Can I Deep Scan the Entire Disk Instead of Just the Free Space?

Usually, Deep Scan scans just the empty space of your hard drive for lost data. However, there are cases when a disk is not readable in a usual way, and you can’t view some non-deleted files (due to partial file system corruption, for instance). Or perhaps you’re unsure which partition your lost data was on, or you suspect one of your partitions is missing.

In this case, it’s important to know that with Disk Drill you can scan the entire disk when needed — both the empty and the occupied spaces. Just select the main disk name (instead of one of its partitions) and click the “Recover” button. The disk will be treated as raw file system, and will be analyzed as one binary chunk without differentiating free space from taken. Disk Drill will search for lost partitions and then Deep Scan the entire disk. This generally means:

1. A longer scanning time.
2. A much longer list of recovered files to go through (since it includes both deleted and undeleted files).
3. The possibility of recovering files from the space which is marked as non-empty.
4. Knowing for sure that your lost files will be found as a result of running an exhaustive scan.
5. The possibility of recovering files from partitions that were lost.

Note: It is much quicker to Deep Scan just one partition than an entire drive, so if you know which partition your lost data was on, you can try scanning just that partition first. However, scanning the entire drive always has better chances to produce the best recovery results.