothing was found. The program threw the message “(No files were found, please try again)”
After Advanced & Detailed scan on the physical storage device:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
27 files were not recovered: 1 mkv, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Deleted partition (NTFS): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
An NTFS partition was found. All folders and files were found with correct names. All of them were correctly recovered.
Deleted partition (exFAT): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
27 files were not recovered: 1 mkv, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Deleted partition (FAT32): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan:
Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
26 files were not recovered: 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
Deleted partition (exFAT – memory card): Compare
After Advanced & Detailed scan: Only raw files with incorrect names were found, they were recovered successfully.
27 files were not recovered: 1 mkv, 1 mpeg, 4 mts, 13 mp3, 6 docx, 2 xlsx.
