Data Recovery is the process of salvaging data from damaged, failed, corrupted, or inaccessible storage media when it cannot be accessed normally. Often the data are being salvaged from storage media such as internal or external hard disk drives (HDD), solid-state drives (SSD), USB flash drive, CDs, DVDs, RAID, and other electronic storage devices. Data recovery may be required due to physical damage to the storage device or logical damage to the file system that prevents it from being mounted by the host operating system. One possible scenario for the need of data recovery involves a disk-level failure, such as a compromised file system or disk partition, or a hard disk failure. In any of these cases, the data cannot be easily read. Depending on the situation, solutions involve repairing the file system, partition table or master boot record, or hard disk recovery techniques ranging from software-based recovery of corrupted data to hardware replacement on a physically damaged disk. If hard disk recovery is necessary, the disk itself has typically failed permanently, and the focus is rather on a one-time recovery, salvaging whatever data can be read. Another scenario that requires data recovery, files have been deleted from a storage medium. Typically, the contents of deleted files are not removed immediately from the drive; instead, references to them in the directory structure are removed, and the space they occupy is made available for later overwriting. In the meantime, the original file contents remain, often in a number of disconnected fragments, and may be recoverable.

Data Recovery Types

Corrupt partitions and filesystems, media errors

In some cases, data on a hard drive can be unreadable due to damage to the partition table or filesystem, or to (intermittent) media errors. In the majority of these cases, at least a portion of the original data can be recovered by repairing the damaged partition table or filesystem using specialized data recovery software; other types of software can image media despite intermittent errors, and image raw data when there is partition table or filesystem damage. This type of data recovery can be performed by people without expertise in drive hardware, as it requires no special physical equipment or access to platters. Sometimes data can be recovered using relatively simple methods and tools; more serious cases can require expert intervention, particularly if parts of files are irrecoverable. Data carving is the recovery of parts of damaged files using knowledge of their structure.

Hardware repair

A damaged printed circuit board (PCB) may be replaced during recovery procedures by an identical PCB from a healthy drive; this does not necessarily work, as data specific to an individual drive unit may be stored on a chip, so that even boards manufactured to be identical may not work on a drive mechanism for which they are not set up. Other examples of physical recovery procedures include performing a live PCB swap (in which the System Area of the HDD is damaged on the target drive which is then instead read from the donor drive, the PCB then disconnected while still under power and transferred to the target drive), read/write head assembly with matching parts from a healthy drive, removing the hard disk platters from the original damaged drive and installing them into a healthy drive, and oftentimes a combination of all of these procedures. Some procedures require training for successful use; most void manufacturers' storage device warranties.

Call us for help

PC Repairs Brisbane receives calls every day from people in need of recovering of lost or deleted data. Our technicians are experienced in data recovery issues. Data recovery can be time intensive. Though, we usually can give you an estimate on time and cost within 2 - 3 working days. We will also provide you with advice on how to prevent data loss in the future and how to recover from failing storage devices fast. If you need data recovery in Brisbane or on the Gold Coast then call now: 04­-0375-5519.