Hi Everyone,
Downloaded and installed Power Data Recovery Boot Disk 6.8 on my HP Lap-Top with Windows 7 64Bit with no problems at all!
Registration was immediate and the program launched and asked what boot device I wanted to use? I selected a 4GB Thumb Drive, It worked very fast! Tolled me to remove my thumb drive and continue and then it listed some Internet help files that show you how to boot your PC from ether a CD/DVD/Drive, Or, From a memory stick, Or, Thumb Drive. Very easy to read and understand for the novice? Or, Anyone not familiar with how to setup your BIOS to look for these drives to boot from "BEFORE" The PC looks to boot from the C:Drive? Or, Boot Drive? And to Boot from the Thumb Drive? Or, CD/DVD/ROM Drive? For my testing, I disabled the boot Drive (C:Drive) Ability from a partition utility and tested this out! I already have my PC's set to look for possible boot OS devices from my CD/DVD/ROM, Memory Sticks, Or, Thumb Drive, But, I could have just hit F12 on the start of boot to select the device I wanted to boot from. I was very surprised to see it read the Thumb Drive and then access the C:Drive and started to boot up! Everything came up normally, A little slower, But! It worked like a charm! (Before this, After disabling my Boot ability from the C:Drive! I tried to boot and it failed!) So, Power Data Recovery Boot Disk 6.8 Worked! Just as described! And worked very well! And Very Easy to use! I repaired my Boot partition in the C:Drive (Just enabled Boot Ability) and shut down the PC. I removed the Thumb Drive and powered ON the Lap-Top and it booted right up! Fast and Normal! I give Power Data Recovery Boot Disk 6.8, 2 Thumbs Up! It would be a life saver if something happened to your boot ability on your PC! Everything was available! Just as if it booted from the C:Drive normally! I just ran the partition manager to correct the problem and re-booted and all was well again! (o; Very handy! Definitely a keeper!
I was also able to install the app on one of my thumb drives and use it in another PC to make a boot Thumb Drive! So, It appears to be portable? I installed it again on my desk-Top PC and tested it there as well and it worked the same! So, This GOTD let me install and register on 2 of my PC's and a Thumb Drive! I would say the Application it worth buying if you missed the Giveaway? I will probably buy licenses for some other PC's as it would be a very fast way to boot your PC to be able to repair it in the event of a goof up? "Or Virus, Or, Trojan, etc.
I give a big Thank You! To MiniTool Solution LTD For letting GOTD offer Power Data Recovery Boot Disk 6.8 for us to try and use for FREE this day! As always a BIG Thank You! To everyone at GOTD for all there hard work bringing us geeks new software to Try, Play with, Revue, And use for as long as we like! for FREE! Thank You!
To everyone, Have a Very Happy Holidays! Take Care! Always Have FUN! Rick D.

This is at best an incomplete solution to a serious problem.
Power Data Recovery Boot Disk is for recovering data only from a damaged hard disk, that you intend to give up and dicard. It cannot restore your software programs.
So don't bother with a half-baked solution.

Use a proper Backup & Recovery software that can do bar metal restore when your hard disk will not boot; in addition to specific restore of certain software or data.
Macrium, Acronis and Paragon can do this.
Aomei & Easeus offer alternatives but I think they are not as good.

Am still waiting for GOTD to offer Macrium Reflect Version 5 Standard or PRO.

By far the most versatile recovery CD is:-

http://www.tonymacx86.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=38


Boots, then shows large icons of all bootable partitions on your hard drive, and gives you the option of which one to start.

You can actually do this using a Linux GParted "live" boot. I've gotten tons of data back from crashed systems before ever having to tell someone their stuff is history on a sys rebuild.

PC owners need to keep their DATA and FILES on external drives, 2 to be exact, with 1 with the data and files, and the 2nd drives as a backup of the first drive. I also burn ISOs of my files and data monthly or bi-monthly.

NEVER PUT YOUR EMAIL, DATA, OR FILES ON YOUR C DRIVE. If it crashes, then you will lose it or take a lot of time trying to recover it.
Programs are OK to install IF you have backups on CD/DVD/ISO with License Numbers. I ALWAYS MAKE AN IMAGE OF MY DRIVE, WITH ALL PROGRAMS AND TOOLS INSTALLED, AFTER I FIRST SET UP MY PC.

I use ThunderBird for my email client and I load the portable version from my P drive (USB 3.0 external PERSONAL drive). All email is saved there. I make auto-backups daily to the BACKUP drive. I make ISOs of those files weekly.

