Data Recovery Dilemma: Seeking Solutions for a Lost 2TB on a 4TB WD Black HDD

Recently, I faced a severe setback in my data management journey. While dealing with a mounting issue on my 4TB WD Black hard drive formatted with NTFS, I inadvertently executed a command that would cost me dearly: sudo rm -r. This simple command wiped out nearly 2TB of data, leaving me in a state of distress—especially since much of it included my essential AI models, Python scripts, generated images, and other vital files.

Despite the hard drive itself functioning perfectly with no bad sectors, my oversight in the command led to significant data loss. The drive is in optimal condition, but the ramifications of my actions are substantial. My recovery efforts have so far been met with mixed results.

When I attempted to recover my lost files, I turned to various recovery Software. Recuva struggled, often failing to restore paths and file names. R-Studio seemed promising but became stuck, looping on a single file name with no resolution in sight. Even when I attempted to stop the process and skip the problematic files, it continued to get hung up, making no real progress.

Currently, I am trying UFS Explorer Pro, but I find myself in a frustrating situation. After initiating a scan on my G: drive to recover deleted files, the program has now been frozen for three days. Although the hard drive is showing 100% usage, the read speed has slowed to a crawl at 90 KB/sec, and the application appears completely unresponsive.

At this point, I’m at a crossroads. Should I continue to wait for the recovery process to unfreeze, or is it time to consider alternative solutions? If anyone has insights or suggestions based on similar experiences, I would greatly appreciate your guidance. I’m particularly worried about restoring my AI models and related files, as they are crucial for my work.

Thank you for any assistance you can provide in this challenging situation.