The world of data recovery is a big mystery for most consumers and even some IT professionals. This is largely because hard drives themselves are complex devices and their technological specifics are not generally well known. Data recovery companies thrive on their customers lack of information and often get away with charging obscene rates for any recovery, regardless of complexity. I hope this article will be a helpful resource for consumers and professionals alike. I provide some basic information about data recovery by shedding some light on how hard drives work, how they can fail, what are the chances of successful recovery and how much the user can expect to pay. This information will enable the user to make an informed decision when choosing a data recovery company.

A bit about Hard Drives

A computer hard drive stores data on metal oxide platters which spin up to 10000 revolutions per minute. An actuator arm contains the head which reads and writes the data in the form of magnetic charges one millionth of an inch above the surface. Any given drive can have multiple read and write heads and each head can crash independently. A head crash occurs when the read/write head comes in contact with the platters of the disk (more on head crashes below). As manufacturers strive to cram more space on hard drives without increasing their physical size, the data gets written increasingly closer together, making for very difficult recovery should one or more heads crash. The brain of the hard drive is its controller board and this is unique for each individual hard drive. One other detail worth a mention is the service track of a hard drive. This is an area located on the outer part of the disk platter and it contains the drives firmware zone. The firmware of a hard drive is the information used by the computer to communicate correctly with the drive. These are the main components that make a hard drive work, now lets talk about what can go wrong.

There are many ways in which a hard disk can fail

Hard drives are extremely fragile and can suffer failures in many different ways, leading to a loss of data. The five most common types of drive failures are: logical errors, mechanical failure, electronic failure, firmware corruption, and bad sectors, or any combination these. Least severe of these is usually data loss due to logical errors.

Logical errors are often the simplest and sometimes the most difficult problems to deal with when recovering data. They can range from an invalid entry in a file allocation table, a simple problem that needs little work; to severe issues such as the corruption or loss of the entire file system. Logical errors can be spotted when files become inaccessible, there is a delay in starting up the computer, and programs do not run properly. Logical errors are often seen as simple because there is nothing wrong with the physical drive leading users to try recovering it themselves by using third party software. This is quite risky, however, as running such software on a damaged drive can result in total loss of data. The most effective way to prevent logical errors on your hard drive is to regularly use the Disk Defragmentation tool in your operating system. For more comprehensive information on preventing data loss, visit the tips section of our website.

Recovering a drive with logical errors can be simple and quick, however if the problem requires manual bit-by-bit reconstruction of the data, it can also be quite complex and time consuming. Normally, logical errors are in the lower end of the price range as they do not require manual disassembly of the drive, however there are cases when logical failures end up in the higher end of the price range. The bottom line with logical errors is the sooner they are caught and the less a user tampers with the drive, the better the chances for a quick and thorough recovery.

Mechanical failures are often much more serious than any other failure and frequently lead to a partial or even total loss of data. The most common type of mechanical failure is a head crash, which is when the read/write head comes in contact with the disk platter. Head crashes can be caused by a variety of reasons, including physical shock, static electricity, power surges, and mechanical read/write failure. Mechanical failures are detected by a constant clicking or grinding noise coming from the drive. If you suspect mechanical failure, you must immediately shut down your computer and call a data recovery company for advice.

Mechanical failures are usually the most severe and most challenging to recover from. All mechanical failures require physical disassembly of the drive. The replacement of a read/write head is one of the most complex and costly procedures that can be performed by a data recovery engineer, especially with larger capacity drives. The chances of recovery depend entirely on how much damage the drive has sustained, however they can be quite good. A crashed head does not mean that all your data is lost! Once again, the sooner you catch a mechanical problem and turn off your drive, the more of your precious data is likely to be rescued.

Electronic failures are most common after a power surge or due to some other electric problem, and the most common type is control board failure. A power surge can knock out the control board, making the drive undetectable in the BIOS. Because each drive is fitted with a unique control board, recovery of this type is relatively complex. However, the good news is that normally once the control board issue is fixed, the data is usually 100% recoverable.