I also set my PC to IDLE/SLEEP at midnight every night (IT WILL GO TO SLEEP NOT REBOOT). All my hardware is plugged into the UPS so when I set it to go to sleep/idle, everything shuts off or goes to sleep (saves wear and tear on the external hardware). ALWAYS HAVE A LOGIN ID AND PASSWORD on your PC, so IF someone does get through your router or cable modem, they will have to know your ID and password. MAKE IT HARD FOR THEM. Change your password every single month using something difficult in combination with letters, small case and uppercase, symbols, and letters: Example: >NoWIs4u2BsafE#

This info info is really great, how to backup and restore .

Question for you all!:

How to extract windows 8 key from a computer that does not want to boot to windows and needs a fresh install,and also
the recovery/restore don't work! Or also how to recover the win 8 key on a pc that works, i see that they hide the microsoft keys in
win8.

Thanks.

Six months ago, somehow I lost my ability to do a START, SEARCH, all files and folders option.It drove me nuts. GOTD gave away File Searchy a few weeks ago, and it did what MY XP Windows Pro 64 bit could no longer so...find things through a search. I d/l'd today's GOTD, burned it to disc, rebooted via safe mode, chose " boot via disc " after inserting today's giveaway, waited, came back up to my desktop, and ability to SEARCH was restored. On that alone I'm giving Data Recovery Boot Disk 6.8 5 stars. Great giveaway ! Thanks so much !

@Giovanni

Thanks for sharing the information about the 'REDO BACKUP'

"Onekey Recovery" is also very useful program. But as I already have a recovery partition and 'Dell backup and Recovery' or 'Dell datasafe local backup' can access that partition for system recovery purpose so I haven't used it on my system.

But can we say AOMEI BACKUPPER an alternative to Power Data Recovery ? ?

I can see two programs have clear functional distinction. I am a regular user of AOMEI BACKUPPER.

Power Data Recovery is a retrieval program of lost files due to operating system and hardware crash.
Also it recovers deleted files, repairs damaged or lost partitions.

Whereas AOMEI BACKUPPER can back up partitions, the whole operating system or the entire hard disk or cloning drive or migrating the OS etc. so to restore or recover system it requires the system backup.

@6 Clueless & Grateful

You have to start the PC/laptop from the USB, not from the normal Windows-HD.
And this program searches for lost files; not for files, that can be accessed at the normal way(then use a live boot-CD, they are free on the net)
When there is a file lost on the HD with Windows and when Windows is started, there is a chance the file will be completely overwritten with temp-files of swap-file.
In that case use directly this program. DON NOT start Windows for a attempt to recover.
Always start in a different way.

(The pictures are not very good.)

Boot from USB/CD:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Boot-1.jpg
Choose Boot-device(CD or USB . .):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Boot-Select.jpg
Some info about booting:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Boot-Progress.jpg
Choose to boot Power Data Recovery Disk:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Choose-Option.jpg
Then choose a option: deleted files/ partition . .
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Choose.jpg
Choose the partition to look for deleted files:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/Choose-Partition.jpg
Select the files to be saved(on a different location, the extra USB-disk:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10366431/_GOTD/PowerDataRecoveryBootDisk68_20141209/Foto/SelectSave.jpg

That's it, folks

nice giveaway ,you should get this and burn it to a CD or boot from USB .it will come in handy if your OS suddenly dies.however this software can only recover data from unbootable OS's and it can do nothing if the boot sector of your HDD where your partition table and bootloader info are coded is physically damaged.

Is this any different from the one given away 12/08/2014? Has the same name and version... v6.8.

I've got this GAOTD elsewhere a few days ago and, after reading some good reviews about it, I decided to keep it in my huge arsenal (still didn't use it as my system is in perfect "shape")

As best FREE alternative, besides AOMEI BACKUPPER (http://www.aomeitech.com/features/create-bootable-disc.html), I recommend an excellent tool called "REDO BACKUP AND RECOVERY ".

It's a freaking good Live CD Open Source backup and data disaster recovery software supporting BARE-METAL restore, meaning you can completely restore a system back even on a machine without OS or with its Hard Drives completely erased by a virus.
Yes, you heard me right dudes: this FREE GEM doesn't need Windows or Linux or Mac, since it relies on a complete mini OS with a point-and-click user interface into your PC's memory.
It's even able to automatically search your LAN for drives to backup to or restore from, as well as gain access to the Internet in order to download your drivers or read documentation, even if your PC is totally broken: cool, isn't it?
And besides editing, managing, and resizing partitions, it can also be used to permanently erase all of your personal or business data, before selling or giving your old PC away.
And of course, since it's an Open Source tool released under the GPL, it's s completely FREE both for personal and commercial use.

http://redobackup.org

But why not create a FACTORY recovery partition for your system, so as to recover the entire operating system along with all its drivers and settings for FREE?

