RAW SATA HDD File Recovery

[greenhawk]

when I have had the not formatted error I find I have a lot of luck with a program called file scavenger. It is not free, but it does a excellent job.

But if your drive is reporting hardware damage as well, I do not think anything short of a clean room will help get the data back.

 

[Elixer]

As for Spinrite, read my thoughts in an article I wrote about it.

http://www.recoveryforce.com/spinrite-a-data-recovery-program/

It, too, is snake oil. When these programs first hit the market, they could use the function of ignoring ECC errors and after multiple reads of a sector, try to deduce the contents and write it back and possibly salvage some of the sector. But, it still does not guarantee that you will get 100% of the sector recovered, nor does it mean that the process won't kill the drive first.

To get a better understanding of what I mean about ECC, you can watch the YouTube video posted by DeepSpar - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_AhZeQtN7k

Nice example...
I am curious, do your findings in the field correlate with google's HD study, which said:

After their first reallocation, drives are over 14 times more likely to fail within 60 days than drives without reallocation counts, making the critical threshold for this parameter also one.

and

After the first offline reallocation, drives have over 21 times higher chances of failure within 60 days than drives without offline reallocations; an effect that is again more drastic than total reallocations.

Personally, I when I get 1 reallocated sector, I tend to order a new HD, and use the one with the reallocated sector to a scratch drive.

 

[redzo]

...

Just out of curiosity,
Could you post your opinion about "Roadkil's Raw Copy" and "HDD Raw Copy Tool" as I suspect that they are very similar to ddrescue?
thanks

 

[PhIlLy ChEeSe]

the drive has had an impact, you'll most likely have to open it and move the stuck pick up off of the platter.
If it was a software issue, you'd be done already. Enjoy!

 

[RecoveryForce]

Nice example...

Thanks

Personally, I when I get 1 reallocated sector, I tend to order a new HD, and use the one with the reallocated sector to a scratch drive.

I agree completely. Bad sectors tend to form for a reason...remapping a sector does not remove the cause. Just like taking a pain killer numbs the pain, it does not fix the broken leg.

 

[RecoveryForce]

Just out of curiosity,
Could you post your opinion about "Roadkil's Raw Copy" and "HDD Raw Copy Tool" as I suspect that they are very similar to ddrescue?
thanks

I honestly haven't played with Roadkil's Raw Copy or HDD Raw Copy. I've been thinking of doing a side-by-side comparison of various hard drive imaging programs, I'll add these to my list.

 

[SERT Data Recov]

I had good luck with DriveSavers, they don't charge if data cannot be recovered. One array (8 drives, 3 drive failure) was quoted at 24K, no charge because they couldn't recover anything, and they paid for shipping. The other was a 16 drive array with a 3 drive failure, 30K, they recovered everything. Obviously the prices are large because these are big commercial RAID arrays

How big were the storage containers and what type of drives were they if you don't mind me asking! We work the same way, less harsh on the rates though.

 

[heymrdj]

I don't know everything about them as these are groups that called us in because they were in an IT emergency, we didn't do the everyday work for them.

8 320GB 15K SAS Drive RAID 5, data was nearly as large as the pool.
16 3TB nearline SAS 7200 RAID 6, was about 3/4 full.

 

[SERT Data Recov]

8 320GB 15K SAS Drive RAID 5, data was nearly as large as the pool.

$24,000 for a RAID 5 2TB recovery (ok SAS drives, but still) ...... I'm choking here, trying to call 911

 

[heymrdj]

$24,000 for a RAID 5 2TB recovery (ok SAS drives, but still) ...... I'm choking here, trying to call 911

You're more than free to post proof of your legitimate business. Clean rooms and suits, shipping plan to assure against data breach (you must protect the data end to end), and millions in insurance against data breach. I'll wait. :biggrin:

 

[CiPHER]

You forgot the gold-coated facemasks...

 

[SERT Data Recov]

You're more than free to post proof of your legitimate business. Clean rooms and suits, shipping plan to assure against data breach (you must protect the data end to end), and millions in insurance against data breach. I'll wait. :biggrin:

Our clean work area has passed ISO 4 CLASS 10 standards, and certified for ISO 5 CLASS 100. We have shipping and data protection procedures in place that Fire Departments, Police Departments, FBI agents, Universities, major corporations, and all kinds of clients are perfectly comfortable with. We are extremely transparent, and registered in our county, city, and state of business. I suppose that would qualify for legitimate business?

You forgot the gold-coated facemasks...

LOL seriously

 

[heymrdj]

Our clean work area has passed ISO 4 CLASS 10 standards, and certified for ISO 5 CLASS 100. We have shipping and data protection procedures in place that Fire Departments, Police Departments, FBI agents, Universities, major corporations, and all kinds of clients are perfectly comfortable with. We are extremely transparent, and registered in our county, city, and state of business. I suppose that would qualify for legitimate business?



LOL seriously

I'm the PM of Australia.

See how easy it is to make an unsubstantiated claim? :biggrin:

 

[SERT Data Recov]

I'm the PM of Australia.

See how easy it is to make an unsubstantiated claim? :biggrin:

You can be whoever you want to be especially when not using your real name, however eventually if you're not who you say who you are, it will come out. Plus its not hard these days to find out who's who with Google. On another note being the PM of Australia must be a very demanding job. :biggrin:

 

[RecoveryForce]

I never heard of SERT Data Recovery before this forum thread, but based on his/her posts get a strong sense that they know what they are talking about. So, it certainly adds to their credibility vs any other lab where we just have a website to reference.

I also can see the argument that when dealing with critical business data, it isn't worth messing around with the unknown just to save a few pennies and possibly risk losing all your data.

 

[SERT Data Recov]

I never heard of SERT Data Recovery before this forum thread, but based on his/her posts get a strong sense that they know what they are talking about. So, it certainly adds to their credibility vs any other lab where we just have a website to reference.

I also can see the argument that when dealing with critical business data, it isn't worth messing around with the unknown just to save a few pennies and possibly risk losing all your data.

Thanks Recovery Force. I too also agree with your statement about critical business data. We could start a new thread about the practices of some of the data recovery companies (I would never mention any names) that I know for a fact that advertise and claim SOC and security audits, yet make inflated or very vague reports about the true nature of the data recovery situation in order to get a higher rate.

Those security audits are extremely expensive and usually only required by corporations/military/government where their vendors are required by corporate to have them in order to do business with the company.

When ever a company or an individual asks for proof of anything (which we always encourage) we provide it to them. Our clean room certification is listed on our site, and you can call the lab that certified it and verify it as well. We are listed in our state as a legitimate corporation, which we are, and have tax cert, and local licensing. But I didn't feel it was necessary to have to post them here to prove anything. If you would like to send in a drive, fill out a quote request, add that you would like to sees those documents, and we'll be happy to provide them for you :biggrin:

Otherwise, just here trying to help out and provide value to the community!