A low-cost data recovery solution which suited our client down to the ground!

This week I successfully restored data from a client's backup and set everything up on their new computer which they had sourced elsewhere (I'm not fussy or precious about this: if you think you can get a better deal, then do it!). The one stumbling block was that the all-important Outlook 2003 Personal Folders File - containing all their e-mail - had failed to back up (maybe it was in use when the backup ran, or was possibly in a non-standard location), and the old computer's hard disk was clearly faulting (noise, heat) and couldn't be read. I would have been able to recover the e-mail from Google Mail by forcing it to present all 6500 messages for POP download again, but the folders which had been so lovingly created and filled would have been missing. 6500 messages swilling around the inbox would have been less than ideal and with a rural broadband connection, may not have even completed successfully.

I took the hard drive home and placed it in the deep-freeze overnight. In the morning, I connected it to my Linux computer, mounted it and had it run successfully for about 30 minutes, which was enough time for me to recover not only the lost e-mail, but also the address book (that lives in the Personal Folders, too). The icing on the cake was that since the last backup the client had saved some photographs which he had since deleted from his camera. I was able to recover those and a few other newer documents by searching the hard disk for the files with a last modified time of less than 35 days. That saved me having to recover everything, which I'm certain would have killed the fragile hard disk completely: it was already overheating in spite of the freezer treatment. I was able to deliver the data on an external hard disk straight after the recovery.

The cost of data recovery is normally extremely high unless the client is prepared to pay for an insurance policy. Most home users and even larger businesses won't make that investment and so photos and important documents are lost all the time. My client was delighted that at my usual hourly rate he got all his data back. A little ingenuity goes a long way...

Do you have any data recovery stories with a happy ending? Or tell us about the ones that didn't go so well...

Write a comment

  • Required fields are marked with *.

If you have trouble reading the code, click on the code itself to generate a new random code.
 
pfmdxr
Posts: 3
Comment
zJuhPsRRqC
Reply #3 on : Sun April 01, 2012, 21:42:30
9uZRQ5 <a href="http://chupspscjrfg.com/">chupspscjrfg</a>
Karen
Posts: 3
Comment
YmtOyStXZs
Reply #2 on : Sun April 01, 2012, 02:53:56
first of all chances of rnvocerieg ur my documents' are very triflle.arnd at 3%.If u still want then use programs like Easy reovery pro or others and scan ur hard disk for deleted or lost files. It will display a list of files try filters of filnemae like .jpg etc.If u have formated ur hard disk then ur chances are even lowered at 1.5% but beware it take a lot of timeAnd if u want to recover files( considering u have installed ur OS in ur C:) in ur c: that would take hell of time .My advice install a second os in d or anyother colon and do recover that would be faster and reliable. And stop creating new files in ur os partition since u may complete destroy the chance of rnvocerieg ur files or photos.
????
Posts: 3
Comment
Re: A low-cost data recovery solution which suited our client down to the ground!
Reply #1 on : Sun May 29, 2011, 10:29:50
algeria