Where to start with personal learning?

[XanderSholtz]

Background
I currently work for a company that offers data recovery. In house we can really only do software (partition corruption, deleted data, etc), get data from affected Seagate 7200.11 drives, and get data off drives with hardware issues only if it's in good enough condition to be imaged with ddrescue / dd_rescue. Anything beyond this goes to the clean room we are partnered with. We also do not have tools like PC3000, pretty stone age when it comes to data recovery. My company tells me we will never have a clean room or do that sort of work for liability reasons.

I am very interested in the art that is Data Recovery, and would like to learn more about real data recovery techniques, and frankly I'm at a brick wall for learning where I work now. Is the best way for me to work with a bunch of drives (which I have access to) experiment, note, and develop my own techniques (combined with research obviously).

I'm really just looking for pointers on where to start I guess.


Thanks, any help appreciated,

Xander Sholtz

[phishin_ca]

Get a bunch of identical drives and play. I suggest older hitachi drives (40GB). Lots of information out there on them. I go to the local Whitebox shop every saturday and buy all of their bad drives for $1 each. You really have to figure out what the drive is doing when it is working properly(logically and physically). Direct IO access to the drive is a good start from the programming end. The ATA spec and a LOT of research helps as well.
Shawn

[itconcept]

Hi
Xander welcome check the link below see this videos it will help u lot to understand Data Recovery this Guys are really doing something for Data Recovery but it is not good for Us i mean Professionals check it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kx-D1nJc ... re=related

[XanderSholtz]

phishin_ca: I really appreciate the information

itconcept: I have watched these clips a million times in the past, this is where I learned of the Seagate terminal connection (may have been on his website) and researched the 7200.11 method. I really respect the time and devotion put into research and development that many of the members here have done, and honestly, while I am happy to have the information Scott provided, if I were a Data Recovery Guru these videos would have infuriated me.

[phishin_ca]

The fun part about the videos is that they make things look easy. THis convinces people to try it on their own. The videos are a joke.

[drc]

I'm really just looking for pointers on where to start I guess.

This forum has a wealth of information, you just have to be prepared to do your own sifting.

[jono-ats]

There is a tremendous amount of info "out there."

I initially purchased about 10 loose-leaf folders and assembled information by brand. it's still useful when I forget something - which seems more often than not!

[jono-ats]

There is a tremendous amount of info "out there."

I initially purchased about 10 loose-leaf folders and assembled information by brand. it's still useful when I forget something - which seems more often than not!