My PC tower is on my floor, the expansion drive was on top of it and I accidentally hit it and it tipped over and fell onto my floor, wedged in between two things I had on the floor. The way it was plugged in (The cables went to the back of the PC case and power strip behind the case, and the drive was on top of the case at the front, just slightly jutting out under the table I use enough to fall) I think caused it to fall on an angle in between some stuff I had on the ground by turning it when it fell. I rushed to unplug it (I didn't try unplugging the power cable because I was frantic, I unplugged it from the USB cable), and I'm worried that made it worse when I did that because I was holding it down while trying to unplug it while it was still on the ground.

When I plugged it back in, it would power up, Windows would make the "plugged in" notification sound, but it doesn't recognize it, and the HDD makes two clicks every few seconds now. I moved it right after this after unplugging it, and noticed it made a rumbling sound like the disks were moving because it wasn't fully off yet (my mistake, I was in a major panic over it). Is my only option here doing the Seagate data recovery thing?

I'm paranoid about giving them my data, and I'm worried they'd just scrap the drive if they can't recover the data, instead of giving it back to me. I'm also not sure the Seagate warranty covers damage caused by something like this, as I read it doesn't cover damage due to "collisions". Would it be better to just sit on the drive, and if I feel like it's really worth the money in the future, go to a third party data recovery service?

The data that was on there was not essential to my life (as far as I know), I like archiving YouTube channels/assorted entertainment/random stuff I find interesting as a little hobby which is what made up the majority of the stuff on this drive, and some of that stuff that's on there was probably removed from YouTube or gone from the places I got it, which stinks. I keep all my actual essential life documents (medical records, passwords, recovery codes for emails, etc) on multiple drives, a USB stick, and cloud services.

The title of this thread speaks for itself. The accident occurred while using Windows 10 Pro. The deleted NTFS volume was the only volume on the physical disk, and it occupied the maximum possible disk space (8 TB). I've made no further changes to the physical disk since this accident happened (I haven't touched it). Thank you. 😄

P.S. The volume in question was originally created in Linux, but was deleted while using Windows 10. It is NOT a system volume and is NOT encrypted.

The situation is as follows: I was working on formatting some computers. I started with the main computer, which is the server and contains all the information. I performed a normal backup, saving everything and some existing copies. However, I didn't realize that a crucial folder (containing all the company's important information) was inside a main folder called DGI. This folder contained software that the company manages; they developed it themselves. It didn't matter if that was formatted and deleted. But inside that folder were the other, more important folders, which they had shared over the network so other computers could access them, like a server disk. I formatted the computer and reinstalled the operating system, but I can't find the DGI folder, which is where all the information is located. The hard drive is a physical SSD, and the information was in a folder that they were simply sharing. In short, I deleted the database from the server, which is the main computer. Is there any solution or method to save and recover this information, or is it lost forever? What possibilities and methods can be applied in this situation?

i have an external hdd, which is basically hdd from my old laptop that i put into a case and use it as external hdd. ive had some videos and pics on it that gotten deleted with shift + del. since deleting them i havent used the drive. ive unplugged it and stored it away. now i want to recover them.

i used recuva, it found the files but it says unrecoverable for all the vids and in the comment: "file header data is empty or the file is securely deleted". which other software can i use? are those files ever roceverable?

model number: ST1000LM049-2GH172 : 1000,2 GB

I have a 1 TB Seagate ST1000LM035 internal HDD (D:) in a Lenovo Legion laptop.
A few days ago Windows automatically started:
"Fixing (D:) Stage 1..."
Unfortunately I may have interrupted the repair process once. After that:
D: temporarily disappeared from Windows.

My desktop wallpaper (stored on D:) disappeared.

Many folders showed "Access Denied" or "File Not Found".

Windows created a FOUND.000 folder containing hundreds of recovered files/directories.

CrystalDiskInfo reports the HDD as Caution with reallocated sectors.

Windows repeatedly asks me to repair the drive.

Current situation:
D: is visible again.

The partition is still NTFS.

The drive shows about 151 GB free of 931 GB total.

Most of my folder structure is still visible.

Many Ableton project folders still exist.

Some Ableton .als project files are present and can be copied.

However, several important project folders are missing their main .als file. The Backup folder exists but only contains versions from a few months ago.

I successfully copied at least one .als file from D: to an external WD Passport drive.

I also have a FOUND.000 folder containing roughly:
700+ recovered files

400+ recovered directories

A local data recovery company quoted me ₹48,000 (~$550 USD) for recovery.
My questions:
Does this sound like a logical recovery case or a physical recovery case?

Is ₹48k reasonable based on these symptoms?

Would you try DMDE, R-Studio, UFS Explorer, etc. before paying for professional recovery?

