data recovey Need Recommendations on Affordable Data Recovery

[TheZorch]

I'm looking for recommendations on a good data recovery service that won't cost an arm, a leg, a kidney, and a virgin sacrifice or two.

 

It's a 3TB HGST internal SATA-III 7200rpm HDD. We can't get it to come up in either Windows or Linux (we were going to see if ddrescue could save the files). It is about 1/2 full, most of it is videos but there are some important project files on there too that we need (which "should" have been backed up!!!). We're in the United States.

 

If you've got any recommendations, thank you in advance.

[Bombastinator]

Standard practice as I have been told here is to clone the drive and then do your data recovery on the clone.  Might or might not be useful in this case.  Data recovery services are famously expensive I’m afraid.  There’s a lot of labor and often specialized equipment.

 

I have a friend who is a system administrator and for a while his standing joke was that the moral to every single story ever was “always make backups”

[TheZorch]

3 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Standard practice as I have been told here is to clone the drive and then do your data recovery on the clone.  Might or might not be useful in this case.  Data recovery services are famously expensive I’m afraid.  There’s a lot of labor and often specialized equipment.

 

I have a friend who is a system administrator and for a while his standing joke was that the moral to every single story ever was “always make backups”

The drive isn't being detected by the operating system. It spins up but then start clicking loudly after that. The data is likely ok. If you know of a service that won't cost thousands but maybe hundreds that is doable. We found some backups of a few important files, so this disaster wasn't as catastrophic as the "current user" thought.

[Bombastinator]

3 minutes ago, TheZorch said:

The drive isn't being detected by the operating system. It spins up but then start clicking loudly after that. The data is likely ok. If you know of a service that won't cost thousands but maybe hundreds that is doable. We found some backups of a few important files, so this disaster wasn't as catastrophic as the "current user" thought.

My memory is prices vary according to what they have to do.  Simple stuff costs less than expensive stuff generally.  If someone has to decant the drive in a vacuum chamber it’s going to cost thousands no matter where you go.  I don’t have any suggestions for companies I’m afraid.  I’ve never had to use one.  Some other poster might have something for you.  GL.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Maybe @SSD Sean or @Lord Xeb can chime in on data recovery experts to use (Lord Xeb used to do professional data recovery for a living).

 

While is too late to help you now, in the future, maintain a set of at least two external backup drives for each data drive you have: one of each set kept onsite and the other one of each set kept offsite (for a drive to be a true backup drive, it must be kept powered down, disconnected from the computer and network, and be stored out of sight of the computer). Getting and maintaining backups will cost immensely less than data recovery with an incredibly better chance of success of recovery.

[Pickles von Brine]

Alright, first off, please stop plugging in that drive. If it is clicking, your drive has suffered a mechanical failure. Likely read/write head failure. Continuing to do so WILL result in platter damage. There is absolutely nothing you can do on your own and HAS to be sent to data recovery. However, there is a chance there is platter damage.

Luckily, it is an HGST/Hitachi drive. Those drives are tanks. 

Do not be suprised if data recovery costs between 1100-1700 dollars. The lowest I have seen a recovery for this was just under 1000, but it was in snail mode (month turnaround). Most data recovery companies do offer a payment plan so you should be fine. 

 

 

Personally, I would recommend sending off the drive to SalvageData (my former employer). The techs there combined have about 55 years of experience between the 4 of them. 

Either them or Drives Savers. 
Or 
We Recover Data

 

Any competent data recovery company is going to cost a bit. The cheap ones like 300 Dollar Data Recovery are absolute scams. I use to see SOOOOO many drives from them that were... messed up. Bent heads, finger prints on platters, screws missing, PCB missing a rom, etc. 

Most locations offer free diagnostics and no data no charge. 

 

Worst case scenario you send it out, it is too expensive, you get it back. Sometimes there is a return shipping fee.