How deleting files work

[chibicitiberiu]

I have recently found out how files are deleted on hard drives. It's very interesting:

A common misconception is that the data is actually removed from the hard drive (erased) when you delete a file. Any time that a file is deleted on a hard drive, it is not erased. Instead, the tiny bit of information that points to the location of the file on the hard drive is erased. This pointer, along with other pointers for every folder and file on the hard drive, is saved in a section near the beginning of the hard drive and is used by the operating system to compile the directory tree structure. By erasing the pointer file, the actual file becomes invisible to the operating system. Eventually, the hard drive will write new data over the area where the old file is located.

So this is how data-recovery software works: finds the files that are not pointed to on the hard drive. They are often damaged because part of them was overwritten.

Quote from HowStuffWorks.com
This is the source: http://computer.howstuffworks.com/question578.htm
You should check this article out, it's very interesting

 

[fade2green514]

makes sense to me. after all formatting a hard drive is like filling a hard drive up with the same thing over and over, therefore overwriting everything and anything that is already there. (in a way, showing the operating system that its empty)