• What Are Some Recovery Techniques
• The Data Recovery Process
• What Types Of Data Do We Recover?

To avoid further damage to your media and prevent extended data loss:

• Do not perform any operation on the storage device that will cause physical damage to the device or the data on it
• Do not write to any of the files on the device or add additional files
• Do not format the drive
• Do not modify the partitions on the drive (using FDISK or any other partitioning software)
• Do not try to open the device to see what is wrong. (Hard drives are particularly sensitive to contamination and should only be opened in a microscopically clean environment)

• Do cease using the hard drive or storage device that requires recovery.

If your drive is making unusual noises or showing other obvious signs of distress, shut it down immediately and do not power it up again. Before you forget them, write down all symptoms of the failure and all recent actions and events involving your computer.

Contact EDR for additional advice (which will depend on the type of media involved).

If you have a backup, evaluate how current it is and if it will fulfill your needs. Consider restoring your backup to a different system in case you find that critical files are missing or outdated.

Do remember that professional data recovery is a skill learned from practice and requires highly specialized tools.

While data recovery can seem expensive because it is a highly technical and labor intensive process, recreating your data may be significantly more expensive. Also, the turnaround time for data recovery is usually much faster than the time it would take to recreate your lost files from scratch.