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[crisdecuba]

I'm in a situation where despite having a mirrored drive set up, there are about a years worth of photos that I've lost due to a damaged hard drive. I found the most reputable company i could find in terms of the actual recovery of the data, but I'm wondering if I am paying too much versus other services that might be less established or have a slightly lower recovery success rate.

I'm recovering about four or 5 GB of data from a 3 TB internal hard drive. They gave me a range of $399 to up to $1800, depending on whether the recovery can be done without utilizing a clean room to do an internal repair of the drive mechanisms.

Does this range seem outlandish, or reasonable? Also, they have a no data no cost policy, meaning if they don't succeed, then I don't know them anything.

Anyone have any experience with this?

 

[cwmartin]

Are these pictures worth $1800 to you?

 

[dave is ok]

I can't speak to their quote, but yes - data recovery is very expensive.

Have you tried Recuva or something?

 

[crisdecuba]

Are these pictures worth $1800 to you?

Potentially, yes. Coincidentally they are from the first year of our twins being born. But if I can avoid paying that much, I would like to. That's a huge amount of money.

 

[Gareth Bryne]

I have a 32GB microSD card that I may need to have recovered, and I've seen quotes of anywhere from $300-$600+ for that if it's successful. It's definitely not cheap .

 

[HomerSimpson-Man]

From what I've seen those prices are within range of industry standard of data recovery.

 

[tuffy]

A friend of mine needed this done years ago (also to recover important pictures), and that's about what it cost for recovery. Pulling data off hard drive platters in a clean room is an expensive process.

 

[BlackGoku03]

That's normal pricing. You can try doing it yourself by buying the EXACT same drive (same version too). If it doesn't work you can send it in then but it's kind of technical if you havent done it before.

I've tried doing it about 4 times and was only successful once... They have static free/dust free rooms that they perform these drive recovery operations. Some people create their own box to do it in. It's pretty neat.


You just have to justify the price considering how much you need that data.

 

[crisdecuba]

That's normal pricing. You can try doing it yourself by buying the EXACT same drive (same version too). If it doesn't work you can send it in then but it's kind of technical if you havent done it before.

I've tried doing it about 4 times and was only successful once... They have static free/dust free rooms that they perform these drive recovery operations. Some people create their own box to do it in. It's pretty neat.


You just have to justify the price considering how much you need that data.

Well, I just dropped it off and over the next couple of days I'm going to see how much I can recover just based on things I've shared with friends or posted online or that I still have on my old phone, etc. From there if I'm moderately successful then I may go down the route of simply having them give me the drive back and I'll try to fix it myself since I already have an exact version of the drive.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!!

 

[One Eyed Willy]

Can't help you on recovery, but from one father to another... please, please get your data in the cloud. Local backups, mirrored drives, RAIDs, local NAS's solutions are not enough.. they're not. They can be part of the equation.

Your data doesn't exist unless its in 3 places. Keep your local copy, a local backup and then get that shit in the cloud. Crashplan is $5/mo for unlimited data.. unlimited.

Best of luck man

 

[Sulik2]

Sounds about right. Data recovery at a professional level is very time consuming and takes a ton of special software tools. That is not even including if they need to use a clean room to disassemble a HDD and manually access the platters.

DO NOT USE Recova if the drive is having physical problems. Spinning it up at all to try it can cause more physical damage and lose more data. Recuva is more useful for recovering data that was accidentally erased rather then a failing drive.

 

[NewFresh]

one of my old directors did this for some files and photos. He paid a large amount as well.

Afterward I set up a cloud storage account for him and google photos as well.

 

[newdayrocks]

Seems like a great time to remind folks to always have multiple backups to places like Google Photos, as well as services like Backblaze.

I can't imagine not having any kind of offsite backup in 2017.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

Seems like a great time to remind folks to always have multiple backups to places like Google Photos, as well as services like Backblaze.

I can't imagine not having any kind of offsite backup in 2017.

I still store everything of consequence on my NAS. A bad habit I should break, I know. About 10TB worth of stuff dating back 20 years that I've moved over from ZIP drives, floppy disks, old digital cameras, blah blah.

I'm in a situation where despite having a mirrored drive set up, there are about a years worth of photos that I've lost due to a damaged hard drive. I found the most reputable company i could find in terms of the actual recovery of the data, but I'm wondering if I am paying too much versus other services that might be less established or have a slightly lower recovery success rate.

I'm recovering about four or 5 GB of data from a 3 TB internal hard drive. They gave me a range of $399 to up to $1800, depending on whether the recovery can be done without utilizing a clean room to do an internal repair of the drive mechanisms.

Does this range seem outlandish, or reasonable? Also, they have a no data no cost policy, meaning if they don't succeed, then I don't know them anything.

Anyone have any experience with this?

What kind of damage did your drive have? What's wrong with it exactly? I assume you've already exhausted the possibility of a software recovery solution? I had great success with one of those on a drive that wouldn't load, but if it's a physical issue that's a different matter of course.