Recovering a drive that has suffered from an electronic failure can be time consuming, mainly because the specific problem takes some time to diagnose. Once diagnosed, though, the recovery is usually not tremendously complex and would probably land in the mid-range in terms of price. Most of the time, we are able to achieve a 100% recovery from drives that have suffered an electronic failure.

Firmware corruption is caused by logical problems or physical damage to the firmware zone on the disk platter. When the firmware becomes corrupt, the computer is often unable to properly communicate with the hard drive, and drive is not recognized in the BIOS. Fortunately, when the drive fails due to firmware corruption, the data is usually fully recoverable once the drive has been repaired.

Recovering a drive that has suffered from Firmware corruption is possible with the use of our proprietary technology. Because the firmware information is isolated on the outer rim of the disk, most of the data can be recovered successfully. The complexity of recovering a drive that has suffered from firmware corruption depends on the amount of damage suffered by the service track on the disks platter. Expect the cost of this type of recovery to be in the mid- to high-price range.

Bad sectors are a common fate of all hard drives.

Eventually, all drives develop areas that are no longer functional and when this happens, they are isolated by the operating system. Bad sectors are very much like bumps in the road, areas which are avoided by the read/write head and which are no longer accessible to the user. If mission critical data exists on the drive, we recommend to backup as soon as possible, as the formation of bad sectors often indicates the impending demise of the drive. Finally, and most importantly, do NOT under any circumstances run the ScanDisk or Chckdisk utilities when data becomes inaccessible. These utilities are designed to fix only file system errors and not any other types of errors, so if your hard drive has suffered from bad sectors, these utilities only make things worse.

Bad sectors are accessible

We are able to recover drives with bad sectors using our proprietary mirroring technology. The process often involves manual mirroring bit-by-bit, which can be time consuming. The price of this type of recovery will generally be in the mid-range of the pricing schedule.

I hope the above explanations are of some use to all computer users. The basic fact is that data loss happens to everyone. Every hard drive crashes, and often when you least expect it to. Backup is essential for end-users and business users alike, and there are many excellent ways to back up your data. But if youve lost data, attempt to understand the problem before calling a data recovery company. Be informed, save your money, get your data back.

Much information on one web site does tend to contradict information on another site, but after all, most companies with sites of this nature are trying to sell you their solution so you will never get an overall unbiased picture, but there is one underlying fact which we can not get away from, a fact that is stated on most sites and the following fact that I totally agree with is, Data is the lifeline of all companies and organisations; if data is terminally lost then the chances of a company trading efficiently or even surviving after 2 years of the disaster not at all good. There are various statistics relating to this fact, but it is accepted that 50% to 70% of companies will go out of business within 1 year if data is lost. It is also acknowledged that everything within a business can be replaced, desks, chairs, buildings, even people can be replaced, everything but the data. Imagine, you sit on a chair and it breaks, you buy another one, you get the picture but imagine the consequences of data loss, you don’t know who your customers are, you don’t know who owes you money, you don’t know who you owe money to, you don’t know what orders you have to ship or who you are supposed to be visiting. Dire times are ahead.

Taking all of the above into account I go back to the original question, if people, companies or organisations understand the true value and importance of their data, how do they manage to lose it? Data loss is totally unnecessary and unacceptable! I honestly feel most IT administrators do have the best intentions when it comes the preservation of data. In my experience data loss stems from only a few sources, human error, lack of resource or lack of planning. Total data loss should never occur when hardware fails.

Human error – I forgot to take the tapes offsite when fire or flood struck offsite tape removal company incorrectly labelled your tapes, I did not test the tape prior to backup and consequently my data was not backed up, I forgot to backup! I did not put my tapes in a secure safe and they were stolen overnight. My backup server crashed in the middle of a backup. The web is littered with stories like this; they are almost a comedy of errors. Responsibility for data backup cannot ever be placed upon the shoulders of one person or one team of people, if there is room for human error, then you have a flaw within you backup system.

