Q. My Macbook laptop just recently starting having problems and is no longer recognizing the hard drive for whatever reason. Apple can fix it for me by putting in a new HD but I would very much like to save the files that I know are still stored on the old HD. Does anyone have any recommendations on a good mail away or local (to Northen Virginia) data recovery service? How much is this probably going to cost me?
A. Data recovery is a specialized service, there aren't going to be many local places that have a lab to work on it. Most places will perform a free diagnostic and give you a free quotation. You can probably expect to spend anywhere from $500 - 1400 for software recoveries and $900 - 2200 for hardware recoveries. I've used CBL in the past and them managed to save my data. It was a heads problem and cost me $1500. http://www.cbltech.com
Fix Damaged Images AFTER Data Recovery Has Been Performed?
Q. I used a data recovery program to recover lost images from my digital camera. Unfortunately some of them came out grey. Meaning, when I look at the picture as a thumbnail, I can see the entire picture, but when I open the image, a large portion of it completely greyed out. Any idea of how I can fix these images? I've tried recovering them twice and both times the same images came out damaged.
A. The photos are damaged. The embedded thumbnails appear fine because they were pre-generated. Think about it like a lock and key: if one tooth of a key is missing, it'll still fit but it won't unlock the door. Recovery may be possible but only if you know what you're doing.
Here's how one person capable of preforming these recoveries describes the condition:
" - Grey Areas in your Image
In various forums on the internet, people have incorrectly stated that photos are unrecoverable if they contain gray areas. This is not usually true. Some JPEG decoders are very picky with how they recover from errors and simply report Drawing Failed (in Windows Picture and Fax Viewer), while others might draw a middle-gray region or just display a "Red X". In some cases the gray area is in fact completely damaged (overwritten by unrelated data), but this is not always the case.
- Why do JPEGs get damaged?
There are many sources of damage to photo files, but the most common reasons are:
- Photos were deleted or formatted & a "recovery" utility was used
- Memory card / hard drive error (logical or physical error)
- RAM failure
- File transfer / interface error (memory coherency issues, buffer over/underrun, etc.)
- What Happens when you Open / Decode a Corrupted JPEG?
Even a single byte changed in a JPEG file can cause an image to be unrecognizable (or not open at all). Why? Because of the way JPEG compression is designed, images are stored in tightly-packed streams of binary bits (not bytes). Each pixel can be represented by as few as 2 bits to as many as 26 bits (dictated by the variable-length Huffman Coding scheme). To make matters worse, in an effort to keep the compression as efficient as possible, there is virtually nothing to indicate where you are in the stream of bits (unless Restart Markers are used). Therefore, as soon as a single bit is encountered wrong, the millions of bits that follow will be decoded incorrectly as well. The manner in which DC and AC coefficients are arranged in MCUs means that this corruption often shows up in shearing, wild color shifts and many other visual phenomena."
- http://www.impulseadventure.com/photo/fix-corrupt-jpeg-photo.html
It appears from the examples and comments that he or she is fully capable of preforming JPEG recovery when such operation is possible. Unfortunately, the author no longer accepts recovery requests.
There are similar JPEG recovery services available but your photos should be worth the cost. Here's one example (I don't know the reputation of the company so I can't recommend it):
http://www.jpeg-repair.org/
The company above seems to recover a small number of JPEG submissions for free for their own analysis and your benefit.
There are a number of recovery tools available too, but unless those pictures are very important they aren't worth the money; you don't know for sure if the files are recoverable, but mostly because you'll only have the programmers word that it even works.
http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=jpeg+recovery&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
Here's how one person capable of preforming these recoveries describes the condition:
" - Grey Areas in your Image
In various forums on the internet, people have incorrectly stated that photos are unrecoverable if they contain gray areas. This is not usually true. Some JPEG decoders are very picky with how they recover from errors and simply report Drawing Failed (in Windows Picture and Fax Viewer), while others might draw a middle-gray region or just display a "Red X". In some cases the gray area is in fact completely damaged (overwritten by unrelated data), but this is not always the case.
- Why do JPEGs get damaged?
There are many sources of damage to photo files, but the most common reasons are:
- Photos were deleted or formatted & a "recovery" utility was used
- Memory card / hard drive error (logical or physical error)
- RAM failure
- File transfer / interface error (memory coherency issues, buffer over/underrun, etc.)
- What Happens when you Open / Decode a Corrupted JPEG?
Even a single byte changed in a JPEG file can cause an image to be unrecognizable (or not open at all). Why? Because of the way JPEG compression is designed, images are stored in tightly-packed streams of binary bits (not bytes). Each pixel can be represented by as few as 2 bits to as many as 26 bits (dictated by the variable-length Huffman Coding scheme). To make matters worse, in an effort to keep the compression as efficient as possible, there is virtually nothing to indicate where you are in the stream of bits (unless Restart Markers are used). Therefore, as soon as a single bit is encountered wrong, the millions of bits that follow will be decoded incorrectly as well. The manner in which DC and AC coefficients are arranged in MCUs means that this corruption often shows up in shearing, wild color shifts and many other visual phenomena."
- http://www.impulseadventure.com/photo/fix-corrupt-jpeg-photo.html
It appears from the examples and comments that he or she is fully capable of preforming JPEG recovery when such operation is possible. Unfortunately, the author no longer accepts recovery requests.
There are similar JPEG recovery services available but your photos should be worth the cost. Here's one example (I don't know the reputation of the company so I can't recommend it):
http://www.jpeg-repair.org/
The company above seems to recover a small number of JPEG submissions for free for their own analysis and your benefit.
There are a number of recovery tools available too, but unless those pictures are very important they aren't worth the money; you don't know for sure if the files are recoverable, but mostly because you'll only have the programmers word that it even works.
http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=jpeg+recovery&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
Data recovery of a file that was cut and paste to another hard drive. What are my options?
Q. I have 2 hard drives on my computer. My computer was having problems, so I moved everything (via cut then paste) from drive C to drive E and removed drive E to make it an external hard drive. Long story short, I need to know if there is a way these files still exist on the old computer's drive C as I have lost access to the external hard drive. I have not been using the computer these files were cut then pasted from. Cost isn't really an issue here, as I originally sent the external drive to a data recovery company (which is pricey, and they ultimately couldn't help). I thought I might try to recover them this way as a last ditch effort. Any chance these files are still floating around somewhere on the old drive despite being cut and pasted to a new one? Any idea how to recover them if thy are?
A. If you haven't used the computer all that much in terms of downloading files and installing programs after you have cut your files from drive C, there is a chance you can recover your files from drive C as it is most likely your 'deleted' files haven't been overwritten by other files. However this is complicated as you cannot install the recovery software you need on drive C or even boot your computer from drive C. Your best bet is to take the drive and install it in another computer and use RECUVA http://www.piriform.com/recuva to try and recover your files. You can always get the file recover company to try your drive C if you don't feel up to this task.
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