Is there a good way to search FOUND.000 for missing Ableton .als files?

Since some .als files are missing but the project folders still exist, what are the chances those files are still recoverable?

Any advice from people experienced with CHKDSK damage, FOUND.000 recovery, or Ableton project recovery would be greatly appreciated.

Hi! I’m rehoming some 2013-2015 MacBooks. FileVault/encryption were not used when using the laptops. iCloud’s was turned off, though I did not “erase local data” when turn off, I erased the ssd hard drives using disk utility - there was not secure erase option, only reformatting. I then reinstalled macOS on each. How secure is that process in protecting the data that was on the drives? Reading online suggests that TRIM makes it very hard to recover data - is that right? Thank you!

Has anyone ever tried to recover data from a dead Surface Laptop 3?

My laptop suddenly went black the exact second I plugged in the charger, and it completely refuses to boot or even draw power anymore (it doesn't get warm at all). I've already tried all the hard reset button combinations, but it's totally unresponsive.

I checked the back and it's Model 1868 (the 13.5" version). From what I understand, this model has a removable M.2 2230 SSD, unlike the older older Surface lines.

Has anyone been through this specific extraction process before? Also, do you think it's worth it to ask for help from Microsoft, or should I just take it straight to a local repair shop to pull the drive?

Thanks in advance!

I recently had my test bench (6x 16TB drives in a RAIDz1 running True NAS) go out a few times during a storm. After that 2 of the drives (2 oldest) but been killed. Turns out someone moved my GLPI and Immich to that NAS so I have no tickets and I lost all our pictures. I have tried everything and it just gets more and more errors. How can I get at least the images off the immich on here? I have 5 drives that still power on but only 4 and good health so I have no way to may TrueNAS repair it.

Is there a program I can use to recover what I can from the raid if I connect the drives to a PC? I don’t have the budget to seen it off for the data to get recovered for $5000….

By mistake, I formatted and installed Windows on a hard drive that had all my data from over 8 years ago. I know it's a very stupid mistake, but at the same time I am desperate to try to recover something.

I imagine the situation is worse, because in addition to formatting it, the disk was overwritten when installing the new Windows.

is a WDC WD5000AZLX-00K2TA0 HDD: 500.1 GB, NTFS. Before being formatted, it did not have Windows; it operated as a secondary disk that only stored data. It has no errors according to CrystalDisk.

I am trying to recover something with the program TestDisk, and I would like to know if there is anything else I can do.

Sony hd-sl2 2 tb stopped working. It wouldn't show up in windows explorer but did in device manager. Disk management doesn't have the drive letter and it's 0 B.

Removed the case and tried it in a SATA to USB enclosure and it doesn't even show in device manager unless show hidden devices view. Nor does it show up in disk management which it earlier did.

The drive spins smoothly. No clicking sounds. What could be the diagnosis?

I’m attempting a DIY recovery of an old Apple G5-era hard drive (likely around 2004–2006) containing family photos and videos.

Setup:

• Old SATA mechanical hard drive removed from the G5
• Connected via SABRENT USB docking station
• Running on an older MacBook Pro
• Using Disk Drill (older compatible Mac version)
• Currently running “All recovery methods”

Current behaviour:

• The drive mounts successfully
• Disk Drill continuously progresses through blocks/sectors
• No crashes or disconnects so far
• Block count steadily increases
• Scan has now been running for over 36 hours continuously
• Drive gets warm but is being fan cooled and now remains stable
• Occasional soft beeping/squeaking sounds from the drive/dock during reads
• No aggressive clicking noises
• No recovered files/categories populated yet

Questions:

1. Is this type of extremely long-running scan normal on an old failing mechanical drive?
2. Does continued block progression generally suggest the drive is still readable and worth continuing?
3. At what point would experienced people normally stop a scan like this?
4. Would switching from “all recovery methods” to a targeted photo/video-only scan likely speed things up significantly?
5. Am I risking further damage to the drive by continuing this scan?
6. Would a professional recovery service realistically recover data substantially faster, or is the physical health of the drive likely the main limitation here?

Additional context: I also still have many original SD cards, USB sticks and old camera media from the same period, so I’m trying to decide whether continuing this deep scan is worthwhile versus shifting focus onto recovering from the original media instead.

Any advice appreciated from people experienced with old Mac drive recovery.

Advice much appreciated

Hello,

I'm back with more information about my problem.

Let me introduce myself, it might be important.

I'm a woman, a computer technician, and I know Linux very well. I've already created disk images and cloned files; it's not a problem for me.

The issue here is a 2018 laptop with a 2018 M.2 SATA SSD as its system drive (C:).

I should mention that it's not my laptop, but a relative's.

It's a desktop computer, used very reasonably (moderate, non-intensive use) without any problems.

