I saved a word document over top of an older one and closed the file. I need
to retrieve the older one. Is it possible?

On Sat, 18 Jun 2005 08:11:03 -0700, "La Petraia" La
wrote:

I saved a word document over top of an older one and closed the file. I need
to retrieve the older one. Is it possible?

It's highly unlikely.

If you have checked the "Automatically save backup copy" item in the
Tools Options Save dialog
(http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/General/AutomaticSave.htm), there would
be a copy of the older document with the name "Backup of XYZ.wbk" in
the same folder. If you don't have the option checked, now you know
why you should.

If you had made regular backups of your documents, there might be a
copy there -- but then you wouldn't be asking here.

If this happens again, remember that you can use the Undo command to
get back to the original version, as long as you don't close the
document.

Failing all that, it's barely possible that the original is still on
the disk but no longer available as a file. There are data recovery
programs that can find such "lost" files, but the longer you use the
computer before attempting recovery, the more likely it is that the
data has really been wiped out.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP FAQ: http://word.mvps.org