Data Recovery
When essential documents, video, or audio has been lost, it can be a very stressful experience. Should these files be just for personal use, the loss is annoying and potentially very damaging. In professional settings, the loss of files can be detrimental to a career or an entire business. With drive sizes mushrooming to over a terabyte, the malfunction of a single drive poses a very serious threat to an individual or entire business. To overcome this threat, regular backups should be made by the system administrator. Unfortunately, this is not always the case, even when important files are involved. As such, an entire industry has grown up around data recovery services.
The loss of potentially vital data has given rise to a host of data recovery utilities and businesses. Fortunately, many of these tools are very effective data recovery systems, bringing back files from the brink of destruction. There are several potential causes for data loss, including user error, software issues, and hardware failures. Data recovery software can help in the first two cases, where more expensive services must be hired in the third. TestDisk is a leading data recovery utility, including a full set of features and compatibility with a number of operating systems.
In the case of user error, an accidentally deleted file may need recovering. Luckily, this is relatively simple for most data recovery utilities. When a file is deleted by the user, it typically remains intact on the hard drive until more space must be cleared up for new files. Utilities like TestDisk can successfully bring files back from this state of limbo. When this happens, it is very important that users act quickly to restore the file. The longer one waits, the more likely it is that the file will be overwritten as the operating system looks for a place to put new data.
Software issues can include data corruption and the loss of drive partitions, or even formatting. In these cases the operating system has lost the ability to locate files due to corruption that has made the drive partition table unusable. The operating system may even fail to operate when this occurs. To perform data recovery, unplug the offending drive and connect it to a computer that is still functioning. Install TestDisk there, and run the program on the dead drive. If the issue is software related, TestDisk can rebuild the partitions needed to pull files off the drive.
In hardware related situations, data recovery can be more complicated to perform. In most hardware related failures, the drive will have to be shipped off to a specialized service such as DriveSavers in order for the data to be rescued. Although DriveSavers is a very effective service, it does command a fairly high price.
Filed under: Data Recovery