Hard Drive Help and Advice, Known Issues & Case Studies

Welcome to Data Clinic’s regularly updated Help and Advice section. Here we discuss and provide links to various different types of hard drive problem and what can be done about them. Take a look below and see if you can find a problem similar to yours. If you can, great! – if you can’t, use the form to your right to contact us and tell us more about the issues you are having.

Further down this page we discuss current known issues with particular hard drives in the marketplace and have links to some case studies of recent RAID and server recovery work we have completed.

To find our more about our services and capabilities, click on Data Recovery Services from the main menu above.
To find your local Data Clinic lab go here: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/dataclinic-locations/
Click for Data Clinic’s main data recovery homepage

Help and Advice

March 2021: A case study of our Advanced Data Recovery service on a WD20NMVW hard drive: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/advanced-data-recovery-case-study-wd20nmvw-hard-drive/
March 2021: Using non-Apple charging cables to charge for iPhone / iPad can cause damage: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/charging-apple-iphones-with-non-apple-charging-cables/
March 2021: Some of the wonderful recoveries we’ve done on broken phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/some-of-the-wonderful-things-we-can-do-with-broken-phones/
February 2021: New Data Clinic data recovery office located in Southampton, Basepoint, Anderson Road, Southampton SO14 5FE: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-and-hard-drive-recovery-southampton/
February 2021: New Data Clinic data recovery office located in Bristol, Castlemead, Lower Castle Street, Bristol BS1 3AG: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-and-hard-drive-recovery-bristol/
February 2021: New Data Clinic data recovery office located in Edinburgh, 9-10 St Andrews Square EH2 2AF: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-disk-drive-repair-and-data-recovery-services-edinburgh/
February 2021: RAID and server data recovery services across Greater Manchester and the North West of England: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/nas-raid-5-and-server-data-recovery-greater-manchester/
February 2021: Seagate Backup Plus, Expansion and Barracuda hard drive data recovery in Greater Manchester: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/seagate-backup-plus-expansion-barracuda-data-recovery-manchester/
February 2021: Phone data recovery from in and around Greater Manchester, Salford, Stockport, Bolton, Oldham etc: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/phone-data-recovery-manchester/
February 2021: Western Digital My Passport / Elements hard drive data recovery in Greater Manchester, Stockport, Bolton, Oldham: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/wd-my-passport-elements-data-recovery-manchester/
February 2021: Hard drive and phone recovery Q&A: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-and-phone-recovery-qa/
January 2021: NAS and hard drive recoveries: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/nas-and-hard-drive-data-recovery/
October 2020: KenXinDa mobile phone data recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/ken-xin-da-phone-data-recovery/
October 2020: Nokia phones – “Unable to find a bootable option. Press any key to shut down“: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/nokia-phone-data-recovery/
October 2020: Lenovo SSD data recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/lenovo-ssd-data-recovery/
October 2020: SD card and Micro SD card data recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/sd-card-data-recovery/
October 2020: SanDisk SSD hard drive data recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/sandisk-ssd-data-recovery/
August 2020: Page about recovering the data from liquid and water damaged phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-from-liquid-and-water-damaged-phones/
July 2020: Two new Data Clinic data recovery locations in the UK – Leicester and Belfast: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/new-data-clinic-office-locations-belfast-leicester/
June 2020: Data recovery from a broken and smashed iPhone 8: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-on-a-damaged-iphone-8/
May 2020: Data recovery from Macbook’s with a soldered SSD and T2 security chip: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/soldered-macbook-ssds-and-the-t2-security-chip/
May 2020: Examples of when hard drive recovery and external hard drive recovery is necessary: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-recovery-blog/
March 2020: Teardown and data recovery of a water damaged iPhone XS: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/recovering-data-from-a-water-damaged-iphone-xs/
February 2020: Recovering data from iPhones with error code 14: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/recovering-data-from-iphone-error-14/
January 2020: Data Recovery from SSDs that use the TRIM feature: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-and-the-ssd-trim-feature/
January 2020: Data Clinic hard drive, phone, RAID server and CCTV recovery in Bolton, Blackburn and Bradford: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-bolton-blackburn-and-bradford/
December 2019: New Page – Bitlocker data recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-from-bitlocker-encrypted-volumes/
