Storage Solutions Estimated data recovery charge.

P

Pimpom

Disciple
My 2TB HDD (Toshiba HDWD120UZSVA) with ~700GB of data crashed due to a severe power fluctuation that overwhelmed the UPs. The drive is still accessible and I managed to copy a few GBs of data from it. But it's slow going, probably due to bad sectors from the crash.

So far, I've tried only one session of copying with Tera Copy, not any recovery software. I can probably recover most of the data myself after doing a surface scan but didn't want to risk causing further damage and data loss, so I disconnected the drive. That was two months ago.

My question is: Has anyone employed the services of a data recovery company in such a scenario and can give an estimate of the charges? This is probably one of the easiest tasks for a company with proper facilities.
 
No damage is gonna be caused as long as the drive is working AND its your only chances of getting the data recovered on your own. Pro services are anyways going cost you a bomb and unless its some corporate thing better and you have something really worthy better not to opt for it.
I have been recovering data for my employers by myself but its hard to believe by people around but that's fine., Have saved lacs till now.

You can use getdataback, recuva or stellar. I would start with gdb and its my trustworthy tool since two decades.

Also, if your drive had partitions the better to recover the partitions using easeus partition master as its easier than data recovery.

And for all these operations, ensure you have an additional storage 1.5 times of your existing ones.
 
Thanks for the reply. Oh, I've done plenty of data recovery myself but they were always for others. This is the first time I'm facing any problem with my own storage in 30 years of using computers.

What I mean is this: A head crash could cause only a tiny bit of damage, maybe a couple of sectors. No problem with that. But a more serious crash could score the surface coating, causing tiny bits of magnetic material to fly around, maybe even block the head travel in some places and cause endless problems.

I'm moving to an all-SSD system anyway and the HDD itself is to be discarded. Maybe I'll do a surface scan and be able to transfer everything normally. Using a professional data recovery company is only a last resort, just in case. I just wanted to have some ballpark estimate of how much they'll charge in such cases.
 
My HDD had crashed last year which had some critical data. It was WD 3TB HDD. The important data was around 250 GBs only. I had to resort to professional service for the same as the drive was not being detected at all even in BIOS. They charged me around 7K for the service. It took around 3 days for the overall process. I was able to get all the data and they even returned my faulty drive (which was a bit surprising to me). I got it done at Nehru Place (New Delhi). Overall I was happy with their service.
 
Had a similar experience. One of my backup Seagate 2TB 2.5" drives crashed on me a good while back. It had a lot of personal data which had not been backed up anywhere else. The HDD was dead as it neither spun up nor get detected by the system (based on dmesg output). So, without much options left, I took the HDD to a data recovery store located at Ritchie street in Chennai. The repair guy inspected and quoted me 10K in total for recovering all the data. Since it seemed too much, I left and inquired at a different store where I was quoted 5K in total. They managed to retreive all the data (approximately 1.4TB) to a secondary drive and gave back the damaged drive as well. Although 5K seemed a lot at that time, I am now happy that I got back all the data and the fact that I managed to escape getting ripped off by the first store makes me sleep soundly at night.
 
joy.das.jd said:
My HDD had crashed last year which had some critical data. It was WD 3TB HDD. The important data was around 250 GBs only. I had to resort to professional service for the same as the drive was not being detected at all even in BIOS. They charged me around 7K for the service. It took around 3 days for the overall process. I was able to get all the data and they even returned my faulty drive (which was a bit surprising to me). I got it done at Nehru Place (New Delhi). Overall I was happy with their service.
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  • BY crashed, can you elaborate a bit more? Was it not detecting at all in the OS?
  • Was it an external usb one or an internal?
7k is literally very vfm but that could be only for that 250gb data which might be a bit pricey but if the data is worth lacs or emotional then its just peanuts!
I'm interested in knowing the entire process though..like:

  • When you approached them, how was the negotiation? Was it per GB/MB or is it flat 7k for the entire HDD irrespective of the recovery size.
  • ETA- Within how many days was the data recovered.
  • How did they ascertained THAT specific data (you required) or did they called you to have a look at all the recovered files and you had a choice to keep x,y folders etc while rejecting the other dump!
  • Was any digital or a physical paper signed as to confirmation that your data was not stored/shared with them/anywhere etc.?
Anything more which I might had missed above...
entropy said:
Had a similar experience. One of my backup Seagate 2TB 2.5" drives crashed on me a good while back. It had a lot of personal data which had not been backed up anywhere else. The HDD was dead as it neither spun up nor get detected by the system (based on dmesg output). So, without much options left, I took the HDD to a data recovery store located at Ritchie street in Chennai. The repair guy inspected and quoted me 10K in total for recovering all the data. Since it seemed too much, I left and inquired at a different store where I was quoted 5K in total. They managed to retreive all the data (approximately 1.4TB) to a secondary drive and gave back the damaged drive as well. Although 5K seemed a lot at that time, I am now happy that I got back all the data and the fact that I managed to escape getting ripped off by the first store makes me sleep soundly at night.
Click to expand...
5k 10k is just peanuts if you ask me. But glad you got it done at half the rate.
 
nRiTeCh said:
5k 10k is just peanuts if you ask me. But glad you got it done at half the rate.
Click to expand...
Yeah, you're right. Back then, 5k was huge for me because I was in college and that used to be my monthly allowance. Only years later, I learnt that I could've lost a kidney to recover that data.
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The HDD is was a WD Purple drive 3.5 inch internal drive. Around 4 years old or so. It was mostly used as data backup and media storage.

It was working perfectly alright and I never faced any crashes or data corruption or even drive slowdown. Overall it was working just fine. But one fine day on switching on my PC , I observed that the BIOS was taking way more time to boot. Once booted into windows I found that the drive is no longer showing. Tried all sort of workaround. Like changing SATA slot , changed the sata power cable etc etc. But it was not showing any sign of life. Even tried it on the 3.5 inch dock at the office. Nothing.

The shop was recommended by one of my colleague. They were asking 10k for backup. They said that the charges depends on the capacity / size / type of the drive and NOT on the data that is to be recovered. After some negotiation settled on a figure of 7k. They took my drive and gave a hand written slip with the drive details and date of submission. They asked me to give them a call after 3 days. I DID NOT PAY THEM ANY ADVANCE. The amount was to be paid only after they had done the recovery of the drive.

After 3 days I went to their shop with a 1 TB external drive. They let me use their PC to browse my recovered files and allowed to me copy all the required data. They had nearly recovered almost all the data. I copied all the critical data that I needed (approximately 250-300 GB ). They returned my drive and also told that my backup up data will be available for one month or until I confirm them for deletion (for privacy).

Overall I liked the service and would whole heartedly recommend them for data recovery. I also felt that the charges are quite competitive. Last time I remember that one of my office laptop HDD has crashed and seagate charged like 25k+ for recovery of the same. So 7k seemed like a fair price.
 
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