The practical, device-by-device guide to what to do (and what not to do) as soon as your storage begins to fail. Based upon over two decades of experience in-house, recovering failed devices, since the correct initial steps are usually critical to whether your data will ever come back.
Most data loss occurs after the failure, by proceeding regardless of the failure. All five steps below apply to every device listed below.
There are five steps that protect both your data and your chances of full recovery from any failed storage device. Go through these steps before doing anything else.
Every photo taken, file saved or program opened can overwrite data still recoverable. Set the device down immediately!
If it is clicking, beeping or will not spin, switch the device off immediately. Each time a physically failing drive powers up risks damaging the drive beyond recovery.
For a physical failure of a drive, the recovery and “repair” tools keep power flowing to the drive and continue hammering weak points in the drive until typically, but not always, it becomes lost permanently.
No freezer tricks, don’t open the case, no swapping circuit boards. These myths have caused real damage to many devices, often irreversible.
Leave it here or send it to us fully insured. We will let you know just what you can recover and at what cost prior to starting any chargeable work.
Select the type of media you are having trouble with for the warning signs, do’s & don’ts and process of recovery for that media.
Hard drives fail in two completely different ways. Data loss due to logical failure (deleted, formatted or corrupted) means the drive still functions and is often the least damaging way to attempt to recover from. However, physical failure (failed head, motor seizure or dead electronics) requires bench time and the wrong first step could destroy your chances of recovery. Identifying which category your hard drive falls into is the key to success.
Recovery of hard drives takes place internally at our facility. This involves replacing damaged components (heads and other parts), imaging weak drives sector-by-sector and repairing damaged file system structures.
More on hard drive recovery →Solid state drives do not contain any moving parts therefore do not click or grind; instead, they normally fail without warning and quietly. Normally, controller lock-up, firmware faults and “sudden death” account for these types of failures. In addition to their lack of mechanical movement, solid state drives differ from hard disk drives in two major areas: TRIM (the automatic deletion of files within minutes after deleting them) and the gradual decline in power retention by flash memory over an extended period of time while idle.
Our engineers access the NAND in technical mode directly and restore the translation table of the drive along with accessing the controller to retrieve data from dead SSDs.
More on SSD & NVMe recovery →External drives are essentially normal hard disks or solid state disks (SSDs) with a casing surrounding the disk; therefore an external drive will also fail like a normal disk plus two additional types of failure: the USB-to-SATA bridging board and encryption applied to many enclosure devices. This is why many people get no usable information when removing an encrypted disk from an enclosure and attempting to access it.
We bypass bridge board failures, remove and decode the bridge encryption, perform motor and head repair on dropped units, all done within our facility.
More on external drive recovery →USB sticks consist of a small flash memory on a tiny controller. The good news: if a USB stick fails, it is generally either the controller or the connection between the stick has been snapped off, however the data contained within the memory of the flash remains intact. The bad news: since the flash was accessed using the controller, the data stored in the memory is scrambled by the controller, which makes extracting this data difficult, certainly outside of the realm of standard “repair” tools.
We extract and read the memory chip itself directly (via chip-off method or through the internal test pads on monolithic stick designs) and build your original files from the extracted raw flash.
More on USB stick recovery →Memory cards typically corrupt due to two primary factors: a photo/video write process interrupted by removing the card (camera shutting down), or formatting the card by mistake from within the camera. Both of these scenarios cause corruption of the file index; however, in both instances the actual photos and/or videos remain uncorrupted and may be recoverable. The critical element is to ensure you do not overwrite the corrupted file(s) prior to recovering them.
We create a bit-for-bit copy of the memory card and we use specific algorithms based upon the file signature characteristics associated with each type of media (photos and video) to isolate them from other unusable data. Once isolated we recreate a hierarchical file structure similar to how an operating system would display it: SD, microSD, CompactFlash, XQD, etc.
More on memory card recovery →Modern Macs are complicated for the recovery process by two things. First, with the switch to APFS (Apple’s file system), there is potential for an error during an update to leave the file system damaged. Second, the T2 or Apple Silicon security chip will “lock” your storage media using encryption; this media is typically attached directly to the logic board via soldering. So now your data exists only as readable files on that board so long as it remains working and you have the decryption key.
When performing chip level repairs on Macs, we will create images of encrypted Mac storage, reconstruct broken APFS container data, and access FileVault (encrypted) partitions using your encryption key.
More on Mac & MacBook recovery →For a Windows laptop or desktop computer, a non-booting condition typically does NOT indicate that your data is at risk. In many cases, the issue is simply a bad operating system installation rather than physical failure of the drive(s). Therefore, the first step for recovering data from a Windows machine is to determine whether the problem lies with the operating system or if there is also a physical failure in one or more of the drives. If the physical issues exist, then proper steps must be taken immediately to prevent loss of recoverable data due to further failure of a drive.
We perform drive imaging to allow successful recovery from dead, dying, or failing mechanical hard disk drives (HDD), solid state disks (SSD), Dell, HP, Lenovo and other computers.
More on laptop & PC recovery →RAID arrays and NAS devices provide redundancy for the event of a disk failing. However, they are not backups. The problems begin when a second disk fails, or during an attempted rebuild into a bad disk. In fact, the worst thing you can do to your data is to rebuild onto a disk that is already going bad or to let it reinitialise into the same disk. Once this occurs, you may lose forever the very data that you were attempting to preserve.
We make an image of every disk using read-only access. Then we rebuild the virtual representation of the stripe, parity and disk order of the array and then run file system repairs on top, vendor neutral.
More on RAID recovery →The least expensive recovery will be the one you do not have to use. To protect your data before something goes wrong simply follow a few habits:
Make at least 3 copies of everything that could be lost (on at least 2 different forms of media) & keep one off site (or in the cloud). Don’t think one drive = backup.
If you have never recovered a backup file, it’s hope, not a backup. Open files from backups every now & again to ensure they still work.
As soon as possible after experiencing unusual noises, repetitive freezing, files that won’t open, or SMART warnings on a hard drive back up and replace the drive. These signals are coming from a failing disk asking for help.
If you delete a file, you should act immediately because solid-state disks (SSDs) can erase deleted data within minutes by means of TRIM technology. Never let an SSD that is your only copy sit idle and unpowered for months, as over time flash memory slowly drains away its charge.
Drops, heat, water and static electricity damage hard drives. Protect your drives by keeping them padded/protected, cool, dry; power-down before physically handling; and always discharge static electricity by grounding yourself when reaching into your computer.
A surge protector (preferably a UPS unit for desktop computers and NAS units) protects your devices from surges and/or sudden loss of power which can destroy file systems or burn out circuit board components.
There are many “fix-it-fast” solutions online to help you fix your hard drive, but many of them can cause more damage to your hard drive than they could possibly repair. Here are the ones we see ruin the most drives.
Every recovery begins with a complimentary written diagnostic report. This report will advise you which items are recoverable and the costs associated with recovering them prior to us performing any billable services; in most cases you only pay if we recover your data.