Data Recovery Information

After your hard drive is brought in or shipped to my data recovery service, my goal is to complete all hard drive data recovery estimates in 2-3 business days or less. There is a minimum service fee of $150.00 * for recovering all data on hard drives up to 40GB. Recovered data will be copied on DVD's or on a USB hard drive supplied by the customer. Payment will be due at completion of recovery.

*Plus shipping & handling fees.

Payment Options - Credit Card, Cash,* Checks*

Visa, MasterCard, American Express & Discover

* Cash & Checks accepted for local customers only.*




After diagnosing the hard drive, an initial estimate will be given to recover all lost files, folders, pictures etc. up to 40 GB.
Additional recovery fees will apply for hard drives larger than 40GB.

Recovery may be raw file types or folders. This depends on condition of recovered data. If recovery is not possible, there is no charge. No Recovery - No Fee.

Password Removal - A password removal service is available for all Fujitsu, Maxtor, Samsung, Seagate, Toshiba and Western Digital laptop, desktop and USB hard drives. Call for a price quote!

Levels of Hard Drive Recovery

Level 0 data recovery - This level is commonly know as "restoring". Your data is restored from a backup or copy of your data. The restoration can be done by the user or by a PC repair shop.

Level 1 data recovery - This level is when your hard drive is recognized by the system, but you are unable to access the files you want. It can be caused by file deletion, reformated drive, deleted, damaged or corrupt partions or virus infections, spyware etc.

Level 2 data recovery - This level causes your drive to appear corrupt, as an incorrect drive size, or as an incorrect drive model. The repair requires special equipment to rewrite the drive's firmware, and recalibrate and program the drive, so that the files can be recovered.

Levels 1 and 2 are classified as   "logical failures".

I am able to recover your data from Level 1 and most Level 2 types of logical failures.*

*Note: Level 2 data recovery is available for all Futitsu, Maxtor, Samsung, Seagate, Toshiba and Western Digital laptop, desktop and USB hard drives.

Level 3 data recovery - This failure is when you hear clicking or other unusual sounds. The platters may not spin or the drive may not be recognized by the computer. The repair requires a clean room to remove the covers and to repair a read write head stuck to a platter and realignment. May also require repairing printed circuit board components.

Level 4 data recovery - This type a failure requires extensive clean room component repair such as replacing read heads, transplanting platters, spindle motor seizures or removing contaminated foreign materials such as water etc.

Note: Water and Fire damaged hard drives are handled on a case by case basis.

Levels 3 and 4 are classified as "hardware failures".

These types of hard drive repairs require a clean room.

All level 3 and 4 recoveries will be repaired in a Class 100 mini clean room.

                      Types of Hard Drive Failures

Logical Hard Drive Failure - This type of failure can occur from a temporary power surge or loss, computer viruses, system crashes, deleted partitions, deleted files, corrupted master boot records etc.  The drive is still functional, but the data or drive may be inaccessible. The drive may not be recognized by the computers bios, but could still be just a logical drive failure.

This type of failure does not require the hard drive to be opened.The data is recovered using Logical Recovery methods.

Firmware Damage - This type of failure falls between Logical and Mechanical / Physical hard drive failures.
A typical symptom of this type of failure is when your drive to appears to be corrupt, as an incorrect drive size, or displays an incorrect drive model. The repair for this type of failure requires special equipment to rewrite the drive's firmware and to recalibrate and reprogram the drive, so that the files can be safely recovered.

This type of failure does not require the hard drive to be opened, but it does require an exact match of the same model and firmware version. A donor hard drive may be required for the repair, if an exact match of the firmware cannot be located.

Mechanical / Physical Hard Drive Failure - This type of failure can be mechanical or electronic in nature. It can be caused by a head crash, motor or electronic component failure or physical damage from moisture, extreme shock etc. The drive does not spin or may not be recognized by the computers bios. This type of failure will require the drive to be repaired in a facility that has a clean room and the ability to repair the drive before any type of recovery can be attempted.

Hard drives with this type of failure will be repaired in a Class 100 mini clean room.

If a hard drive is sent into my service and the estimate is not approved by the customer,
the only charge will be the shipping fee to return the drive. See bottom of Shipping Instructions page.

  *******************             New Service Offering      ****************************

I now offer a new file repair service to repair most Microsoft Office file types and Adobe PDF's.

Adobe - PDF's, Microsoft Word - docs, Microsoft Excel - xls, Microsoft Access - mdb, Microsoft Outlook - pst, Microsoft Publisher - files, Power Point - files

New corrupted file repair service - Starting as low as $99.00 to repair up to 50 files, depending on file size.

HD Doctor Drive Restoration System - New high tech firmware repair tool.

"State of the Art" Class 100 mini clean room has been added to inspect and repair physical hard drive failures.

Clean room utilizes HPE Pro Platter Exchangers and other advanced "state of the art" recovery tools.

                                                                     Call now for details

Inside view of a typical multi platter hard drive.
Note: Top platter is damaged.