dan, while it is just a file, many photo image formats have well defined header data structures that can aid in recognition of them and extracting and parsing the header data can improve the likelihood of recovering the image files from a raw drives surface rather than relying upon a "ghost" of a filesystem reference to a file that had been deleted or lost in some way which is how unknown file types of file types without a well defined header structure are limited by recovery methods available.

So basically photo only recovery software is supposed to be an "expert system" recovery tool leveraging expert knowledge of specific unique data structures to aid recovery.

TK,
Thanks, wasn't aware of that; too bad the giveaway is over.
Dan

Jake, unlikely, it would have to do some kind of deep scan vs active file systems contents comparison and that would take significant development thought and work to impliment and this is not supposed to be a really advanced tool. It is only version 1.0.1 barely out of diapers yet! Even though THIS version is over 3 years old! previously givenaway https://www.giveawayoftheday.com/ashampoo-get-back-photo-1-0-1/ December 7, 2015 and https://www.giveawayoftheday.com/ashampoo-getback-photo-1-0-1-2/ February 25, 2015 and... https://www.giveawayoftheday.com/ashampoo-getback-photo-1-0-1/ August 15, 2013 and.... that's it I think... undeveloped for at least 5 years.

Make that 6 years stagnation from their webpage "Version 1.0.1, 2012/04/26"

beergas, confusingly the softpedia article is called one thing but is about a different ashampoo product. The two product pages are

https://www.ashampoo.com/en/usd/pin/0173/tools-and-utilities/photo-recovery

and

https://www.ashampoo.com/en/usd/pin/0073/tools-and-utilities/Ashampoo-GetBack-Photo

Where getback-photo was abandoned at version 1.0.1 and supports windows back to XP and photo recovery product is at version 1.0.5 and only supports from windows 7 and above... I suspect but cannot prove that the photo recovery product was a rebrand of GetBack Photo product which is likely why that old product was abandoned.

Maybe you down voters would like to explain why the program did not work for you? I tried using my camera yesterday,, and it kept telling me to reinsert SD card. I did several times to no avail. I then tried reading it in my computer, where the format message came up. I tried another card adapter with the same results. Was going to work on it this weekend to see if a recovery program could find the pictures. This came up today, so I gave it a shot and it worked.

JIM, don't fret, overly glowing reports are often viewed as planted comments rather than genuine giveaway participants comments, your comments are in the early plusses now :)

Andriy, ...hey...protected?...that didn't work huh? I mean if you lost them...I haven't tried this program yet but as many have
said Ashampoo has always been a good program

Andriy, please define what you mean by "protected photos" and why it is any different to any other deleted photo and then we might be able to give you an informed reply!

Andriy, Not quite sure what you mean my protected. If you mean the photo was a read only file, then I can't see any reason why not. However, if by protected you mean, for example, encrypted, then I say no as file encryption normally changes the file extension which would not be recognized by the software. Photos would be .RAW, .JPG and the likes whereas an encrypted file would have something different, depends on the encryption software. Most types of file/photo recovery work by doing a deep scan of the drive and access parts of the drive that users can't normally see ... It a bit more complex than that but that's very simplified explanation. The only way to be sure is to try the software and see what happens. Good luck, hope you get back whatever it is you lost.

Robert, Thank you for detailed response. Some of my files are locked(I guess- encrypted) I don't know what happened, but can not open them

Andriy, try rebooting into safe mode and accessing the same files or booting from a linux LiveCD and try accessing the files from there or from a WinPE boot CD or bootable USB drive and see if the files are avilable then... some protection systems use rootkit technologoy that involves a special service/driver that hooks into the host version of windows and hides or adds a layer of security like effect but does not really protect the files and folders as it's smoke and mirrors that can be circumvented by removing the "smoke genreators" and "mirrors" by booting into a differnt operating system without them. It's worth a try!

Tariq, Recuva didn't even find anything with one flash drive I ultimately recovered over a 1,000 photos with one program offered here earlier (Magic Uneraser)...so sometimes 'free' doesn't work well either

Faye, been a while since I participated in an ashampoo giveaway but I recall that once you have registered an email with them it has an associated account on their server that you should be able to create a password for if you haven't already and any license keys you have had genereated for the products you have purchased or obtained via giveawayoftheday.com offers should be saved in the online account.

I may be wrong but if it is still true you may be able to login using the same email address you used before and retrieve the key manually instead of waiting on an email that probably will never arrive as many corporate email spam filter agents are likely to block ashampoo emails for past history of overtly aggressive marketing emails that don't always honour user preferences.

Barry,

Don't hold your breathe waiting for a response from Ashampoo. They have made numerous offers here over the years. But not one time have they taken the time to reply to us users here.

Barry, first thing is that version 1.0.1 is just over 6 years old with no further development since it was released... From the products home page above "Version 1.0.1, 2012/04/26"

That is I think the biggest technical difference between this ashampoo product and almost all other available free or commercial file/picture recovery software out there!