Earlier this month, our data recovery team successfully recovered more than 2TB of data from a faulty external hard drive.
The hard drive in question – a WD My Passport with a storage capacity of 4TB – was sent into our office by a customer who could not get it recognised by any laptop or computer. After failing to connect it to her own laptop, a MacBook, she attempted to connect it to three other machines, all of which failed to recognise the drive. After speaking to one of our team and explaining the problem, the drive was sent in to our data recovery lab for examination. The customer was given a job reference number and a QR code to print off; these followed the drive throughout its journey.
Upon arrival into the data recovery lab, the hard drive was checked into the system, and handed over to our data recovery technicians for a free diagnostic test to ascertain what the cause of the problem was. Upon further inspection, it was discovered that the PCB had sustained damage; in most cases, this is the result of a power surge. A hard drive that has suffered from a power surge normally has some kind of visible damage, such as burn marks, on the PCB. Often, shortly after the power surge, you’ll be able to smell burning plastic. The printed circuit board, or PCB, is a fibreglass sheet that consists of multiple components that manage the functions of the hard drive. Without it, the drive is nothing more than a collection of components.
Our data recovery team sourced an identical donor PCB from our spare parts library, and using specialist tools, were able to image the contents of the drive, before providing a list of the recovered files to the customer. After the quote was accepted, the recovered data was transferred to a blank hard drive and returned to the customer. In total, the data recovery process took less than three days.
We will undertake a free data recovery diagnosis for all devices sent into the lab, and we provide a list of recoverable files along with a no-obligation quote. If accepted, we will complete the recovery upon receipt of payment, before returning your data on a blank drive or via FTP. If declined, we will return your device back to you free of charge via courier.
