Entire Documents folder wiped

Question

Hi. After restarting my PC, my entire Documents folder has been wiped, losing 20 GB of my project files. Was there a reason for this happening? I hadn't touched it and it just vanished. It wasn't hidden and I wasn't in a temporary user account. Using data recovery software only got me 5% of my files back despite it being fine right before I restarted it. Is there any way to recover at least some of the files?

Answer 1

Hi

Thank you for the screenshot, thee is no errors in that registry location, this is a complete mystery, did anything happen on you PC before your Documents folder disappeared?

What folders are in the C:\Users folder on your PC drive?

Answer 2

Yes, here it is:

Answer 3

Hi ItsPoofy,

Thank you for that screenshot, there is no errors listed there, please provide a screenshot of this other location too:

Paste this into the Address Bar in Regedit at the top and hit Enter.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders

Please provide a screenshot of that Registry Editor page.

Answer 4

Hi, Dave.

Unfortunately, I didn't use any cloud services to backup my files.

Here is the Registry Editor page:

Answer 5

Hi ItsPoofy,

I am Dave, I will help you with this.

1

Do you use OneDrive or any other cloud service to sync your files?

If you log into OneDrive, are your files available online to download?

https://onedrive.live.com/

2

Click your Start Button, type regedit and hit Enter to open the Registry Editor.

Click View and make sure 'Address Bar' is turned on.

Paste this into the Address Bar at the top and hit Enter.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders

Please provide a screenshot of that Registry Editor page.