Newbie question: Why won't manufacturers do data recovery?

[Leolo]

Hi everyone,

Maybe this question has been answered before (I couldn't find it searching), so please accept my apologies if that's the case.

However, I'm very intrigued to know the reason why drive manufacturers don't offer official data recovery for their own products.

I think the logical thing to do would be to specialise in their own drives.

For example, if you have a broken Fujitsu drive, you would buy fujitsu's data recovery services. If you have a broken Seagate, you would go to seagates's data recovery service, etc.

Advantages: They know their stuff. They know their own secrets. They probably have A LOT of spare parts of their own drives laying around! They probably have all of their firmwares on a file server somewhere in the office!!

Why don't they do this?!??

[Doomer]

One company does
http://services.seagate.com/

[fzabkar]

I would think another good idea would be for each drive's adaptive data to be stored in a central database. Then the manufacturers could supply fully working, pre-programmed PCBs to their customers.

Moreover, I would like to see manufacturers stand behind their products by offering physical data recovery services on a non-profit basis. That's the least they could do to placate their customers, especially as current products have serious quality problems and high failure rates.

[CK]

IMO, it's a conflict of interest to have a manufacturing and repair element to the business.

[BlackST]

I would think another good idea would be for each drive's adaptive data to be stored in a central database. Then the manufacturers could supply fully working, pre-programmed PCBs to their customers.

Not all drive / families store stuff on PCBs . Again, PCB is useful but not absolutely necessary for DR if totally destroyed - personally when PCB was already "touched" by customers, I discard it intentionally or ask not to give me it as it is completely useless. Everything depends on DR skills. Also, it is impossible because of legal / intellectual property issues and patents on EVERYTHING on the device, including microcode and derivative parts, artwork, PCB, schematics etc. etc.
Some data in the wrong hands could give manufacturers, DR and also end users even more problems, so thank God it's like that and it will stay this way.
This should make forget the idea of such database open to public.
About supplying PCBs it is not possible because STOCK is a PURE COST and you pay taxes on inventory, so manufacturers would not store spare PCBs for a simple economic reason - not to talk about obsolescence and about the fact that if a firmware update was applied to the drive, it is another problem to consider.
Manufacturers tend to work with just-in-time basis , to maximize profit and minimize loss / costs / taxes / inventory. That's life.
People who sell PCBs are another thing : usually they buy stocks of scrap materials and then sort the parts that can have an aftermarket.

Moreover, I would like to see manufacturers stand behind their products by offering physical data recovery services on a non-profit basis. That's the least they could do to placate their customers, especially as current products have serious quality problems and high failure rates.

Impossible. It's market economy the world we're living in and all business are profit oriented, not charity oriented.
Current products are supported for warranty and RMA and that's the only thing manufacturers MUST/SHOULD fulfill. They sell devices and data inside is not under any warranty - written statement !! Note : the fact that Seagate offered a remedy for the flaws of .11 firmware if it is proven to be the cause means that they were concerned about the problem.

However, I'm very intrigued to know the reason why drive manufacturers don't offer official data recovery for their own products.

For the same opposite reason why DR companies don't make HDDs.
If you make bottles, you don't care about what will be the use of the bottles or what kind of fluid the end user will put in and you are not responsible if the bottled wine turn into vinegar. If you make bottles you just warn EU about not to drop them as glass is fragile, not to put some chemicals on it as it will attack glass and to use them within certain specs.
I see some analogies....

Final note : customers are not always right : there's a limit for decency at both side (mfg's and EUs) - the demand for lower cost drives, dumping , TTM pressure, counterfeiting and most of all the craziness of many EUs lead to problems but summing up I didn't hear (yet) about death or injury or blasts or serious problems because of data loss, and even if such episode exist it would be pure statistics while 99,99% of the drives contain just irrelevant personal data.
If you loose your ID or driving license or important document because of theft or neglicence, you pay the cost for having it back. Stored data is exactly the same - with appropriate procedures the risk is mitigated and all you loss is just the downtime while setting back system / data.

[poehere]

If you buy a brand new computer from any store they guarantee this sytem for 1 years but now more and more here it is 6 months. In the guarantee it is stated that Programs, Virus, and what ever you store on your HDD is not guaranteed. So if your drive crashes within the time frame the markets that sold you this system do not care. They only care for one thing. They remove the defected part, repalce it, send it back for RMA, and give you back this computer as it was before. I have seen this one with HP and the way they do business. If your system has a problem they send you a box and instruction to send this back to them. In this box it is clearly stated that if you want anything from your HDD get it off before you send it to them. They will automatically set this hard drive back to their factory standards before giving it back to you during their repair.

Here if you buy a system and have problems with HDD inside they pull it out and load back the OS that was on it and active it then give it back to you. I do not know many repair shops who are even concerned with what you have on that HDD that has failed during the period they guarantee this one.

So to me why if you send this back for RMA would the company who made this HDD care what was stored on it. They will refurbish this back to their factory standards and give it out again for another RMA that they received.

Hard drives do fail this is a given fact. Today the larger the storage unit for data has a or could have a higher failure rate on this one. I have seen the older Maxtor drives work far longer than some of these new HDD out today. Especially WD. A brand new WD laptop HDD was purchased and installed in a laptop and less than 6 months it was gone. Had a problem with the PCB board and heads. Is this the fault of the manufacture who made it? This one is hard to say you have no idea what the client did when using this one that caused this failure on it. So how can you fix this for them for free and on top of it give back their data to them that was stored on it. I can see the manufature taking back this failed drive not caring how it failed it is under warrenty and giving them a new one. That is fine and should be this way.

[fzabkar]

IMO, it's a conflict of interest to have a manufacturing and repair element to the business.

Every manufacturer of consumer goods has a service organisation, so that's just standard practice. In fact it's expected. However, I agree that, when the product is of poor quality, the manufacturer should not take advantage of this by profiting from it, otherwise it would appear to be a conflict of interest. In fact I used to work for two companies whose service departments were more profitable than sales.

[BlackST]

The business is no more selling goods but the service and aftermarket. And it's becoming more and more difficult if not impossible for end user to do DIY. It's part of the marketing strategy and self defense.

[poehere]

Today all new cars have an onboard computer system in them. I do not see the car manufactures supplying this information to you. I know that new boat run this way too and you need a very expensive computer in order to diagnose the problems with the motors in them. I do not see them offering this service or suppling a data base so you have it for you.

If you drop your HDD is it necessary they fix this one? There is more than one reason your HDD does not work anymore. It is not a simple swap of a PCB board and move over some adaptive that fix them all.

Seagate only offers a limited DR service and that one is on certain drives that were effected with their FW bug.

Today it seems that more and more what you purchased is almost considered disposable after it stops working. It is cheaper to buy new than to fix what you had before. In the past it was reasonalbe to fix what was broken and keep using it. But now the price of items today it is cheaper to buy new than fix what you have.

Prices of HDD have droped so much in the past 10 years. Before here a 80 or 160GB HDD was running right around 185 dollars. Today a new 1TB can cost you around 70 dollars. The price is cheper for more storga. So it would make sense if you are concerned about this one to buy 5 of them and use 1 for your system and the others for B/U.