Recover SD Card DELETED .avi files

Wait, so you deleted it off the card, or the Mac?

If the Mac...
When you delete something, it's not really deleted-- Finder just puts a tag on it saying "when I need more space to create a new file, I can overwrite this space here". Hence Data Recue's ability to "remove the tag", assuming you get on it early enough, and you haven't made anything new that might take the space Finder has made up for grabs. In short, if Data Rescue doesn't see it, Finder has already overwritten it. You may try another application, but Data Rescue's the best I know.

If the card...
I have no idea. I guess it would depend on the manufacturer and camera. I wouldn't even think Data Rescue would work on a card.

To be honest, I can't imagine there being any kind of recovery app for an SD card. One of the reasons I still prefer tape-based editing (in addition to the huge hassle of geting footage of a card).

so far i have tried CameraSalvage from subrosasoft.com...worked on jpgs, and wmvs deleted from camera datacard.

Last Christmas my wife deleted a major movie from our camera. I tried several Mac programs, but had no luck. I then took the SD card to an old windows box, and i found two or three free programs that were able to find the lost AVI. PC Inspector was the best of the bunch. http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/smart_recovery/info.htm?language=2. (After all, the SD cards are usually formated in MS-DOS Fat 32..)

I now currently own Data Rescue II, DiskWarrior, and TechTool Pro (great buy with MacUpdate's MacBundle). I recently had to recover some lost images, and the truth is that PC Inspector was still the best solution.

I've used from the same folks that make Data Rescue II... you might investigate that.

Patrick

Actually, there is also Camera Salvage for the mac, but it is not free. Not sure what their demo version can/cannot do. http://www.subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?mainpage=product_info&cPath=1&productsid=3. They do advertise they can recover AVIs.