Disk Tools

File Scavenger is a Windows file undelete and data recovery utility for NTFS and FAT/FAT32 volumes. It can recover files that were damaged by virus or accidentally deleted from Windows Explorer, the Recycled Bin, command line window, or a network share along with original folder names and file Create and Modified dates. It supports reformatted volumes or broken hardware/software RAID volumes as well as file compression, dynamic disks, alternate data streams, sparse files, Unicode filenames and more. With the trial version only 64KB or smaller files can be recovered. File Scavenger offers 3 different search modes, one for quick access to recently deleted files, one for exhaustive search and also a defunct volume search that can even recover files from compromised striped and RAID volumes. We tested the product on a machine that was reformatted a few days ago, and safely recovered some of the files, old desktop shortcuts and more.

SizeExplorer Pro is a disk space usage analyzer that allows you to manage your files and hard drive space. It includes graphical charts, file statistics, reports (biggest files etc.) as well as features to print file lists, compress files into ZIP archives, export options and more. The quickly scans a selected drive and also integrates into the Windows Explorer right-click menu for quick access to reports, and analysis. Other features include network support, command line scanner and more.

EASEUS Partition Manager enables you to configure and manage partitions on your hard drive(s). You delete or format, and also resize and move your partitions. If you do not have any free disk space you can reduce the size of an existing partition, and use the unallocated disk space to create new or enlarged partitions to better manage your data. In addition, you can view disk and partition properties, set an active partition, change drive letters and more. EASEUS Partition Manager can be run from within Windows, but also includes an option to create a bootable CD, that allows you to manage your partitions before Windows loads (may be needed for certain changes). The demo version does not allow you to apply any partition changes.

TreeSize Professional is a powerful and flexible hard disk space manager. It allows you to find out which folders and files are taking up the most space on your computer. TreeSize Professional shows you the size of the files/folders, allocated and wasted space, the number of files, the last access date, the file owner, the NTFS compression rate and much more. The data is presented in Explorer style window with an easy to view, interactive 3D bar and pie charts. The program also comes with a built in search function that is designed to find old, big and temporary files with special support for Internet related files (IE and NS). You can also print detailed reports or export the collected Data to Excel, HTML or ASCII file. As an added convenience, the program also integrates into Windows Explorer and can be launched from the right click menu of every folder. All Explorer functions, including deletion are available from within the software interface.

Active@ UNDELETE is a data recovery software that helps to recover lost, deleted and formatted data on local and network drives, as well as removable drives and digital media like Secure Digital, CompactFlash, SmartMedia, MemoryStick etc. The program supports FAT12, FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS files on any Windows systems including servers versions. In addition, the program supports EFS (Encrypting File System) file recovery, damaged RAID reconstruction and also allows you to create a disk image to further protect your data.

FolderSizes shows how your drive space is being utilized with the help of graphical, interactive bar charts and targeted reports to locate oldest, largest or specific file types. It can analyze individual folders or entire hard drives and sort the display based on files size, number of files, folders and several other criteria. The reports can also be exported to HTML format, including full color graphs. Additional features include support for network paths, Windows Explorer integration and more.

BootIt Next Generation combines a boot manager, partition manager, and imaging tool in one product. The partition manager features non-destructive resizing, converting, creating, copying, moving, deleting, and undeleting partitions on hard drives up to 2TB in size. In addition, it also includes an integrated imaging tool for backup and restore of entire partitions. The boot manager enables you to boot any partition on any hard drive (up to 8 hard drives), including booting from the CD-ROM drive, booting multiple operating systems from a single partition as well as user id and password protection, custom graphic background, and more. BootIt Next Generation supports FAT, FAT32 and NTFS. The program creates bootable floppy disks or CD ISO image.

HDDlife Professional is a handy tool, that runs in the system tray and monitors the health status of all your hard drive(s) that support S.M.A.R.T. technology (almost all modern drives do). If your hard drive supports temperature measurement, it will also display the current temperature. In case of problems, the program can send an email or network message, play an alert sound or automatically turn the computer off. The overall status is indicated by a dynamic tray icon. HDDlife Professional supports only IDE and Serial ATA disks, it does not support RAID disks.

Drive Health helps you to estimate your hard disks life resource. It allows you to predict possible hard drive failure and prevent loss of critical data. To estimate hard disk life, the program takes advantage of the S.M.A.R.T. technology that is supported by most hard disk manufacturers. By implementing this technology, Drive Health provides easy to use access to your hard disk drives reliability monitoring features, and keeps you informed about any degradations of performance or reliability. The monitoring program can be run as a NT service.

