A CompactFlash is a type of Flash media card used in camera for storing photos and other data. CF Cards like most other cards in it's league is also prone to errors. Data either gets deleted or is rendered inaccessible in those cases. One of the most common mistakes photographers make, is pulling out the card from the Card Reader while data is being transferred from the Camera to the computer. Another big mistake made by users while using CompactFlash cards, is that they do not take timely backups of their card data. A combination of the two scenarios is often hurtful. If there is no back-up of the files, then a camera data recovery software can be used to recover data from the card.

For example, imagine a situation when you are transferring photos from your CompactFlash card to you computer through Card Reader. You see all the files on the computer and then go ahead and pull out the card from the reader. You then find all the pictures on the card inaccessible.

Cause:

The CompactFlash card uses a read-write process while transferring data from the card to the computer. The computer reads the data on the card and writes it to the computer's hard disk. Even when these files are displayed on the computer screen, these files have not been transferred completely to the computer hard disk. Disconnecting the card from the computer at this time interrupts this process. Thus the pictures on the card become inaccessible.

Resolution:

To resolve the problem, format the card. Before formatting the card, take a back-up of all the information stored on it. Formatting the card erases the data on the card. It can either be done from the back-up taken or using third party camera recovery software. These software work on the principle that even when a file has been deleted from the system, it remains in other locations on the file system. These files cannot be accessed by the computer itself, but specially designed software can retrieve them. They also penetrate formatted file systems, and retrieve information stored there on prior to formatting.

Stellar Phoenix Photo Recovery is a user friendly camera recovery tool which can salvage pictures, videos and audios from formatted or corrupted file systems. The tool supports all popular file formats; JPEG, GIF, RAW, TIFF, AVI, MOV, WMV, etc. It is compatible with both Windows OS and Mac OS X and has a simple GUI so users don't need to be software experts to use it.