December 2019: Huawei phones hanging and not booting: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/huawei-phones-hang-on-loading-screen/
November 2019: Phone Data Recovery Questions: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/phone-data-recovery-questions/
October 2019: Western Digital WD My Passport hard drive data recovery in London: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/wd-my-passport-data-recovery/
August 2019: Is it possible to recover data from a phone after a factory reset?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-on-a-phone-after-a-factory-reset/
July 2019: Data Recovery Q&A – forensic data recovery, application errors, water damage and CCTV image recovery: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-july-2019/
June 2019: New Page – Advanced data recovery solutions for digital forensics examiners: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/digital-forensic-data-recovery/
June 2019: Video walkthru of the repair and recovery of a water damaged iPhone: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/water-damaged-iphone-repair-and-recovery-video-walkthru/
May 2019: Submitted data recovery questions from customers: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-with-data-recovery/
April 2019: Data Clinic’s mobile phone data recovery services – chip off: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-clinics-chip-off-data-recovery-for-phones/
April 2019: Data recovery on Dell XPS8300 and Buffalo Ministation HD-PCFU3 series hard drives: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/dell-and-buffalo-data-recovery/
March 2019: Hard drive data recovery enquiries in our London and Birmingham data recovery locations: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-in-our-london-and-birmingham-locations/
January 2019: What to do when you see the error “The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable”: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/the-file-or-directory-is-corrupted-and-unreadable/
January 2019: Recovering data from Apple Fusion hard drives: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/fusion-hard-drive-recovery/
December 2018: Hard drive recovery enquiries from our London office on Lombard Street: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/london-data-recovery-advice/
November 2018: External hard drive recovery – examples of faulty drive problems: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/external-hard-drive-recovery/
October 2018: Examples and UK data recovery centre locations: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-lab-locations/
September 2018: Example data recovery hard drive and phone enquiries: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-lab-locations/
August 2018: New local hard drive data recovery service pages for August: Salford and Barnsley
July 2018: New local data recovery service pages for July: Walsall, Nuneaton, Sefton, Rotherham.
June 2018: New local data recovery service pages for June: Fife, Birkenhead, Derby.
May 2018: Data recovery enquiries from Glasgow, Manchester and London: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-recovery-in-london-manchester-and-glasgow/
April 2018: ‘Equipment Interference’ – how the government can legally hack your devices: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/equipment-interference-how-the-government-can-legally-hack-your-data/
April 2018: Data Recovery Mistakes – clueless local IT shops and computer companies try their hand at data recovery with disastrous effects: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-mistakes/
March 2018: Hard Disk Error and SMART Errors – what to do to rescue your files: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-disk-smart-errors/
February 2018: Data recovery advice on G-RAID and WD MyBook Duo NAS hard drives: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/network-attached-storage-data-recovery/
February 2018: Solved – Problems with hard drives that are not initialised: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/unknown-disk-not-initialised-hard-drive-problem-solved/
January 2018: Cookies – Protect your online privacy using this handy guide and factsheet: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/cookies-a-privacy-factsheet/
January 2018: Serious security flaw in some WD My Cloud NAS hard drives uncovered: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/serious-security-flaw-in-some-wd-nas-hard-drives/
November 2017: Safe Mode and System32 data recovery problems discussed: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/safe-mode-and-system32-boot-problems/
November 2017: Recovering data from hard drives and phones with faulty or broken PCBs: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/pcb-problems-with-phones-and-hard-drives/
October 2017: Unresponsive phones – examples of phones in need of data recovery from across the country: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/unresponsive-phones-need-data/
October 2017: Recovering the data from a hard drive with orphaned files in Harrogate and dealing with bad sectors to rescue files in Loughborough: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-recovery-qa-october-2017/
Sept 2017: Need to recover data from hard drive or mobile phone?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/need-to-recover-data-from-hard-drive-mobile-phone/
Sept 2017: Finding data recovery services for phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/find-data-recovery-services-phones/
