Problem with opening AI files

[paulacz]

Hi, I'm having trouble opening AI files. Everything looks correct, proper extension, I even hover over it and it shows me the right attributes (type: Adobe Illustrator Artwork 15.1), but when I try to open it, I get the message: "The file is in an unknown format and cannot be opened". If it matters, these are files recovered from a crashed drive, some can be opened, some not, but none have an annotation that the file is corrupted. Old version of Illustrator (5.5) and those files were created using this version also. 

[Monika Gause]

Typical for recovered files. The recovery tools mess them up.

You can try if you can still open them in Acrobat in order to recover some more of them.

Also maybe @Anshul_Saini can help with some files. There is not a lot of hope, but maybe they can do it.

[paulacz]

Thank you very much, I've tried with Acrobat but I've got a message that file is damaged 😕 

[Anshul_Saini]

Hi @paulacz,

Sorry for the delayed response. I agree with Monika. The third-party recovery tool overwrites Illustrator file data with there own jargon. However, you may share the files with me here or via DM, and I will take a look at them.

Kindly update the discussion if you still need assistance with it. I'd be happy to help.

Thanks,
Anshul Saini

[paulacz]

Hello, thank you very much for response - if it's not a problem it would be great if you could take a look at these files - I'll upload 1-3 to show the problem

[Anshul_Saini · Accepted solution]

Hi @paulacz,

Thanks for sharing the files. I checked both of them, and as we suspected, the files are overwritten with recovery software jargon. I've attached a screenshot comparison for reference between a valid Ai vs. a recovered file.

There is no illustrator data in the file to recover. I am afraid these files cannot be saved. 

Regards,

Anshul Saini

[paulacz]

Thanks a lot for checking this for me, it's a pity they can't be recovered, at least I know exactly what happened. Cheers!