Hard drive recovery specialists in SA? (Austin, Bowie: home, utilities, storage)

[StanStelle]

Can anyone recommend a company here in town that does a good job at extracting data from a crashed hard drive? I already tried a few commercially available utilities so I'm looking for someone who does something beyond that - whatever that might be. I have also read that some companies offer a "no recovered data, no fee" type of service so I would be particularly interested in those.

[dcjes]

Does the drive power up at all? Does it make any clicking noises? Have you tried Altex Electronics?

If none of those work there is a place in Austin called Flashback Data. They can probobaly recover your data.

[Bo]

Have you tried the freezer trick?

Put the hard drive in a static proof bag. (Not a Ziploc bag, those are full of static electricity!)
Put the drive and the bag in the freezer overnight.
Install the hard drive back in the PC, directly from the freezer.
It should work for a few minutes... long enough for you to recover your most critical files.
If the drive or the computer are under warranty, do not tell the repair folks that you did this.

[rd2007]

I take it there isn't a backup of the data? If so, I'm sure you realize this already, but for the rest of the people reading this thread, back up your data and then back it up again..
I just installed these (Dell : Lexar Media Lexar ExpressCard SSD - flash memory card - 16 GB - ExpressCard/34 : Solid State Disk (SSD) : Home & Home Office (http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/products/Solid_State_Disk_SSD/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=A1164 892 - broken link)) in my two main laptops and they provide an excellent solution. They are very small, hidden from view, more than large enough to back up most critical files, and can also run ReadyBoost if you're running Vista.
I can't help you with your original question, but hopefully some others will learn a lesson.

edit- the backup software that comes with the drive has to be updated prior to running. It crashed on me when I first started it, but after an update it worked just fine. It's very easy to use, just select the folder to be backed up and add it to the list. You can also specify how often it should back up your files.

[majormadmax]

Actually, I am interested in hearing if you are successful in recovering the data either using a company or Bowie's freezer trick! I have an old hard drive that crashed that I lost data from. Unfortunately, my only back-up at the time also crashed; and I lost all the bicycling pictures I had from three years in Belgium. I was able to recover most of my files but those were the exception, and I would love to give it another shot!

The lesson learned here is to have multiple back-up sources of stuff you really don't want to lose!

Cheers! M2

[rd2007]

Definitely MMM. Pictures are one thing I prefer to have at least two backups of. Almost all of my pictures from the last 10 or so years are digital and it would be awful to lose them. I back them up on other hard drives and also on other computers. I probably have at least 4 or 5 copies of every picture spread throughout my network, but that's really the only way to do it with something that valuable.

[Bo]

Originally Posted by rd2007

Definitely MMM. Pictures are one thing I prefer to have at least two backups of. Almost all of my pictures from the last 10 or so years are digital and it would be awful to lose them. I back them up on other hard drives and also on other computers. I probably have at least 4 or 5 copies of every picture spread throughout my network, but that's really the only way to do it with something that valuable.

What about off-premises backups? 5 hard drives in the same building does no good if the building burns down or gets burglarized.

I have our photos and important files backed up on a pair of USB thumb drives that we swap back and forth as we update them with a copy in the safe deposit box at the bank. We used to use CDs and DVDs, but thumb drives seem to provide the biggest bang for the buck nowadays.

[rd2007]

Good point and I forgot to mention that I also keep them stored online as well.
There's no such thing as too many backups, data storage is dirty cheap now. I never would've imagined 16 Gb SSD's for $47 and they'll probably only get cheaper.

[StanStelle]

Dcjes, this is an old drive that died on me last year and entombed about 5 months worth of non-backed up photos and other files. As I recall a utility I used just kept reporting "unable to read sector" all over it. I recently rediscovered it and wanted to see if a professional could resurrect some data.

Bowie, I tried the freezer trick back then to no avail.

I have since gotten smarter about backups. Here is my current scheme along with some software utilities in case it might help someone.

I keep a machine as a dedicated repository ("server") for all our data (~ 10 years of digital photos, over 60 digitized videotapes, incremental work backups, music, personal docs etc.). So the data is in the hundreds of gigabytes which makes backups challenging. We have Gigabit ethernet so our laptops can browse this data over the network with little hesitation.

Every night software minions on our laptops automatically wake up and backup data to a 500GB internal drive on the "server" machine. I use Acronis TrueImage to schedule daily incremental backups of our work related files and SyncBackSE to copy any digital media we have placed on our laptops during the day.
Later at night the "server" synchronizes its updated internal drive, using SyncBackSE, with an external 500GB drive - just in case the internal ever fails.
About once every 3 months I hook up another 500GB external to the "server" and create a copy that a relative stores in his closet for safeguarding against disaster in our home. This offsite drive is an encrypted volume using TrueCypt - in case it gets stolen.
About once a week I zip up and upload important files to iDrive.
My external drives are connected with 3GB/s eSATA since USB is too slow.

It took some work, but its mostly all fully automated now. I hope my daughter never asks me "where are my kinder graduation photos and summer of '07 photos". :-)
We'll see how data recovery goes.

[StanStelle]

Originally Posted by rd2007

Good point and I forgot to mention that I also keep them stored online as well.
There's no such thing as too many backups, data storage is dirty cheap now. I never would've imagined 16 Gb SSD's for $47 and they'll probably only get cheaper.

If you rely on online storage, its prudent to use more than one. I use iDrive and xDrive, but the latter is shutting down. At least they are giving users a chance to get their files. Of course one hopes people only keep backups there.