# Have you ever lost important files after Scandisk or Chkdsk 'repaired' the file system?

The Windows Chkdsk and Scandisk utilities are designed to verify the file system, and (if required) to return the file system to a consistent state. File system inconsistencies can occur after an operating system crash.

# Did Scandisk or Chkdsk convert your files to Filexxxx.chk files?

When recovering the file system to a consistent state, lost or cross-linked clusters will be reset to 'available' when the file system is verified. The contents of these cluster(s) will be saved to a '.CHK file' (Filexxxx.CHK).

# Did you ever wonder if there was something useful in those filexxxx.chk files?

While CHK files may contain garbage, prior to deleting them it is wise to examine the contents of these files. This is especially true if you lost files after a system or application crash: the CHK files may contain the contents of the lost files. Unfortunately Windows does not offer a tool that allows you to do so in an easy way. CHK-Mate is a utility that should have been 'standard issue'.

CHK-Mate will examine the contents of the CHK files and determine if the contents are known filetypes, such as MS-Word files or GIF files. When contents are recognized (for example, as a Word document), the CHK files are copied to a new file with the correct file extension (Filexxxx.CHK -> Filexxxx.DOC). The new file extension allows you to easily open the file using the associated program.

If the contents of a CHK file can not be linked to a known filetype, you have the option to extract all the readable text from the CHK file. Use this option to recover information from a CHK file that is perhaps not intact enough to be recovered completely as a known filetype.