[mercurious08]

Is winrar can damage folders? I think my folders/files were damaged by winrar? How can I retrieve my folders/files in my usb? I really don't have any idea how to retrieve my folders. I don't have any backup files of those folders? Anyone who can help me about this...

[athrun_zala]

I don't think winrar can damage your files...

Maybe your flash drive got corrupted?

Sorry I don't know much about file recovery. Though there are certain recovery programs that might help you.

[blueforgetmenot]

i think i have that program in our office, anybody's familiar with PCI file recovery?

[jefflyceum]

try using other archiving software like winzip. if it does not work, there is a high chance that you won't be able to retrieve your files. File Compression does not damage a file being compressed. If it cannot be uncompressed, it means that it failed in checking it's integrity. That 'checking' is called Cyclic Redundancy Check. Sorry dude if this does not help you much.

[titopao]

@mercurious: Please elaborate on this. Were you asking if WinRAR can damage files that are on you computer, or were you talking about a RAR file that has damaged files and folders on it?

If you mean the former (files/folder are stored in the computer, but not yet saved in a RAR file), I don't think there's a way that WinRAR can damage your files or folders (unless, God forbid, you have a corrupted or buggy version of WinRAR). In this case, your best recourse is to create duplicates and backups of these files before doing anything on them (including storing them on RAR or even ZIP files).

If you mean the latter (files/folders are stored in a RAR file), then this means you have a corrupted RAR file OR you were downloading a RAR file but wasn't able to complete the download. The reason you're still seeing the list of files and folders in the RAR file is because the information about the complete files/folders to be stored on it is saved in the first few sectors/bytes of the RAR file (to spare you the geek talk: basically, it's a list that lists the file/folder names, information about how they were compressed, and the actual location of these compressed within the ZIP file).

What might have happened in your situation (based on the clues I have from your post) is that you started downloading/copying a RAR file, you got the first few mega-/kilo-/bytes of your RAR file (which includes the information about the files/folders, but NOT YET the actual file/folders) and, for some reason, the copying/downloading was interrupted (say, a power interruption, your PC restarted out of the blue or you removed a flash drive while you were copying a RAR file on it.

I'm not much of an expert in file compression (in computer science, it is a specialty in itself), but I do know that there are RAR recovery software floating in the Internet. Fortunately, the newer version of RAR files include a checksum (a number that acts as a signature of a compressed file), which may help reconstruct your damaged file/folder. I have to emphasize, "may", because it may not work all the time, but you can give it a shot. Do a backup of the RAR file you need to recover, then try processing the RAR file under one of these RAR file recovery softwares. You can try Googling some of these RAR recovery software (try "RAR recovery") but make sure you scan them under antivirus software first, for safety reasons

[jhe_enriquez]

uhm... i don't think that winrar can do that... I've been using this compressing tool for about 6 years already and I don't have encountered any problems on this software... maybe what can cause the corruption of the file is the improper method of compressing the file or the computers response for the compress process is slower.

[jeimebrean]

Originally Posted by mercurious08

Is winrar can damage folders? I think my folders/files were damaged by winrar? How can I retrieve my folders/files in my usb? I really don't have any idea how to retrieve my folders. I don't have any backup files of those folders? Anyone who can help me about this...

first and foremost you cannot blame winrar for damaging your files there are alot of reason why you files were damage. and i think the reason your files is damage is most likely the cause of your usb flash drive. Most usb flash drive are not well proofed in regards to magnetism and electric impulse even to static electricity so this are the common reason files get corrupted in usb 2nd some usb flash drive ain't formated so this is also another reason. so best option is to try "recovermyfiles" it is a program for deep file recovery just google for it.

bottom line try to protect your usb flash drive the way you protect your files.