I want to provide data recovery services

  • Thread starter Thread starter jho
  • Start date Start date
J

jho

I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out how
I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive. Can I
just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works? Is
there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some sort
to shed some light on this topic?
 
Previously jho said:
I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out how
I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive. Can I
just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works? Is
there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some sort
to shed some light on this topic?
Click to expand...

Well, I guess the people that know how to do this will not be
talking, since they dont need the competition. As for how to find
out hot to do this, I guess the best path is feither to do HDD
engineering at a manufacturer or to work for a data-recovery
outfit that already has the expertise.

Arno
 
jho said:
I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out how
I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive. Can I
just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works? Is
there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some sort
to shed some light on this topic?
Click to expand...

If you plan to move the platters between hdd's you have your work cut out on
the learning curve!

btw if you find "some kind of machine that I would put the platters into"
please post the information to this NG!
 
jho said:
I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out how
I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive. Can I
just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works? Is
there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some sort
to shed some light on this topic?
Click to expand...

http://www.actionfront.com/ts_whitepaper.aspx > prolly you will have to do
without a magic machine ...

http://www.acelab.ru/products/pc-en/pc3000.html > this may help you extend
your services beyond the usual DIY techniques.
 
Noname said:
If you plan to move the platters between hdd's you have your work cut out on
the learning curve!

btw if you find "some kind of machine that I would put the platters into"
please post the information to this NG!
Click to expand...

Odd timing, I received notice of actionfronts use of signal trace technology
today.
I expect they're likely to sell the technology and units very
inexpensively!!!???
 
Arno Wagner said:
Correct me if I am wrong: In April 2004 these guys claimed to have
some idea that would make the magic recovery machine that recovers
everything possible, and their paper on it has been in writing or peer
review since then, but has never been published?

Nice link.
Click to expand...

The goal of providing the link was to illustrate that a magic machine is
highly unrealistic for someone running a PC repair shop that thinks "hey I
need a magic machine to recover disks with". Anyway, if you look a little
further you will notice that they claim that 'SignalTrace' was first used in
a production environment in 2006. So 2004 - 2006, I can imagine that this
type of technology isn't developed overnight.
 
Joep said:
The goal of providing the link was to illustrate that a magic machine is
highly unrealistic for someone running a PC repair shop that thinks "hey I
need a magic machine to recover disks with". Anyway, if you look a little
further you will notice that they claim that 'SignalTrace' was first used in
a production environment in 2006. So 2004 - 2006, I can imagine that this
type of technology isn't developed overnight.
Click to expand...
I was following this with interest when it first became public
knowledge.

However, it appears to have disappeared into the ether somewhat.

Either a major breakthrough pending, or Actionfront (all respect to them
- they *are* good) have decided it's simply not going to work.


Odie
 
In news:[email protected] jho typed:
I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out
how I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive.
Click to expand...

Hi "jho", I don't believe this can be done by a personal shop (costs!).
Even when You have a clean room then I think to regather the platters
data will need very expensive equipment (the platters would need
very accurate adjustments because of the build in servo tracks)?
Can I just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works?
Is there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some
sort to shed some light on this topic?
Click to expand...

Don't know! But why do You think the costs asked from data recovery
companies are such high? I think it's because of that high investments.
If You don't have any technical background on this then I'll say forget it.
The investments (and problems) would be much to high.
Horst
 
I have a computer shop in Philadelphia. Over the past few years people
have come to us to recover data. In most cases we are successful. The
thing that has been preventing me from being close to perfect is when
the drive itself is actually damaged, when swapping the exact board
does not work. I would like to setup my own clean room and find out how
I can for example, extract the data from a 40GB notebook drive. Can I
just move the platters to a replica drive that currently works? Is
there some kind of machine that I would put the platters into?? How
does this work? Is there a book of some kind or a resource of some sort
to shed some light on this topic?
Click to expand...

If you really want to find out the details, give it a try. You could
try it with two identical older drives, even with both still working,
as a low-cost proof-of-concept experiment.

I wouldn't worry about a clean room and particles until you decide
whether you've got the required mechanical skills and equipment to
move the platters from one HD to another and have it spin back up. My
guess, based on experience, is that you'll decide it's not worth the
effort, but you may be successful.

At that point, putting together a small, relatively clean workshop is
fairly straightforward.

Alternately, you could start marketing an automated backup system
consisting of True Image, an external HD, and a well thought out
backup schedule that would be a lot less work and be much more
effective. If I had a computer shop, that would be a key marketing
item for me. Not much good once the HD's dead, unfortunately.

max
 
Hello Jho,

The PC 3000 will give you more functionality and give you the ability
to recover allot of disks which don't really need a physical
recovery. Sometimes you will think that you need a physical recovery,
but often the PC 3000 can handle this by manipulating the hard drive's
firmware.
But of course there are cases where you will have no other choice then
to perform physical recovery. The Data Recovery community is a very
much closed community and people don't like to share information with
outsiders or competitors. Officially there is no machine that can
perform such tasks. I have been told by a reliable source that such
machine's exist and are used by certain agencies. But you will not be
able to get your hands on one of those. If you want to provide data
recovery I would recommend to start out with a portable clean room,
they are smaller and less expensive. You can not move the platters,
especially if you have multiple platters in your hard drive. But you
can replace almost anything else. For the most part you must be
willing to dedicate allot of time to Research & Development.
I hope this will help you on your journey.

Best regards,
Andrew
http://threesquaresolutions.com
 
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