AMWTWhen a card's file system is damaged, Windows shows a message like “You need to format the disk in drive E: before you can use it. Do you want to format it?” with two buttons: Format disk and Cancel. The drive letter may be different.
Click Cancel. Formatting writes a new, empty file system over the old one.
What to do
- Click CancelWindows may follow with another message saying the drive can't be opened. Close that too. That is fine: AMWT Desktop reads the card directly.
- Don't let Windows scan and fix the cardIf Windows offers to scan and fix the drive, say no. Repairs write to the card. Recover your files first.
- Open AMWT DesktopThe card still appears in the list, shown as “Unreadable format”. It may take up to about 8 seconds to appear.
- Start a scanWithout a readable file table, the deep scan does the work. It finds photos, camera RAW, video, music, documents and archives by their content (the full list). Their original names are lost.
If you already clicked Format disk
Stop, and do not save anything to the card. A quick format, which Windows uses by default, usually rewrites only the file table, so the photos may still be there. Scan it and see what the preview shows before you pay anything.
If Quick Format was unticked, Windows wrote over the whole card. Then the files can't be recovered by any software.
If the card does not appear in AMWT Desktop or in Disk Management at all, see your card doesn't appear on Windows.
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