You might want to consider a second opinion on the price. These folks are quite good: https://cherrysystems.com/

 

[Justin Bailey]

Yes, that range is about what you'd expect to pay. In fact, that's actually a bit cheaper than what I've seen. The fact that they don't charge a fee upfront is a huge plus.

If the drive is truly physically damaged and you need that data back then I would do it.

 

[Dreams-Visions]

Yes, that range is about what you'd expect to pay. In fact, that's actually a bit cheaper than what I've seen. The fact that they don't charge a fee upfront is a huge plus.

If the drive is truly physically damaged and you need that data back then I would do it.

Those are the big IFs.

IF the drive is physically damaged

and

IF you *need* that data back.

Those are the questions you have to answer for yourself, OP. But again, I recommend getting a second opinion here too.

 

[crisdecuba]

Those are the big IFs.

IF the drive is physically damaged

and

IF you *need* that data back.

Those are the questions you have to answer for yourself, OP. But again, I recommend getting a second opinion here too.

Yup. It does sound like the drivers physically damaged, though. There is a repeated sound of what seems to be the head attempting to move and then not being able to, like it's seized up.

 

[BlazinSkatinAxel]

That's too much. Use $300 Data Recovery.
https://www.300dollardatarecovery.com/

I've used them before and they recovered 99.9% of my data.

 

[soldat7]

You might have some luck with Linux utilities. You can create a bootable Linux USB or CD fairly painlessly, and get access to a variety of rescue tools.

https://www.linux.com/learn/get-your-data-back-linux-based-data-recovery-tools

 

[Sapiens]

What are the odds of having a mirrored drive situation complete fail? Are you storing your computer on a wine cooler?

 

[tuxfool]

Yup. It does sound like the drivers physically damaged, though. There is a repeated sound of what seems to be the head attempting to move and then not being able to, like it's seized up.

Having worked in Data Recovery in the past, I can tell you that those prices are indeed reasonable as rates go. Maybe on the low end it isn't low enough and the scale up to the higher end seems maybe a bit too high for a single drive, but it isn't outlandish.

As others have mentioned, you have to ask yourself whether that data is worth it. If the drive head is damaged they'll almost certainly need to open the drive and replace the heads. That will be more expensive, also taking into account the volume of the drive they have to trawl through, even just for 5GB.

 

[BlackGoku03]

20 TB of data... Thats a lot. I have about 8TB of data and I don't have it backed up to a cloud yet. That's a lot of shit to upload.

Yup. It does sound like the drivers physically damaged, though. There is a repeated sound of what seems to be the head attempting to move and then not being able to, like it's seized up.

Might be an easy repair if the platter itself isn't scratched or damaged. You just have to ensure ZERO dust is on it. The space between the arm and platter is thinner than your hair, so dust can affect performance or make it not work at all.

 

[shandy706]

That's too much. Use $300 Data Recovery.
https://www.300dollardatarecovery.com/

I've used them before and they recovered 99.9% of my data.

Nice, that's pretty great if they're as good as they say. There's a place locally that it's $400-$600, but you can't beat a $300 flat fee.

 

[crisdecuba]

What are the odds of having a mirrored drive situation complete fail? Are you storing your computer on a wine cooler?

That's a fair question. I didn't notice that one of the drives in the pairing had developed errors and stopped mirroring. I thought that windows would notify me in some obvious manner. So, Drive #1 developed errors and stopped mirroring about 2 years ago, and then recently drive #2 started making a strange noise. I was able to recover some data from drive 2 before it completely failed, and most of the data from drive 1.

 

[Justin Bailey]

That's too much. Use $300 Data Recovery.
https://www.300dollardatarecovery.com/

I've used them before and they recovered 99.9% of my data.

Wow, that's amazing. I'll have to keep those guys in mind. I've used OnTrack in the past via work (several years ago) and they quoted a range of $500-$2500. Ended up being around $2000 for a physically damaged drive.

 

[Syriel]

I'm recovering about four or 5 GB of data from a 3 TB internal hard drive. They gave me a range of $399 to up to $1800, depending on whether the recovery can be done without utilizing a clean room to do an internal repair of the drive mechanisms.

Cheap as shit.

What is the company?

 

[rbanke]

That price is reasonable for data recovery, the question is always is loss worth the cost, you've already decided it is since you've dropped it off with them. There are a few lessons to take away from this.

1. Redundancy is NOT backup. Backup's are duplications of data on separate devices and locations. Today the cost of remote backups are VERY reasonable and all the major players are just fine when it comes to personal data.

1.(b) Test your backups. As you saw, you had no idea you're mirror had failed. People often buy a cloud backup system, set it and forget it and just pay the bill. Remind yourself from time to time to test a restore of some of your data and verify that what you want backed up, is indeed being backed up.

2. If you do have data loss, attempting to recover it yourself if you are not experienced in doing so can make lower the chances of a successful professional recovery. If you are in the situation that recovery is on the table, stop messing with the drives or you could end up paying way more/lose your data.

