The first attempt at recovery is the one most likely to succeed. Every attempt after that is a little less likely.
If a drive has failed and the files matter — photos, business records, a thesis, twenty years of family history — the most useful thing you can do is stop. Don’t keep restarting it. Don’t run recovery software downloaded in a panic. Bring it in.
If your drive has just failed, stop here first
- Turn it off. Now. Every power-on uses up reads the drive may not have left. Don’t keep restarting it to see if it works this time.
- Don’t run recovery software. Tools downloaded in a panic generate thousands of reads on a dying drive, and some of them write to the very areas holding your files.
- Don’t open the drive. Not even just to look. A clean drive interior is the difference between a recoverable platter and a scratched one.
Then ring us, or bring it in to 63 Mitcham Road, Donvale — we’re an easy run from Doncaster, Ringwood, Mitcham, Blackburn, Box Hill and Nunawading.
Ring the shop — 03 9874 3333What we recover from
Hard drives, SSDs and portable media, from anywhere in Melbourne — bring it in to the Donvale workshop and we’ll tell you what we’re looking at.
Drives that have failed physically
- Hard drives that won’t spin up, or are clicking, grinding or beeping
- SSDs that have stopped being detected
- Water damage and physical damage
Drives where the files are still there
- Drives that report as unformatted, RAW, or ask to be formatted
- Accidentally deleted files and emptied recycle bins
- Reformatted or repartitioned drives
- Files lost after a failed Windows or macOS update
Cards, sticks and portable drives
- Memory cards and USB sticks from cameras and phones
- External and portable drives
How we approach it
Assess
First we work out whether it’s a logical problem — deleted, corrupted, reformatted — or a physical one. The two need completely different treatment.
Image
Wherever the drive allows it, we clone it and work from the copy, so the original isn’t stressed any further.
Report
You’ll know what’s recoverable before you commit. Some drives come back completely, some partially, some not at all — and we’ll say so.
Return
Your files come back checked and on fresh media, with a backup set up before you leave.
Severe physical failures. Drives needing a clean-room — head crashes, motor failures, severe physical damage — are specialist work. We’ll tell you when a job is in that category and what your options are, rather than opening it up and making it worse.
Family owned since 1995
Three decades of drives across the bench, and the same family running the place.
63 Mitcham Road, Donvale
No courier, no shipping your only copy interstate. Drop the drive in and talk to the person doing the work.
You’ll know before you commit
An honest assessment of what’s recoverable first — including when the answer is that it isn’t.
Why the first attempt matters
A failing drive is a physical object with a limited number of reads left in it. Every power-on costs some of them. Recovery software running over a dying drive generates thousands of reads, and can write to the very areas holding the data you want back.
Deleted files work differently but the same principle applies: the data is still there until something writes over it. Continuing to use the computer is what does the overwriting.
So: power it off, leave it off, and bring it in.
Once you have your data back
Recovery is expensive and never guaranteed. Backup is cheap and boring. Before you leave, we’ll set you up with something that means you never need this page again:
- An automatic backup that runs without you remembering to do anything
- A second copy that isn’t in the same building as the first — cloud or offsite backup
- For business, a backup that has actually been restored from and tested — part of our business IT support
Frequently asked
Can you guarantee you’ll get my files back?
No, and nobody honest can. It depends entirely on what’s failed and how far it’s gone. We’ll tell you what we think before you commit.
My drive is clicking. Is that bad?
Usually it means a physical fault. Turn it off now and bring it in — running it is actively making things worse.
I already ran recovery software. Have I ruined it?
Not necessarily, but stop now and bring it in. Tell us exactly what you ran, it genuinely helps.
Can you recover from a phone?
Ring us and describe the situation — phones vary enormously depending on make, model and what’s failed.