This way, if the OS gets damaged and fails to boot, you can boot into the Windows PE recovery environment by pressing the "A" key when the system tries to start up.
At that point the software will do the magic for you, by starting the recovery process right away.

http://www.backup-utility.com/onekey-recovery.html

Enjoy!! ^_^

P.S. KARL? Don't be fooled by yesterday GAOTD's rating, as it was clearly rigged by that Chinese company (not difficult to actually do that)!

i installed and made a bootable usb stick.
I pictured this to be a somekind of other WinPe tool, where a user could boot to the PE environment and access the lost data or perform recovery incase of hard disk failure due to corrupt software.
Task like copy/paste is the essential part and followed by restoring.

But this was for restoring lost data like images and files in case the HDD didn't boot.
I don't think i have any use for this software. I would never end up with recovering a lost data such as files and images also with a non bootable HDD. But the idea is interesting.
However this is not a complete software and as pointed out by the first person comments.

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone more techy than me would be so kind as to post some instructions as to how to use this, ie. put this onto a USB-drive and have it be ready to do it's job, if in the unfortunate event it is needed.
I am not understanding how it can run from a USB when there is no OS on it to run from, or when the PC's OS has been corrupted/crashed.

Thanks Kindly in advance :)
Clueless & Grateful

Can anyone help me please? Whenever I try to run setup extracted from the zip file here, I get a popup saying “Failed to launch the program.” and setup disappears without installing anything. So I miss the offer. But when there is a normal setup file and an Activation file, the software installs and is activated & registered perfectly. What am I supposed to do? Before, there was no such problem but since about a month, this is the case each time. Did GAOTD change their setup.gcd files or what? Anyone has the same problem (and/or a solution) maybe? Thanks for any suggestions. (Yeah, I am the admin and the connection is there and it is Win 7/64.)

The software would be much better if there were some instructions as to how to use it. It would also be improved if it didn't load itself into a folder using the words MiniTool, where it is difficult to find.

Installed and registered without problems on a Win 8.1.3 Pro 64 bit system.

This time we get the boot disk installer. The Windows program has been given here on August, 12th, 2014.

Here are the reviews of the same program:
http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/power-data-recovery-6-8/

The windows version made a good impression. The boot disk is the better alternative. I will install this on a USB drive with YUMI 2.0.1.1(Google!) and come back after reboot...

... back again. Sorry that I could not take a screenshot.

Result : lousy.

The boot disk is a small linux system (tinylinux) from September 2013. I created the .ISO, "burned" it with Yumi on an USB stick. Creation was fast and without problems.
I booted the USB stick, the Interface to boot the recovery disk or the first HDD came and then...

I wrote down:

Loading /BOOT/bzimage ................ ok
Loading /BOOT/tinycore.gz ............ ok
............
............
Probing EDD (EDD) ..... ok

and the the further boot process freezes. No error message, nada, nil, nothing. I waited some time...

I restarted the system to see, whether the .ISO file was contiguous. This is the main reason for boot problems. I was contiguous and not fragmented. Could not test. Not so good. May work on other computers. Better to test this beforehand...

By the way, yesterday we had the record breaker. 1176 thumbs up. 74%! This must be a good program.

Got this from another giveaway a few weeks ago and, from my testing, it seems to work quite well. I don't have a dead OS or trashed HD to really put it through its paces, but it gets good reviews around the net. My Vista system booted from the disc and I could recover deleted files from either of the internal drives, an external drive, an SD card, and a flashdrive.

If nothing else you get a good boot disc, and since it takes no HD space it's certainly a "keeper".

Pros
This data recovery software can restore data from a wide variety of devices including USB flash drives, Blu-ray Discs, DVDs, memory cards and more.

Cons
The software component required to recover data from unbootable drives is not included with this version. It is an additional purchase.

The Verdict: It is an excellent product to restore data from many disk and memory device disasters. However, if you need to restore data from an unbootable hard drive or create a disk image, another product may be a more suitable option.

Alternatives:
EaseUs Data Recovery @ http://www.easeus.com/datarecoverywizardpro/
7 Data Recovery @ http://7datarecovery.com/