Image for Windows backup and restore utility that creates a snapshot of a selected partition or volume, and saves it to disk, or burns it directly to most DVD+RW+R-R-RW or CD-R/RW drives. Using a disk image as a backup allows you to restore your entire system with all programs and setting intact, similar to a recovery CD that came with your computer. The program can create the disk image from within Windows (you can keep working), using the free PHYLock add-on, or optionally from DOS with the included Image for DOS utility. It also provides a tool that allows you to browse the disk images and extract individual files from them, rather than restoring the entire drive or partition.

Paragon Partition Manager enables to create, copy, resize or move hard drive partitions from within Windows, without data loss. You can format your disk(s), divide them into multiple partitions, in order to organize your data or to and install several separate operating systems for a dual boot environment. The program offers a visual interface that allows you to manage your drives and partitions, an preview the changes. Paragon Partition Manager supports large disks (over 120 GB), USB drives, dynamic disks (Win 2000 and XP), Windows 95/98/2000/ ME/XP/NT, Dos and Linux. The demo version allows you to work with the software, but none of the changes will be applied.

Disk Triage will size and analyze your directory space in one pass. It provides access to the gathered data via TreeView, Graphs and Reports and offers the ability to export to Excel, Graphic Files and XML files. Analysis capabilities allow you to breakdown by File size, attribute, dates, times, extension, owner and registered file type - as well as the largest and oldest files. You can specify color schemes based on certain criteria The program will also gather and display NTFS directory and file permissions. In addition, Disk Triage comes with a batch for automation, network support, printing and more. Many great features, but interface usability could use improvements.

Disk Space Inspector allow you to determine which folders and files take up the most disk space and how your hard drive is being utilized. It offers interactive pie and bar chart displays, sortable columns and can create customizable file system reports. You can view disk space usage by NTFS owner, shares, folders and various other aspects. Reports can be exported to HTML and CSV format. Disk Space Inspector also supports network drives.

DiskScout Pro is a disk and folder monitor that tracks your hard disk utilization over time. Unlike most other disk usage monitors, DiskScout Pro is not designed to find large folders or files, but to mark those where changes in size have occurred between scans.

Acronis True Image provides a complete PC backup and restore system that allows you to create disk images of your hard drive partitions (or selected folder structures) and store them in a secure location. The backup images can include your entire system partition, including Windows with all programs and settings, so that you can restore your computer to a previous state without having to reinstall Windows or any of your programs. Acronis True Image can also perform incremental and differential backups for selected files and folders, thereby adding traditional backup functionality to the disk imaging features. You can continue to use your PC during the disk imaging operation, no system reboot is necessary. The program can also create a Rescue Disc that enables you to restore your computer in case it becomes inaccessible. Other features include integrated CD/DVD burning, disk cloning, scheduled operations, file exclusions, password protected backups, and Acronis Secure Zone, which enables you to safely store your disk images on a protected partition.

Disk Checker is a disk diagnostics, repair and disk image tool for FAT and NTFS. It supports file access and direct access checking and can can create disk images compatible with disk image files produced by other popular disk copy utilities (Diskcopy, WinImage, DiskDupe, etc). Additional features include commandline support and Explorer integration.

Disk Recon allows you to examine your disk usage, find duplicate files, investigate directory sizes, monitor files and directories and more. It provides a color coded folder tree structure that includes file sizes and number of files and can be sorted by different criteria. In addition, the program includes a file search tool with optional filter settings, built-in thumbnail display for images and a hex viewer for other file types.

Active SMART allows you to monitor the S.M.A.R.T. parameters of the hard disk to detect its fault condition. It uses special algorithms to predict the date of a possible drive failure. In addition, Active SMART provides you with full information about your hard disk. It has several testing modes and can be used at home for personal use as well as for large computer systems. Various monitoring modes and alerting options are available (local and remote). The built in messaging features allow for system administrators to be notified of impending hard disk failure on any machine on the network while local alerting can be configured to notify the user. An easy-to-use interface allows users to use Active SMART without any special technical knowledge.

GameDrive is a CD/DVD emulator that creates disk images of your game CD/DVD and allows you to play your games without having to insert the media each time. Since these virtual disks are hard drive based, they offer much faster access times, resulting in improved game play. To create a new virtual disk, simply insert the CD and click a button to copy the CD and create a virtual disk drive, using the drive letter you specify. Once all your games have been copied, you can simply insert and eject the virtual disks to switch between games. You can can pre-load up to 23 virtual drives with game discs or other content, and easily swap out discs via hot keys or desktop shortcuts.