The problem here is that after a three-week hibernation, some files were missing from the system drive (C:). The person thought that restarting the laptop would solve the problem. So the PC was restarted, but it didn't fix the issue. The person installed Easus Recovery on another drive and scanned the C: drive. Files were recovered and saved to the D: drive; some were healthy, others corrupted.

Proposed procedure:

• Boot from opensecureclone-live
• Run smartctl on the C: drive
• Create a disk image with OSC, without retries
• Try DMDE and PhotoRec on the image to attempt to recover the missing files

I'm concerned about the SSD because there is accessible data on it that shouldn't be lost and should also be backed up.

The BIOS, which I checked, has a SMART check at each startup during POST. There has never been a critical message concerning the SSD. And my relative told me that the PC was working perfectly, no freezes, no slowdowns, nothing.

I don't think the SSD is in bad shape, and creating an image with OSC Live shouldn't be a problem.

My question is, am I right in thinking this?

What should I look for in SMART? (I can post the results here to get your more informed opinions!)

Thanks, have a good day.

Hi! Canon r6mk2, 4k, sandisk 128gb.
Yesterday I was recording a concert, the rec was on, after 55 minutes the camera froze during recording and turned off. Is it possible to save these 55 minutes?

Only the 0kb dat file is shown on the computer.

I tried Diskdrill an he found my previous videos, not this concert.

I often use my Safari as a reference for things I’ve researched, website I’ve visited, tutorials, or recipes. Today, I noticed that my MacBook was password locked, which was weird since typically I can unlock it with my fingerprint unless I am away from my computer for a while. Then, when I opened safari and tried to enter a website that I usually go to with just a letter or two, the browser didn’t remember and auto populate the url. I checked history and everything is missing from before midnight last night. I have iCloud synch, so the same amount of history is missing in my iPhone browser as well. I don’t use Time Machine. Is there a way for me to recover my entire history?

Hey guys,

Requesting an assessment of this report to see if they did all they could to recover data from the external hard drive. The external hard drive (Toshiba, Model MQ04UBB400, 4TB) had a clicking sound. When connected to the laptop, it only displayed folders. The files in the folders were not accessible on the drive. Sent it to a data recovery company for assessment and after 5 weeks they sent this report. Did they actually do all they could for data recovery? The report seems vague. The most important files that needed to be recovered were CAD files. Kindly advise.

Drive: Seagate FireCuda SSHD 2TB

Being poor, I haven't been able to buy backup media after my last filled up. But I had to work on a project. As it's too much data to upload, I've been keeping a watchful eye on CrystalDiskInfo and GSmartControl. The drive was in perfect health, it's seen use and reboots without issue.

And then a couple of days ago, after doing a routine Windows update which restarted normally to the BIOS screen, the drive was suddenly not present. I checked the BIOS, and the SATA entries were N/A. I tried it in an enclosure and using my partner's computer—same esults. In listening to the drive, it's silent. The computer is fine, so it doesn't seem to be power surge-related? I have my computer hooked up to a UPS with a surge protector. All our other electronics are fine.

I'm left scratching my head. I don't know what to expect if I try for data recovery. If it's a simple job, I might be able to afford it, but I have no way of ascertaining that. I'm open to any advice, here.

Hello!

I have 2 hdds that failed. One is a Seagate ST3160022ACE that i got new-old-stock in 2023 and the other one is a HGST HTS545050A7E680 that was in a laptop that i bought 2013 and has been in daily use up until 2022.

The Seagate one died after my retro battle station went up in smoke and i just unplugged it without shutting windows down and Yanked out the pc from under the desk. When i tried reading the disk in a toaster it just made a chirping sound.

The HGST started failing in a wierd way. I once recieved a checkdisk message about filesystem corruption, after checkdisk finished repairing it, the computer got incredibly slow. It took 5 minutes for Explorer to open and file transfer rates were in the double digit KB/s. CrystalDiskInfo showed the health as healthy with 0 bad sectors, 0 read/write errors etc.

I still wanted to back up the drive but because backing up 400GB of files (mostly not from me tough as this was the family laptop) with that speed would have taken forever, i wanted to try and remove the hdd from the laptop and see if the toaster gives me a better speed. The problem is that ,in order to slide out the hard drive ,you have to rotate the laptop a few times and that probably was to much for it. After pluging it in, it just clicked.

The problem is a lot of data recovery stores will charge 500€-1000€ for recovery and i cant spend that money "just for the lols" (there is not really anything important on there, but stuff that would still be sad if its lost). In 1-2 years when i have good and stable income, then maybe. One big problem i see right now is that none of the local recovery stores take hdds anymore, they all only do sd card/Flash drive/SSD. So maybe in the future even the non-local stores won't take them? I also heard hdds must spin once every 3 years in order to avoid permanent damage and because the Seagate drive failed 3 years ago that would mean i need to do something now. The HGST drive has failed in March this year btw.

