Most of the drives that come in and are deemed unrecoverable are usually because the customer did something stupid.

1. Freezed the drive.
2. Figured it would "eventually" stop clicking if left on.
3. Opened the drive to look for damage.
4. Friend down the street "looked" at it.
5. Figured it would start working again if drive was dropped or hit.
6. Used over the counter software to fix a physical failure.
7. Left on for a long time after the failure.
8. Swapped circuit boards.
9. Attempted a firmware update.
10. Sent it to a second DR company because the first was too expensive.


The list goes on and on. If your thinking about doing any of these as an end user then the data wasn't that important in the first place. Keep in mind your wording and how you present your situation on a post will determine if a pro gives advice over another end user with little to no experience. Quite simply, if you don't have the tools or experience to perform data recovery your only wasting your time as your only going to get advice from a newbie.

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Buy your friends Toshiba\Hitachi and your enemies Seagate.

These are the most popular in my neck of the woods

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

Oh, and before I forget, let me add

11. Took it to a local shop and the tech tried to recover the data by formatting and reinstalling windows.
12. RAID failed and the contract tech people tried to rebuild it multiple times with multiple other drives etc

I mean come on, what the hell. I wouldn't be surprised if we were talking Geek Squad, but this is people who actually purport to make a living on fixing computers...

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

13) I have read on the Infernet that.... blah blah.... youtube video.... etc. etc.
14) I have "downloaded" this software and gave it a try but now it is clicking. Good sign ?
15) I am an engineer so I am entitled to make it work, damn !!
16) I want to try by myself, DR is NOT an option , data is not important.... (uhm, no, all that porn and warez......hmmm....)

When everything else fails...

17) I know a forum...

Have a good day !

What bothers me is that the client gets mad at us (the data recovery professionals) when we can only recover part of their data because of the damage caused by their previous efforts.

Better yet, why do technicians feel that we should still offer them a free assessment when they need us to bail them out of a bad situation that they wouldn't have been in, if they had listed to our advice when we first contacted them?

Note to technicians: Backup the client's data drive before doing anything that could possibly lose their data...even if they say they have it backed up. If you have any problems, call a data recovery professional for advice. Don't just backup their profile folder...backup the entire drive. The odds are, if you just backup part of the drive, there will be data in the root folder, program files or somewhere else outside the areas that you backup. Be sure to check the backup and disconnect it from the client system prior to performing further work on their system.

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Luke
Recovery Force Data Recovery

I'd say probably 8 out of 10 RAID arrays we get in fall under this category.

I'm no longer sorry for data loss, no free diagnose anymore and all the extra time needed to fix the additional damage paid at extra cost. Let's see who get tired first....

Hey BL ,
They Were Finding you In the forums ,they Said You Vanished Lol .How is Life

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Regards
Amarbir S Dhillon , Chandigarh Data Recovery Labs [India]
Logical,Semi Physical And Physical Data Recovery
Website-> http://www.chandigarhdatarecovery.com

this should be a mandatory read before any new person comes in to this site

Imo yall just a bunch of moaners. User / lamer is ur bread and butter. And yet u complain about it. If a standart user would be smart - he would have a back up , and would not need any of u . So stop with the crying and praise the Lord for the stupid things some users do.

Hard Disks and other media will fail. this is a fact, and this is our bread and butter. The stupid things users do simply makes DR much harder and incurs more costs so is in everbodies interest for users not to attempt DIY recovery as is stressed many many times before.

Then again, I did expect you to have an opinion here.....

Read more closely, and you'll see that thatdellguy's list is referring to drives that are eventually deemed unrecoverable

Also your point is like saying that if people were smart they would eat right and exercise and then nobody would ever need a heart surgeon

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

Excellent point!

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www.datarecoveryne.com

Fights and more Fights - Atola, ACE, SD who is the best? I believe that no one has even stopped thinking that most customers do not want to know if you have one of the tools or how much it cost her 100 class clean room or how great is its structure. DR professionals are compared to doctors trying to save their patients and our customers want nothing but your files back, oh let the controversy all customers have the right to choose where to retrieve your files, let's not treat our customers like fools, they know read and write! know the risk they face trying to recover your files by yourself without knowledge is a right that they have in the DR professionals help our clients in the best way for him to not lose your files with wrong practices, the more customers they have a choice, not everyone who has to pay 2000 U.S. for a data recovery company charges each over what you want is a free market, the winner will win more customer wins so much more to solve the customer's problem and see a smile at the end of his client with your files back can be sure that other customers will more per referral. In my opinion every tool manufacturer tries to do his best and all we can to help improve these tools is an example: SD I see many reviews for their products, no one says it openly support the poor and have to pay to have updates that also happens to jam, I believe that everyone has their qualities and defects can not be improved or all of the professionals DR Forum think they will live forever, and knowledge to be passed on and our secrets keep us. True knowledge that no one takes from us

Wrong thread?

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

If I am reading what you are saying correctly, I disagree. End users are being misinformed by their technicians and useless hacks who think they know what they are doing. I've tried to avoid saying this, but I can't hold back any longer. Most projects that are previously assessed by technicians are more likely in worse shape or completely unrecoverable by the time they get to us. At least once a week, I have to bite my tongue and not tell a client that the cost of their project would have been half, if it would have come to us first. Yes, I get to bill more, but as the price goes up, the odds of success go down, as do the odds of the client accepting the price.

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Luke
Recovery Force Data Recovery

Ur comparison is invalid. Yes , hard drives will fail. Yet there is 1 fail safe that works with HDD and does not with human anatomy. BACKUP. Smart user has a backup, so even when nature strikes and his/her HDD lies in ruins - they WONT go to u. They will go to their backup and get files themselves. Now not so smart user wont have any backup. He will come to u. But also , because he is not so smart, he will try out a whole bunch of DIY solutions and screw up royaly and become a pain in the butt recovery for u. Comes with the territory. Fire up them brain cells and read closely insted of blindly atacking me. Ull understand. HDDspec, do i make an excelent point ? Allow me to chew it up. If a human would be able to "SAVE" his current anatomical/mental/whatever state any time he wishes - well, as soon as he gets sick he would just load that save. And no , in this event heart surgeons ( and even excercise and right food ) would be useless occupation. Can i get a halleluja ?

what planet are you on....

People don't keep backups.

It doesn't matter how hard anyone tries to get them to. They still won't. Even customers who have already paid for expensive data recovery still don't. I'm working on a case right now for a six-time repeat customer.

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

Ill have to somewhat agree with u DRC. Even the smart users have a tendency to forget about backups. There was smth in the posts above that acted like a red flag on me , so i exaggerated a bit, granted. But human/hdd comparison argument i win =) One way or the other , i applaud the ppl who are trying to do smth themselves. In our day and age , when u have ppl coming / calling in with the problems that are so stupid and unbelivable , that an answer "did u plug it in ? " saves the day - there is a shortage of DIY.