Hard Drive Data Recovery Tips

In today’s data-driven world, securing your file systems and data should be the first step in your risk-elimination strategy. While it’s important to make sure that no one outside your company can access your valuable information, it’s also vital to make sure that the information is always accessible to those inside your organization who need to access it. If a hard drive malfunction, a virus or other data failure makes it impossible for you to access your files, you should have a data recovery policy in effect. All of your employees should know exactly which steps to take if they attempt to access an important file or program and find that it’s corrupt or missing.

Considerations for a Data Recovery Policy

First, be aware that anything you do may affect the ability of a professional data recovery team to access your files. If the file or hard drive is vital to your operations, your data recovery policy should minimize data recovery attempts by your employees. Aside from that caveat, these steps may help you find a lost file or regain access to the information it contains.

If the hard drive is accessible and the operating system is working, but you can’t find the file on your hard drive, check the Recycle Bin to make sure that it wasn’t inadvertently deleted. If it’s there, simply restore it to its original place on the drive.

If the file isn’t in the Recycle Bin, and the hard drive is accessible from another computer on the network, switch to another computer and search the hard drive. Use the file name, or search for words that you know are in the file. It may have been accidentally moved to another location on the computer.

If the file is present on your hard drive, but is corrupt or inaccessible, evaluate its importance to your organization. If it’s vital, it’s time to contact a data recovery professional such as Fields Associates. If it’s not, you can attempt to recover the data in the file using data recovery software.

If the entire hard drive is inaccessible, you or your tech department may be able access the files and copy them to another drive using data recovery software. However, if the contents of the drive are important to your company, you’re better off contacting a professional, who will have specialized software and the proper facilities for attempting to retrieve data from your hard drive.

Of course, you can prevent the need for data recovery services if you set up regular backups to an offsite server. If you haven’t done so yet, though, and you need to get your files back ASAP, turn to an experienced pro for any files that are mission critical.

SSD Hard Drive Data Recovery

SSD—solid state drives—are less prone to data loss, thanks to their architecture, but they’re not immune. If your machine has an SSD drive instead of a traditional hard drive, you’re just as likely to accidentally delete files or become a victim of corrupt files or a virus that corrupts your file system. When that happens, recovering the data can be much more difficult than retrieving data from a standard SATA hard drive. It’s also considerably more expensive to turn to a professional hard drive recovery firm, though low-cost data recovery companies, such as Fields Associates, do provide some cheaper options. If you’re running a netbook, notebook, Mac Air or other machine with an SSD drive, these tips can help you avoid the high cost of data recovery.

First, practice good disk hygiene. That means regular backups are vital, especially if you’re running a machine with an SSD. If you’re the type to forget to back up regularly, subscribe to an online backup utility that will automatically back up your drive for you at regular intervals. That way, even if your drive becomes completely unusable, you’ll be able to recover your data and reinstall it on a new drive.

If you accidentally delete a file on a PC, but haven’t emptied the Recycle Bin, check the Recycle Bin as soon as you realize what you’ve done. If it’s there, you’re golden. Just use the built in restore option to recover your file. If you’ve already emptied the Recycle Bin, all is not lost.

Immediately stop using the drive to avoid overwriting the data. Using another computer or drive, download and install a data recovery program. Run the program from a drive other than the one from which you’re trying to recover data, and follow the instructions to bring back your lost files. If you’re lucky and the file hasn’t yet been overwritten, you may be able to recover your inaccessible data this way.

This won’t be much help if you’re using a TRIM-enabled drive with Win 7, unfortunately, but those are still quite rare. When TRIM is enabled in Win 7, the operating system automatically “sanitizes” the sectors where your data is restored. If that’s the case, or if the data recovery software was unable to find your files, your only option will be a professional data recovery firm such as Fields Data Recovery.

Beginners’ Guide to Hard Drive Data Recovery

You turn on your computer and, horror of horrors, instead of booting up like it usually does, it just sits there. Or it flashes a blue screen at you. Or it just keeps trying to load but it just isn’t happening. And of course, you haven’t backed up your hard drive recently. Welcome to the world of hard drive data recovery. If you’ve never had to deal with this before, there are a few things you should know.

There are two types of hard drive failure—logical failure and mechanical failure. In a logical failure, the hard drive is mechanically sound. It’s working right, but something is preventing your computer from accessing the files on it. It may be because your file system is corrupted, because a file is missing, because a virus has changed some of the files on your drive or some other reason. Whatever the problem is, your hard drive just  can’t find its way around its own data. But unless those files have been completely rewritten, the data is still on your hard drive and you may be able to recover it with the help of another computer and some software. 

Generally, you can recover data from a logical failure by downloading data recovery software onto another computer.  You don’t want to run it from the non-working hard drive to avoid the risk of overwriting data you want to keep, and attempting to access the data from a different hard drive. Chances are usually pretty good that you can manage this kind of hard drive data recovery on your own. If the data is especially sensitive, however, you’re better off contacting a professional data recovery service such as Field Data Recovery.

The other type of hard drive failure is trickier. Mechanical failure happens when something has gone physically wrong with your hard drive. Something inside is broken—it may have slipped , it may be worn out, or you may have dropped your laptop on its head. You can usually tell if the problem is a mechanical hard drive failure. Hard drives with physical damage often make a continuous clicking, grinding or groaning sound as they try to access their data.

If that’s the case, turn off your computer and call in the pros. Professional hard drive data recovery services, such as Fields Associates, are experts at retrieving data from busted hard drives. Attempting to recover data from a broken  drive on your own is very likely to make it impossible for even the best pros to get anything from it. Unless the data on your failed drive is unimportant to you, this is not a do-it-yourself job. Contact the pros and let them do what they do best.

Windows 7 Data Recovery

Windows 7 makes data recover far easier than earlier versions of Windows. The System Restore option is more efficient and effective than the XP version, and you can often recover all of your inaccessible data using the built-in recovery options with Windows 7. If that doesn’t work, you may be able to retrieve your files using data recovery software. If neither of those options work, however, you can turn to a data recovery company such as Fields Data Recovery to get your information and important files back. Before you turn to a professional, though, try these steps.

Data Recovery with System Restore

If your computer has been compromised by a virus or a software malfunction, System Restore may be a viable way to get access to your valuable data. To use System Restore, follow these steps.

Click on the Start Menu, then on All Programs, Accessories, System Tools and finally, System Restore. A window will open offering you the option of starting System Restore. Click Next to continue. On the next page, you’ll see a calendar listing all of the recent restore points that you can use to attempt to restore your system to an earlier state. Choose the most recent restore point before your problem began. Click on that date, then click Next. This will not affect any non-system files, but it will restore all of the Windows files to their pre-crash state. If none of your files have been damaged, this option may be all you need to do.

Data Recovery Software

If some or all of your files are inaccessible, you may be able to recover them by using data recovery software, such as Partition Wizard. When choosing data recovery software, always follow the instructions precisely, and be sure to download and install the data recovery software on a different drive than the one with the inaccessible files. Run the data recovery software from another drive as well, to avoid accidentally overwriting important data you’re trying to recover.

When to Call in the Pros

If software doesn’t work, you may have to call in a professional data recovery service to retrieve your important data. A professional service, such as Fields Data Recovery, has access to more powerful software to get at your lost files, as well as clean rooms where they can safely open your hard drive and remove the disk in order to work on it directly. If your files can’t be recovered using conventional means, then a professional data recovery service is your best option for recovering your missing data.