CCTV Hard Drive Flood Damage

fetster

fetster

fetster

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I have a CCTV Digital Video Recorder with 2 WD HDDs. I have spoken to the recorder company (Dedicated Micros) asking if they offer a recovery service but they don't.


The machine was submerged in sea water and was soaked through. I have opened the case and had it in a hot room for a few days to dry it out. Chips within the machine are already corroding. What are chances of a HDD recovery specialist being able to pull the data off the drives? If there is a chance, can somebody please recommend a reliable recovery company?
 
Hard drives aren't sealed so the water would likely have got into the actual platters area in all likelihood. Unfortunately I don't think the odds are in your favour :( Good luck :)
 
Sea water is your problem, not water. If water is dried out before it is turned back on it would have been ok. Sea Water all those little bits is what has ****** it.
 
Iron rusts quickly in salt water. It rusts really quickly in hot salt water then the water leaves salt behind as it evaporates. The platters are made of iron and read by a needle moving over the surface.

Realistically your drives are dead. How're the backups?
 
I suspect a good forensic recovery service would be able to get most of your data out, but it depends just how important it is! Costs will be eye watering...
 
Fairly sure the platters aren't made from Iron..

Recovery is possible, but going to be expensive.

Do you actually need the footage that's on the HDDs?
 
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I believe the platters are most usually aluminium. IBM used to use glass and I wouldn't be surprised if manufacturers have been experimenting with other ceramic materials.

A very thin layer of the magnetic surface is then deposited on top.

The data probably can be retrieved from the drives though I don't imagine it will be cheap especially if you are after gigs data.
 
Is the magnetic surface not iron then? It doesn't matter greatly what the structural component of the disk is, the data resides in the magnetic state.

I don't think said magnetic state would survive rusting - but if the material is something more exotic than iron (so doesn't rust), then that's not an issue.
 
I think a lot of these posts are misleading, there's a much larger chance of a successful, if partial recovery than they would seem to infer.
 
if you were robbed during the flooding there is a good chance it was fried before the they got in (guessing they came in as water was residing as breaking in mid storm with water rising would be a tad mental!)
 
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JonJ678 said:
Is the magnetic surface not iron then? It doesn't matter greatly what the structural component of the disk is, the data resides in the magnetic state.

I don't think said magnetic state would survive rusting - but if the material is something more exotic than iron (so doesn't rust), then that's not an issue.
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OK, I looked up the construction of a modern platter:

Substrate material Al Alloy, Glass, Ceramic


Base layer Ni Phosphorous (Ni-P) alloy is usually applied by electroless plating techniques, Ni-P is a very hard material and is finely polished and then textured with circumferential grooves, these help the magnetic anistropic properties of the disk. Typically, this layer is 10 microns thick.


Intermediate layer Chromium is used as the intermediate layer as it has epitaxial properties that are similar to that of the cobalt based magnetic coating. Typical thickness of this coating is 0.5 microns.


Magnetic Layer Cobalt alloys are used as the magnetic coating. Alloys of Cobalt-Chromium-Tantalum (CoCrTa), Cobalt-Platinum-Chromium (CoPtCr) and Cobalt-Platinum-Nickel (CoPtNi) alloys are the most commonly used. 0.3 microns is a typical thickness for this type of coating.


Protective Coating A 0.1 micron layer of a Carbon based polymer is sputtered onto the magnetic layer to help protect it from head contact wear and minor shocks. It also acts as a support for the lubrication layer


Lubrication Layer The last layer is an organic polymer lubricant material to minimise head-to-platter contact friction. When the heads park on the platters, it is this layer that prevents excessive wear to the heads as they take-off and land

http://www.mjmdatarecovery.co.uk/howharddiskswork6.html
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Maybe no rust, but as a diver and a PWC owner I see the damage sea water does to kit designed to go in the sea. I'm guessing the HDD will not fair well because salt water attacks materials in waters you may not expect.

I'd try and find a specialist who deals in this kind of recovery, and sooner rather than later.
 
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