Can I restore the files of a deleted Windows user account?

I recently deleted a user from my Vista by going to Account -> Settings -> delete.

I have photos under this users, can I restore them? I don't have any backup.

Thanks.

Solution 1:

When you delete a user account, Windows asks you whether you want to delete or keep the files.

• If you chose to keep the files, you can still access them with any administrator account.

  Start an Explorer with administrative privileges (press Win + E and run explorer) and go to the deleted users' profile (usually C:\Users\USERNAME).

• If you chose to delete the files, you'll need a third-party program to undelete them.

  I've used Recuva in the past, and it worked quite well.

  It's imperative that you make as few changes as possible to your computer right now, as any data written to your hard disk might overwrite the deleted files and makes them unrecoverable. If you can – as @Moab suggested – shut your computer down right now and attach the affected hard disk to another computer for the recovery process.

  If that's not an option, at least choose an unaffected hard disk, partition or flash drive when asked where to save the recovered files. For the same reason, you shouldn't download or install the recovery tool on the affected partition.