Sept 2017: Data recovery required from hard drives and phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-and-phone-problems/
Aug 2017: Hard drives not showing up – light remaining on: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-august-2017/
Aug 2017: Advice regarding unresponsive hard drives and phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-unresponsive-harddrive-phone/
July 2017: Unrecognised hard drives and phones and what to do about them: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-hard-drives-and-phones-not-recognised/
July 2017 – Broken iPhone and Samsung S6 smartphones plus a WD My Passport that is no longer responding: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-july-2017-part-1/
June 2017 – A hard drive with bad media/SMART failure and another one with a “click of death”: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-june-2017-part-2/
June 2017 – Common faults and data recovery enquiries on HTC, iPhone, Samsung, Nokia and Sony smart phones: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/phone-data-recovery/
May 2017 – Discusses 4 common types of hard drive fault, diagnosis and recovery options: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/4-common-hard-drive-faults/
Apr 2017 – Data Recovery Q&A Pt 2 – Retrieving files from an HP Proliant, an SSD and an iPhone stuck on the Apple logo: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-april-2017-pt-2/
Apr 2017 – Data Recovery Q&A Pt 1 – Answers to several data recovery questions: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/april-2017-qa-part-1/
Mar 2017 – How much does data recovery cost?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/how-much-does-data-recovery-cost/
Mar 2017 Pt1 – Help with a problematic iMac, a beeping hard drive and a Samsung S6, plus more: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/march-2017-data-recovery-qa-part-1/
Feb 2017, Hard drive and phone recovery Q&A – a BIG post – perhaps you have a similar problem to these?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-qa-feb-2017-pt-1/
Jan 2017 Pt2, Help with RAW file systems, dropped external hard drives and a LaCie FW800 running RAID 5: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-help-and-advice-jan-2017-part-2/
Jan 2017 Pt1, Recovering data from Samsung S2 and Nexus 4 phones, plus CCTV recovery from a Floureon system: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-help-and-advice-pt1-jan-2017/
Dec 2016 Pt2, Christmas and New Year opening times: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/christmas-new-year-opening-times-2016/
Dec 2016 Pt1, G-Technology NAS with undetected drives, recovering deleted Whatsapp and SMS texts, and retrieving data from a Sun Microsystems RAID 5 server: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-help-and-advice-december-2016-part-1/
Nov 2016 Pt2, The pitfalls of using a data recovery program that overwrites data!: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/data-recovery-help-advice-november-2016/
Nov 2016 P1, The dangers to data of using a warranty repair service and Easy Recovery software: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/beware-of-warranty-repairs-and-data-recovery-software/
Oct 2016 Pt3, A selection of enquiries regarding retrieving the data from faulty phones and hard drives: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/problems-requiring-data-recovery/
Oct 2016 Pt2, Free data recovery evaluations, phones with cracked screens, hard drives that won’t copy data: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/hard-drive-phones-qa/
Oct 2016 Pt1, Is it possible to recover data from a hard drive with a scratched surface?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/scratched-hard-drive/
Sept 2016 Pt2, Various types of phone fault and data recovery options: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/phone-recovery-questions-help-and-advice/
Sep 2016 Pt1, Data loss after an upgrade to Windows 10, and a hard bricked Samsung Galaxy S5: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-with-data-loss/
Aug 2016 Pt3, Is is possible to recover files and folders after a factory reset ?: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/how-does-a-factory-reset-affect-your-data-files/
Aug 2016 Pt2, Hard drive dropped – now hums, beeps and is unresponsive: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/humming-beeping-hard-drives-not-recognised/
Aug 2016 Pt1, An iPhone with the ‘red screen of death’ and an unresponsive SSD: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-and-advice-ssds-and-iphones/
July 2016 Pt2, Various phone problems – Help and advice: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/phone-data-recovery-example-enquries/
July 2016 Pt1, Problems on Samsung EVO 840 series SSD hard drives: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/samsung-evo-840-ssd-faults-beware/
June 2016 Pt3, Data Recovery from External Hard Drives – Help and Advice: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/external-hard-drive-data-recovery-help-and-advice/
June 2016 Pt2, A dropped Western Digital Ultra hard drive, and WhatsApp/SMS message retrieval for use in court: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/help-advice-dropped-wd-passport-and-recovering-smswhatsapp-texts/
June 2016 Pt1, Data recovery advice for owners of LG G4 smartphones that are failing to boot: https://www.dataclinic.co.uk/lg-g4-smartphone-failed-not-booting/

