Hard drive recovery software

mattd85

mattd85

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hi ,

So my 2tb hard drive has failed and changed to raw file, and I need to recover 1.8tb.

I've downloaded a free recovery software but it only allows me 2gb.

Is it possible to use free software to retrieve all my data back?


Is there any preloaded on other seagate hard drives as I have others.

Thanks

Matt
 
More details req, what do you mean by 'failed' is an internal drive or a external?
Also what do you mean by 'changed to raw file'? What has changed to a raw file?
There is no free software available that will recover 2TB of files on a hard drive
 
Hi,

So the external hard drive stopped working, not being recognised by my PC, or any other PC.

The I.T lad at work took it out of the casing and placed it into a dock. He said the software that communicates between the hard drive and PC was corrupt but all the files were still there, albeit as RAW data?

He ran some free recovery software and it started to pull up Jpegs tiffs and CR2 raw files, but only allowed for 2gb.

I don't mind having to pay for recovery software if needs be.

Regards

Matt
 
Ah, if you get the exact same hard drive you can swap the PC board and try that. I have done this in the past but it must be the exact same drive
 
Please tell me that you have no backup of 2tb of files?
 
You can use recuva which is free, there's a few others. TBH I still find ontrack best but it isn't free. It may just be the partition that has failed, you can sometimes restore drive with easeus partition recovery if thats the case.
 
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Thanks all,

Only 1tb was backed up, I've been saying for past few months I need to get a new HD but never got round to it, any client work was backed up twice. Just my own macro and portrait / family stuff that wasn't backed up from July last year.

Looking at getting an 8tb NAS system? That's what's been suggested anyway.

Thanks for the help, do you think there would be an advantage to downloading the official seagate recovery software as its a seagate drive?

Regards
 
Contact Disclabs they can forensically recover anything that's been deleted (accidentally or deliberately). They do quite lot of work for the police and other law enforcement agencies.
 
mattd85 said:
He ran some free recovery software and it started to pull up Jpegs tiffs and CR2 raw files, but only allowed for 2gb.
Click to expand...
Does that software have a paid version that will recover more? If so I'd go with that since it appears to work. OTOH if it really means something to you I'd suggest paying a service to do it, they are far more likely to be successful and not cock up the data on the drive whilst trying.
 
mattd85 said:
Looking at getting an 8tb NAS system? That's what's been suggested anyway.

Thanks for the help, do you think there would be an advantage to downloading the official seagate recovery software as its a seagate drive?

Regards
Click to expand...
Go with what works to recovery the files Matt, that's the objective at the end of day.

As for future backups an 8tb nas sounds great on paper but you'd have to explain how you store things to understand it's relevance within your data storage chain.
 
Whatever software you find to work (I use Recuva), will take a looong time for 2TB because it needs to reconstruct all the file fragments on disk including all deleted files.
One problem I found was that the restored files do not have their original filenames so sorting out what's what took days (especially if you edit files as all the edits were recovered
as well)!
 
Well it's been on since yesterday , it's recovered 3181 files, and still at 1% , I may have to try the Recuva software if it hasn't changed by the time I get home.
 
Just bear in mind that if it's a mechanical failure, running it 24x7 trying to recover data may exacerbate the problem. If it's *really* critical data, take it to a pro. I like Duncan @ www.retrodata.co.uk
 
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