Data recovery companies..

Fuzz

Fuzz

Fuzz

Soldato
Joined
3 Aug 2003
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Mate of mine appears to have had her laptop "factory reset" by some muppets and 2 years of University work was on it. they are saying (who they are I don't know for sure but it sounds like the purple shirt idiots) that they can't get the data back...

I'm about to tell her not to bother with the normal web programs like recuvva etc , or to have "mates" look at it but to leave it alone and go straight to a data recovery company with it rather than possibly make things worse..

Do you recommend anyone in particular....
 
That's crazy.

Format recovery is not always successful it's true but I have recovered lost data many times using EASUS or Recover My Files after a format. Each program has a particular setting for that Scenario.

You must, however, be prepared for the possibility that the data tree will be fragmented and so you may need to filter the search by file type to save time.

In a way you're fortunate that it is a relatively small amount of specific data you care about - search by file extension at least before paying hundreds on a lab recovery.

my 2P
 
I've used cbl before admittedly I paid a lot but they recovered all the critical files on a "wiped" (courtesy of the purple shirts) hard drive. You do get what you pay for in this case.
 
Depends on the value of the files. Some files you can't put a price on.

2 years of uni work if its a thesis or similar I'd say its worth the cost.
 
Kroll Ontrack Recovery or Vogon Recovery (if they still exist) come to mind.
 
chuck it in a usb enclosure. run getdatabackforntfs on it.

it will scan it without writing any bytes to the drive
 
I've given her CBL's details on Myknights recommendations being he has actually used them himself.
Yes we all know how daft it is not having back ups of important stuff like that and she's just about to learn the hard way, meh too late now.
The "Technical support team" she was talking to today sounds like they haven't got a clue.
 
My old boss used a company to his data back and it cost him about £750 so yeah its not cheap by any means!
 
So few people have backups until they find out why they should have them.

Unfortunatly my experience was someone who worked at my old company got a virus then panicked thinking IT would be angry with her so took it to a certain pc related shop who kindly corrupted the hard drive for us. (Ok virus was gone lol). Nothing we tried got it back so sent it to cbl and they sorted it for us. Quite the bill but as the laptop hadnt synced with the network in a few months it hadn't backed up yet.

Cbl was doing a no fix no fee so fingers crossed they still are.
 
Can you get shirt land to pay or did she sign something to say it was ok for them to wipe data?.... i know they say that they are not responsible for data loss.

If she left it and didnt sign the agreement then that cannot fall back on it as a get out clause... they should not perform a restore unless she clearly agreed and told them too.... no matter what they say about it.

Oh and as for not backing up her uni work.... makes me wonder how people supposedly clever enough to actually get a degree can be that daft...
 
unless your friend needs their 2 years work of uni essays and thesis for something i'd say to not bother. It's not like they will use them anywhere else.

Has anyone really ever used their uni assignments and thesis for anything else after they submitted them?
 
At the very least throw it in an enclosure and at least try recuva or getdataback before paying a small fortune for something you can probably do yourself.
 
I used ddrescue to clone my problem hard drive so I could experiment on the clone rather than risking the master. Didnt matter if any online software made it worse at that point as I'd just reformat then clone again.

Still don't know how CBL did it but I guess they have more time to devote to it. I assume better skills than me as well :)
 
Dano said:
At the very least throw it in an enclosure and at least try recuva or getdataback before paying a small fortune for something you can probably do yourself.
Click to expand...

This. Be much better to read to the drive, incase the block gets written over and files lost forever. Rare case, but can happen.
 
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