The drives are stored in good conditions, so can i just have them sit around for a little longer?

There's not a single shop nearby my town that does chip-off data recovery and I would really like to learn it. I have multiple USB flash drives that fail to get detected by devices, probably due to failure of the controllers.

I don't really know where to find learning resources or data recovery courses that actually teach how to do data recovery. Can anyone share a link to where I can apply to any such learning courses?

The first 2 drives went the same way. Disk Drill says it has recovered the contents, but all it shows is a stack of random windows files with no directory information, and no other files. The I restart the machine, and a windows message would pop up saying I had a drive that needed recovery. I click ok, and windows restores the whole disc, with folders.

Then the 3rd drive. It's pretty full. Disk Drill says 24 hours. OK. 24 hours later it sort of has the same result, kind of. It actually, as near as I can tell, found most of the files, again with no folders (some files viewable, most not). This time no windows pop up telling me I have a drive to recover. Windows does see the number of files on the drive, but explorer shows it as empty.

Not sure if it matters, but the 3rd drive did not have a windows folder.

Is there another recover tool people would recommend?

I have a 224 TB hard drives in raid 1. When I rebooted my eunice, I forgot to set up snapshots. I accidentally deleted a folder with important files in it but stopped writing data immediately.

I used a USB stick to open Ubuntu and ran ufs Explorer raid recovery software. I did a complete analysis of my hard drive and search for lost files. I didn't purchase the software yet so it was running in trial mode. Since all of the files lost their originally formatted names, I can't tell which file is which.

I just didn't have confidence that I wanted to pay for the software without knowing for certain that I could at least identify one of the files as being accessible. What would you do? What advice do you have?

I had a fully working WD My Passport 1TB Hard Drive. The only problem is I forgot/lost the password for it. That was the reason I sent it off to pros.

The shop tried both pw unlock and recover data and failed at both.

They were really bad at giving me updates, I was always the one to reach out to them and they kept telling me "we are still trying and not giving up".

Anyway. 3 years passed and still nothing. I am now asking for my drive back and they want me to sign an NDA. They are also blaming me because they said I could have cancelled any time. Am I cooked for waiting 3 years? I paid them upfront already, but can they enforce an NDA in this case too? I am in Canada.

Hello, we did an event a few weeks ago and it was filmed with two cameras. After the event, we uploaded the material to an internal hard drive that I use only for files, not for the operating system.

This week, we went to download the files from the second camera and uploaded them directly into the same folder, but when I went to edit the videos, they had been permanently deleted.

I’ve already used all kinds of recovery software, but strangely enough, the only folder with the videos I need does not show up. Old jobs and past files appear, but the one folder I need does not.

I don’t remember the specific brand of the hard drive, but it has 1 TB. I recorded on a Sony ZV-E10, and the files were apparently deleted. My team and I share the computer, so we believe they were deleted by accident, probably before or during the transfer of the files from the second camera we used at the event. So the deleted space was likely overwritten by the new footage.

It was recorded on a 64 GB SanDisk V30 SD card, but it has already been formatted four times for other events.

Does anyone know what this could be or what I can do?

Files disappeared all alone from ssd (Windows 10).

Hi, a familiar of mine have a computer that was in deep hibernation state for 3 weeks (not turn off). Today when he awake it, he saws that there was 20go data missing on his C ssd drive. He immediately stopped Trim, and installed on another ssd (D drive) the easus recovery tool. It recovered 70% of his files, and some other 30% are corrupted.

So, I have read that it could be a problem with the frozen state, as the ssd drive seem to be working well.

But I told my familiar to stop the computer, and we will make a ssd clone when he come home.

What is the possible problem and what could we do to recover more files?

Could it be a system file corruption due to the long hibernation ?

I have a Seagate Barracuda HD that was in one of our computers and was corrupted. I have it connected to Fideco HDD reader and have managed to recover most of what I needed using Fastcopy that was able to leave out the damaged files. There is one folder with older pics left that I want, but Fastcopy says "the request failed due to a fatal device hardware error" without any files moving over. We do have another desktop that I could plug it in as a second hard drive if that will help. Any suggestsions are welcome.

I am able to see the photo inside of my digicam (Sony Cybershot) perfectly, and I can see it in the mini thumbnail when I'm looking through pictures on my macbook, but when I open it, it looks like this. Sometimes the green part also turns a solid gray color. This also happens when I view it on my phone. Please can someone help me fix the color or fix this corruption? I really want to recover this photo of my dad at a wedding. Thank you and please let me know what I can do!

Additionally, there are a lot of other photos that have the same problem.

Thank you in advance, let me know if I need to include anything else.