Lack of resources – If you work for a corporate, your backup and restore system will have probably cost many hundreds of thousands of pounds. You will enjoy an automated disk to disk system replicated to a second remote location. Even though you are replicating to an offsite location, for added security, you will most likely use this second site to backup to tape. This replicated infrastructure is way out of budget for small to medium enterprises backup to tape is still not a cheap task, by the time you have purchased a tape drive, server to fit the drive into, tape media and the backup software you will have spent at least Ј3,000, plus backing up to tape in the conventional way is still prone to the same potential human errors. The humans that make the error also have to be paid, if a backup solution is not automated then you will have to employ someone to take care of this, I would prefer my staff to be carrying out more proactive, revenue generating tasks.

Lack of planning – probably a harsh way of putting it, a lack of understanding potential disasters may sound more forgiving. It all amounts to the same thing, but a lack of planning was recently highlighted in the UK when the Bunsfield oil terminal exploded. Companies who backed up to tape and secured said tapes in a fire and water proof safe were cruelly exposed when their building collapsed as a result of the explosion, backup tapes could not be recovered for weeks as they were in the safe under hundreds of tonnes of rubble. Their ability to trade was rendered impossible. Most companies feel that this situation will never happen to them, but let’s put this situation into context, Bunsfield is only the fifth largest and one of over 40 oil terminals and depots in the UK all of which are near major towns and cities, so it could happen to you. This case is one of many where buildings have been destroyed and data has been lost as a result.

If you are still with me you will notice I have only mentioned reasons for and ways of losing data. The rapid growth of cheap high speed internet connectivity and consequently the greatly reduced cost of highly secure, fully automated offsite backup solutions is the reason I ask how can companies and organisations lose data?

Offsite backup, also known as remote backup, online backup, is a solution that ticks all the boxes for a small to medium companies with limited budget and resource. Why is this the case I hear you ask? If you deal with a reputable company, remote online backup is cost effective, solutions start at around Ј25 per month, totally automated therefore requires no human intervention resulting in no human error and your data will always be available as it will be replicated between two data centres. To summarise you have an enterprise class backup solution at your disposal for less than the cost of a low end tape drive.

To find out more information about secure offsite data backup solutions, please visit

www.perfectbackup.co.uk

1. Determine Whats Wrong:

- your computer will not start at all
- blue screen of death
- your computer boots up, but files are missing or are corrupted
- your computer opens up but you cannot seem to find some of your other drives

2. Weird Sounds

Before doing anything, try to hear if there are any sounds coming from your hard drive like a weird scratching, scraping or ticking. If you do hear something like it, then it is enough to conclude that your hardware may be physically damaged. The only possibility for you is to take your computer to a data recovery service where experts might be able to get your data off for you. Of course, this would entail a lot of time and money, so you may want to weigh the value of the data you lost before going a step further.

3. Do-It-Yourself Data Recovery Tips:

- Acquire and download software to help you out
- Not all software is free
- Attach your hard drive to another computer if your computer has only a single drive. This is to provide enough space to store all your data
- If your computer has a rollback safety feature, try and roll back to a previous saved state to restore damage

4. Possible Causes Of Damage:

- Lightning strike
- Virus
- Hard drive failure
- Accidental deletion of data
- Water/fire damage
- Improper software installation overwriting important data

5. Be Prepared – Make Backups

Having back-ups is the only solution to your data loss problems. They come in various forms:

- Virus protection software
- Personal firewall
- CD backup
- DVD backup
- RAID hard drive

6. Back-Up Tips

- Try investing in backup software of good quality and performance. Products that leave you secured from data loss disaster or further computer file crashes are always a good investment.
- Double check the restore capability. The software should have features that guarantee that while the product is performing your back up it checks all the data down to the level of bits and bytes.
- Double check the capability of your back up medium. Invest on the best back up software you can get and at the same time, for the purposes of prevention, start manually and diligently backing up your data regularly.
- Do an inspection of your hard drives from time to time. Always be on guard of viruses and spywares that can possibly crash your hardware. Defrag your computer regularly to correct errors and check bad sectors as soon as they are detected.
- Be sure you conduct a proper documentation of what transpired during the data loss disaster, what you have observed, as it progresses and the things you attempted doing to give your files the first aid. This will help the data recovery expert to track the problem and recommend the best solution for your problem.