Thanks for taking the time to read my post.

I have a WD 1TB hdd that has some rotational scoring. I took it into a local recovery place and they quoted me $4500 to recover the data that was on it. Do you guys think this is a reasonable cost to recover the data if the platter has some moderate scoring?

FYI: I've never opened the hdd myself. Only had it assessed at another recovery place in a clean room before taking it to this current location. The previous place said they couldn't do anything but this current location said there was a good chance they can recover all of the lost data.

Thanks again for all of your help.

Depending on your definition of "moderate scoring", this is pretty suspect.

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

That was my concern. The platter sounds pretty damaged but I'm not too familiar with the hdd recovery process. What gives me some peace of mind is that they tell me that I won't be charged unless they are able to recover all of the lost data.

Think about it. There is no data where the media is scored, and replacement heads can't traverse an area close to the damage or they will be ruined as well.

Given that fact, how can anyone guarantee to recover "all of your data?"

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http://www.datasaversllc.com

saying that someone can recover all of the data from scored media, is like saying that he can raise the dead.

I 'd advise you to ask someone else too. I do not know anyone in Ireland, but member pcimage is in peterborough UK and comes highly recommended. Contact him and ask him to evaluate the damage of your drive.

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http://www.northwind.gr
SandForce SSD Recovery
Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

Where EXACTLY is this "scoring" if known ?

Depends on the extend of the damage. I had a wd5000AAKS-00A7B2 a week ago. It came to us with 2 heads sitting on the parking area with no sliders on em ( i found 1 of those sliders sticking to the top lid and another fell out as i was blowing the air in =) ) . Top head and head 1. Top platter had some nice dings looking like an angry bird had a go pecking it. Lots of em. Usually we dont really deal with these situations , we outsource em since it will probably require insane amount of donors and may end but being unrecoverable anyway. We let ppl with better equipped labs have a go at em =) But this guy was bosses friend and he brought a donor as well so i had a go at it. With that 1 donor we imaged ~60 percent of the drive before heads decided to call it quits. I bet if we get a few more donors in we may finish the job. So all in all it really depends on damage.

Thanks for all of your input guys! I don't know where exactly the scoring is from the report that I got but I will be giving them a call and find out. Thanks again everybody.

@discostu, I'm not sure if you had an evaluation done with my company in Dublin but anyone who is quoting 4500 for a recovery is outrageous and if there is scoring on the platter, it's likely to be unrecoverable. If you'd like to PM me, I can have a chat with you. If the drive was with us, we would have provided photos of the platter damage.

CK.

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Data Recovery Ireland

I'd say you hand over the drive to CK for some decent evaluation...

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http://www.northwind.gr
SandForce SSD Recovery
Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

I have the exact same problem. Just a couple of days ago my HD started to make clicking and squeaking noise. My computer could not read the HD so I plugged it into a different computer but still was not able to read. I sent it to a recovery lab and they did an evaluation. After the evaluation, they informed me that my media was damaged and the platter was scored. Therefore no way of recovering the data. Also, they did not tell me where the scoring was but just called me with this information.

I would like to get a second opinion to see whether someone else may be able to recover some data. Or am I out of luck?

Thanks!

A second opinion would not hurt, I guess.

Contact member lcoughey he's near you.

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http://www.northwind.gr
SandForce SSD Recovery
Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

Sometimes it is not visible, so one can't tell where it is without some magic.

+1 for lcoughey

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Hard Disk Drive (HDD), Solid State Drive (SSD, SATA, NVMe, etc), USB Flash Drive and RAID Data Recovery Specialist in Massachusetts