FinalRecovery is a file undelete, data recovery solution to undelete files and folders from Hard Disks and Floppy Disks. It supports FAT12, FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS file systems. It can also undelete files from digital camera cartridges, CF and memory stick. In addition to the undelete functionality, the program also provides the ability to clear any recoverable files (for privacy reasons). Evaluation limit can recover files up to 64kb in size.

Extra Drive Creator Pro enables you to create a variety of virtual drives, including crypted drives, virtual CD-ROM drives, virtual drives linked to files or folders, as well as a RAM-drive. The interface is easy to use and categorizes the available drive options and shows the drive letters that you can use for your virtual drive(s).

WatchDISK can display the current directory size of local or networked drives and unlike most other disk space tools, it can show how those sizes have evolved over time. This allows you to project future storage needs based on current trends and growth patterns and find out why free disk space has suddenly dropped or increased. If you have Microsoft Excel installed, you can also take advantage of visual charts and statistical displays. In addition to the comparison features, the program includes several alert options, allowing you to be notified by message dialog, email, pager or command line if specified disk changes have been detected.

Stellar Smart takes advantage of S.M.A.R.T technology to monitor the current health status and performance level of your hard drives. It can alert you by popup dialog or email message in case of overheating, and also reports on a variety of other disk parameters that are supported by your disk. Additional features include statistical temperature graphs, disk benchmarking, error checking and automatic logging of all test results. Stellar Smart also includes a disk cloning tool that enables you to create an exact copy of your disk and clone it to a new hard drive.

Innovatools diskSpace Explorer Network enables you to visualize drive space usage with the help of interactive pie charts that display the content of folders and drives. You can configure the program to display file types with different colors, review detailed folder information, move/archive/delete folders, view the amount of wasted space and a detailed list of subfolders and their sizes.

Partition Table Doctor is a partition recovery software that can help when you experience drive errors (other than hardware failure). It automatically checks and repairs the Master Boot Record, partition table, and the boot sector of the partition with an error, and allows you to recover the partition. The program can also create an emergency floppy disk or a bootable CD to recover the bad partition even if your operating system fails to boot. Other features include partition table backup/restore, Fixboot, surface check, sector editing, rebuild Master Boot Record and more. Partition Table Doctor supports FAT16/FAT32/NTFS/NTFS5/EXT2/EXT3/SWAP partition on IDE/ATA/SATA/SCSI hard disk drives.

WipeDrive allows you to eliminate all personal data from your computer, before selling or donating it. A simple drive format can leave many files to be recovered by widely available software recovery programs. Using WipeDrive however lets you wipe your drive clean, using secure deletion methods that prevent any recovery of your personal data. The program creates an boot diskette (floppy disk required) that you insert on the next boot, and then follow the prompts to securely delete your entire disk content, including operating system and ALL data, partitions etc. according to the U.S. Department of Defense standard.

Freespace XP is a disk management software which performs a number of unique functions. It supports hot-swappable and frequently changing network drives and allows you to monitor all your drives in several visual and intuitive ways. In addition, Freespace XP allows you to set conditions and actions to be associated with each drive. When the free disk space reaches a user specified limit, it can play a sound, send an email, cleanup trash files, run a program and more. Additional features include a floating disk monitor, color coded tray icons and more.

SIGuardian monitors hard-drive health to prevent data loss caused by failures and malfunctions. It uses S.M.A.R.T. to predict the final date of HDD lifetime, so that you can make backup copies of all your data before it s too late. S.M.A.R.T. technology is supported by IBM, Maxtor, Seagate, Hitachi and most other modern hard drives. The program allows you to monitor multiple drives and lets you select the attributes to monitor. It can optionally check the drive(s) at startup and then exit, or run continuously as a service, displaying a tray icon that indicates the current drive condition. Additional features include email and network reporting.

SpaceTrack offers a single, consolidated system to monitor and track Disk Space Usage across Windows or Novell networks. The system helps avoid downtime due to disk usage issues and provides key information for weekly and monthly reports. SpaceTrack tracks daily usage, enabling you to predict when serious problems will occur while noticing any abnormal increases on a daily basis. Additional features include alerts, email notifications and export to Excel functions and the ability to record disc space usage over time.