Recovering data from external hard drive

"Complicated" is a pretty relative term - I'm somewhat familliar with both vendors' data recovery software, moreso Runtime Software's, which I've used frequently, both installed on a functioning machine connecte to a problem machine, and installed as a component of a BartPE boot disk - it works, if you take the time to read and understand the documentation. Both vendors offer a downloadable reduced feature/function evaluation version of their solutions - the evaluation version won't recover files, but should give you a pretty good indication of whether the files you want are in fact recoverabnle, and give you an idea of what is going to be involcved, before you shell out your money for the fully working version.

Recovering data from external hard drive
I can reconstruct the most private data, although it will of course be t-e-d-i-o-u-s. I wonder if perhaps that might be the way to go, however. It's basically a question of time.

I think I'll try the tentative download, and if enough things are recoverable, then go with the full program. It'll be worthwhile to take a look, anyway.

Thanks!