 

[tokkun]

Can't help you on recovery, but from one father to another... please, please get your data in the cloud. Local backups, mirrored drives, RAIDs, local NAS's solutions are not enough.. they're not. They can be part of the equation.

Your data doesn't exist unless its in 3 places. Keep your local copy, a local backup and then get that shit in the cloud. Crashplan is $5/mo for unlimited data.. unlimited.

Best of luck man

Google Photos is a really nice option if you don't have Google-phobia. The free plan is good enough quality unless you are shooting RAW, the desktop sync app keeps my photos backed up without any effort, and the content-based search functionality in the app itself is incredibly useful.

 

[smoothj]

Google Drive is 100gb for 2 dollars a month. I think Google photos is free and unlimited.

 

[CrudeDiatribe]

One DIY method:

Using a 'live' Linux USB stick, make a block-level copy of the damaged drive onto a new, blank disk using gddrescue, to avoid damaging the disk further. Then run photorec on the copy to another new, empty drive. 'Finally', the monumental task of sorting through the volumes of unsorted .jpg (or raw, or whatever) files.

Edit: There's a number of steps missing from the above— e.g. installing needed software once live distro is booted, figuring out what disk is what and not making things much, much worse.

 

[BlazinSkatinAxel]

Nice, that's pretty great if they're as good as they say. There's a place locally that it's $400-$600, but you can't beat a $300 flat fee.

In total it costed me $300 + buying a new drive which cost like $75.

1. Buy a new drive from NewEgg
2. Send in the old drive with the new drive.
3. ???
4. Recovery.

 

[BlazinSkatinAxel]

Wow, that's amazing. I'll have to keep those guys in mind. I've used OnTrack in the past via work (several years ago) and they quoted a range of $500-$2500. Ended up being around $2000 for a physically damaged drive.

I got 300 Data to recover a hd that crashed 6 years ago.


You can't beat a flat rate.

 

[Sapiens]

That's a fair question. I didn't notice that one of the drives in the pairing had developed errors and stopped mirroring. I thought that windows would notify me in some obvious manner. So, Drive #1 developed errors and stopped mirroring about 2 years ago, and then recently drive #2 started making a strange noise. I was able to recover some data from drive 2 before it completely failed, and most of the data from drive 1.

It was erring for two years and you had no idea?

My advice for you is to invest in a system that will give you obvious external software and hardware notifications on hardware failures. A light to go off and an email to bother you.

Make sure Windows/MS software is not doing this for you in any way. If your data is important, invest in something better.

 

[johnny956]

the "up to $1800" amount is usually requiring a clean room recovery. Average recovery is usually around $600 or so that our company has used. If the pictures are worth it, don't go cheap on data recovery. The reputable ones are reputable for a reason

 

[AndyD]

From what I've seen those prices are within range of industry standard of data recovery.

Same here. 3-700 is reasonable for a basic recovery on a dead drive.

I have also learned that it's cheap to have some Google Drive space and back all pictures up.

 

[andythinkpad]

Google Drive is 100gb for 2 dollars a month. I think Google photos is free and unlimited.

Unlimited for downsized photos. Backup to both google drive and flickr.

 

[Yilia]

OMG, it seems blackmail. The pricing is not reasonable indeed. For me, I got my iPhone data files lost unluckily. But I applied one data recovery tool, named Joyoshare iPhone Data Recovery, which is low-budget and powerful. I can have chance to recover up to 20+ kinds of files from any iOS devices, iTunes ane even iCloud backup. Anyway, you should look further to find the most suitable one.

 

[Fox Mulder]

OMG, it seems blackmail. The pricing is not reasonable indeed. For me, I got my iPhone data files lost unluckily. But I applied one data recovery tool, named Joyoshare iPhone Data Recovery, which is low-budget and powerful. I can have chance to recover up to 20+ kinds of files from any iOS devices, iTunes ane even iCloud backup. Anyway, you should look further to find the most suitable one.

It's not blackmail. Recovering data from damaged physical hard drives is quite different than deleted phone files.

 

[deeppal]

If your Windows (or you) have cleared the recycle bin, then you can try Stillbon Data Recovery Software to seach for files that have been deleted but are still there on the hard drive. There are many programs that will do this, some are 'paid for' and some are free.
These do work very well in many cases. I have used them several times over the years on hard drives, flash and camera cards.

 

[Chairman Tickles]

If your Windows (or you) have cleared the recycle bin, then you can try Stillbon Data Recovery Software to seach for files that have been deleted but are still there on the hard drive. There are many programs that will do this, some are 'paid for' and some are free.
These do work very well in many cases. I have used them several times over the years on hard drives, flash and camera cards.

IF the sectors haven't been overwritten then the recovery rate is close to 100%. But the best software is payware.

 

[Mistake]

Try also using linux and recovering through that if windows is giving you problems. I've had times where windows wouldn't even initialize the disk, but linux would