Need help recovering photos from formatted SD card

[Weetabix]

So, eldest daughter was in London. After a week of taking breathtaking, once-in-a-lifetime photos, her camera inexplicably asked, "Format Y/N?"

She, inexplicably, didn't know what that meant, and inexplicably said, "Y." Then, inexplicably took some photos and erased a few.

The local camera shop claims they can recover it for $65. Stellar Data Recovery has a free download that claims to have found about 800 photos, and the previews look right. If I register the free download for $50, it claims it will recover the photos.

The questions:
1. What has your experience been with this type of issue?
2. Better with a camera lab or with software you buy?
3. Is Stellar on OK program? I could see buying it, even for only this instance, but having it as backup for another one would be great if it's trustworthy.
4. Any free software out there that's reliable?

My main desire is to save the photos. Next priority is to do it as cheaply as possible. But safely recovering photos trumps cost.

[g-man]

Piriform Recuva: http://www.piriform.com/recuva

It's free, and works great. I've used the hell out of it for situations not dissimilar to yours. EXIF data should be fine, though all the file numbers will be jacked up, not that that really matters for photos. Should recover anything not over-written. Set it up for a 'deep scan' in the options and it'll find anything on the card not over-written by newer photos.

[BobbyK]

Make sure that she doesn't write to it.

The software you can buy is decent (and probably what the camera shop will run).

It may having some issues carving files that may be partially overwritten.

Or you could send it to your friendly neighborhood geek who does forensic work.

[Weetabix]

Piriform Recuva: http://www.piriform.com/recuva

It's free, and works great. I've used the hell out of it for situations not dissimilar to yours. EXIF data should be fine, though all the file numbers will be jacked up, not that that really matters for photos. Should recover anything not over-written. Set it up for a 'deep scan' in the options and it'll find anything on the card not over-written by newer photos.

Worked like a charm. It even recovered photos from years past that had been moved off onto an external hard drive.

Thanks!

[g-man]

Good to hear!