Recovering "Unrecoverable" Data

[XanderSholtz]

Has anyone ever gotten a drive that has already been to THAT industry leading cleanroom and called unrecoverable due to platter damage, but you were able to get the data from the drive? I have a friend of a family member that sent their drive there and the data was called unrecoverable due to the media damage, head swap was performed however new heads were killed by media damage before getting any data, anyone ever have any luck in a situation like this? I can provide specs on the drive if needed.

[BlackST]

It depends. Sometimes DR companies concentrate on easier case and when they see that it would require more effort than they consider "convenient", they say "UNRECOVERABLE". Maybe for their business scale, not for someone like us. Or viceversa.
There are also unrecoverable case and recoverable ones that customers refuse (i.e. there's media damage so MANY headsets are needed and customer doesn't want to pay for a large number of donors).
I also had some case where data was needed "at every cost" (if possible, of course). Each case , if doesn't fall into a standard category, is a case by itself.

[pepe]

yes, i have the same experience, I received cases from ontrack, Kürt ... that they considered unrecoverable.
And they were not unrecoverable, it was possible to recover over 80% of user data. They do not have that much time.
Probably they do many bricked .11 and 12

pepe

[XanderSholtz]

Good information to hear, it was a 2.5" toshiba 500GB hard drive, would anyone in the US be interested? If so a pm with info and possible estimates as far as price would be appreciated!

[zebong]

That´s true sometimes them do not want to wast time on a recovery and say it can not be done.

I also had cases like that, with about 50% of the user data recovery.

[drc]

Or it may be that they think there is a low chance of a customer being completely satisfied with what they might be able to retrieve (which is not uncommon even with only minor problems) and therefore not worth the effort.

I have also seen some where "unrecoverable due to platter damage" just meant "we don't know how to do it".

[BlackST]

BTW, there is also the case where the problem is the customer and not the drive - i.e. Professional whiners, troublemakers, scammers, people that bring in the drive at 10.00 and at 12.00 they have called 10 times... Commerce is always a circus, but when the customer reveal himself a danger or a PITA, is better to give up. "UNRECOVERABLE"... Who's next?

[unknown]

Each drive is a case by itself.

[guru]

I know this one very well :O) Will pay for 5 day recovery but EXPECT it recovered within 24 hours ;o)

BTW, there is also the case where the problem is the customer and not the drive - i.e. Professional whiners, troublemakers, scammers, people that bring in the drive at 10.00 and at 12.00 they have called 10 times... Commerce is always a circus, but when the customer reveal himself a danger or a PITA, is better to give up. "UNRECOVERABLE"... Who's next?

[CK]

I agree with BlackST, some customers want priority service at the lowest prices. They don't understand that we need to order donor drives from around the world sometimes. Rather than declaring it "unrecoverable" sometimes, it may be easier to declare it "unrecoverable due to unavailability of parts" - this way they can go and hassle another DR company if they wish Sometimes it's just not economically viable to recover a drive. We will always try our best, but if the customer phones 20 times per day, taking up valuable time that could be spent on fixing drives rather than counselling them....

It's what we call the GRIEF v MONEY ratio.

[quasimodo]

We will always try our best, but if the customer phones 20 times per day, taking up valuable time that could be spent on fixing drives rather than counseling them....

and I thought we only have this in the USA

[gtd4242]

BTW, there is also the case where the problem is the customer and not the drive - i.e. Professional whiners, troublemakers, scammers, people that bring in the drive at 10.00 and at 12.00 they have called 10 times... Commerce is always a circus, but when the customer reveal himself a danger or a PITA, is better to give up. "UNRECOVERABLE"... Who's next?

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I've had a few of these. There are some people, even when I'm first talking to them on the phone, I'm actually hoping they don't send it in. Sometimes if they are especially arrogant, I'll jack up the price. I know this is horrible. Then some of them I get in, and that afternoon they are asking how much longer it's going to be. Then they call 2, 3, even 4 times in a single day.

[CK]

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I've had a few of these.

This problem isn't exclusive to DR, so don't feel too bad! Ask any mechanic or plumber, I bet you'll get the same story..