> For more Help and Advice pages go to The Archive

Known Issues & Case Studies

Data Clinic staff work on recovering the data from a severely damaged hard drive using a Spinstand in the clean room.

As the UK’s largest data recovery company we see lots of broken hard drives, servers and mobile phones that come in for recovery each week. Because we see so many faulty data storage devices, we are often aware of apparent problems early and in addition to documenting them, can identify ways to get around these problems and recover the data. Historically, Data Clinic were one of the first companies in the world to discover the firmware fault on the Seagate 7200.11 series of hard drives, and the serious Fujitsu MPG firmware fault several years before that.

On this page we’ve highlighted a few of the recent known issues we’ve seen with some current hard drives, as well as some interesting RAID and NAS data recovery case studies.

Current Known Issues

> Information Link: Why It’s Not Possible to Repair A Faulty Hard Drive

RAID and NAS Data Recovery Case Studies

Due to it’s complexities, RAID and NAS devices provide some of the most interesting and challenging data recovery work that we do.

Samsung SRD-1670D CCTV Recovery (Ok, so this is a CCTV case study !)

Thecus N7700 RAID 6 NAS
Netgear 4 disk NAS
Netgear server running RAID 5
Seagate 6 disk RAID 5 NAS
HP Proliant ML370 Series RAID 5
Dell Poweredge MD1000 series RAID 5
Dell FreeNAS 6 Disk RAID 0 running ZFS

Information Link: Three Tips To Avoid Data Loss When Your RAID / NAS / Server Fails

The Archive

As we are adding information to this site all the time we have developed an archive area that contains lots of useful links to articles we’ve written since 2002.

The archive contains both recent and older information on all aspects of hard drives and recovery that we don’t have room for elsewhere on the site.

Go to The Archive.

Reece Cairns

12:53 21 Jul 21

The hard drive I use for work recently died. I hadn't backed up for a few weeks and thought I'd lost out on a fair chunk of work. However, Data Clinic managed to retrieve the data in full (around 3TB) and returned it to me fairly quickly. A little pricey, but worth it. Excellent customer service too, I called up a couple of times and each time they were friendly, helpful and informative.

Hannah F F

14:22 02 Jul 21

I highly recommend Data Clinic Ltd. Although on the higher end of the price scale compared to a couple of other companies I contacted; this company is extremely professional and efficient with communication which is why I went with them.Others were a little bit pushy in their sales pitches and one of them failed to get back to me in time.Data Clinic give you the information without pressuring you to choose them which is what I liked. Due to how friendly and genuine they sound on the phone and professional emails I chose them.My damaged external hard drive was not allowing me to access any files. I sent in my damaged one and an empty new one and they were able to retrieve all the data from the damaged one and transfer it to the new one!Initially, when they arranged the old and new hard drives to be collected and sent to their lab, the courier Parcel Force missed two collections but eventually collected it. Due to the inconvenience caused because of this, Michelle who handled my case kindly gave me a £50 discount towards the total cost of the service. She provided her mobile number for easy contact to get updates as well.I had to pay a spare parts charge of £60 before the work was carried out.Once the work was carried out I was sent a final invoice for the balance. There was an extra charge on there for the supply of a hard drive but when I called to query it, Chris kindly ammended the invoice for me.Humans are not perfect and will make mistakes but it's the way the mistakes are handled which gives you a good or bad impression of a company.Data Clinic staff are very friendly and professional and if I ever need their services again I would not hesitate to contact them!Just to note, Parcel Force delivered my old and new hard drive with the recovered data back to me a day later than was promised, but this is not Data Clinics fault. Just be aware that if you use Data Clinic, Parcel Force may delay the collection and delivery. Other than that, I cannot fault Data Clinic for their hard work and professionalism.

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