I am a student.
I backed up all my files onto a cd rw. When I reformatted my hard drive and tried to re install my work my pc tells me I have 640mb free space on the cd, there are no files....

I did delete the disk first, and I believe I wrote the files back onto it, about 400mb.
I was using Adaptec Easy CD Creator 4.

Is there a 'cheap' way to recover the data, either
1) the latest burn or
2) if I somehow didn't do the latest back up and simply deleted the previous, at least most of that will do for now

I have tried 'Badcopy 3' but this still tells me there are no files.

I'll assume your using DirectCD? Did you "close"(no more data can be written) the cdrw after you added all your files or leave open. Try updating UDF reader at the Roxio's website. Be sure DirectCD is running is system tray (startup).

Shoey