The hard drive of any computer or laptop is one of the most important devices, but it, like any other “iron” equipment, is prone to aging, mechanical damage and software failures. But the information stored on it, in many cases is very important. And this is not talking about the files of the operating system, without which it will simply be impossible to work on a computer in normal mode. Recovering a hard disk without losing data, even if it is, so to speak, “sprinkled”, in most cases is a very time-consuming process. However, if you have the appropriate software, you can perform such actions yourself, without resorting to the help of service center specialists. Despite the fact that many procedures are simplified quite significantly, you still have to tinker a bit.
Key situations, code may need information recovery
To begin with, let's consider in which particular cases manual intervention in the hard drive may be required. It is almost impossible to repair a damaged hard drive at home on your own, so in most cases, unless it is a matter of critical damage, you must use software methods. But here you should clearly distinguish between possible cases when you want to restore data from your hard drive. Either it will be files damaged due to failures of the hard drive itself, or information that has undergone accidental deletion (including due to formatting). Depending on this, completely different types of software will be used.
Can I recover data using Windows?
It is natural that many users who are far from carrying out such actions are interested in whether there is an opportunity or some means in the operating system itself that allows you to restore the necessary information or return the hard drive to a healthy state. Alas, such tools are not provided for in any known system of this entire family. However, despite their absence, it is possible to diagnose the device (stationary or external), as well as correct the errors of the OS itself, in order to further access the disks in a functioning software environment.
What to do to restore system files and bootloader?
Before recovering data from a damaged hard disk, you should take several steps to reanimate the operating system, critical files of which may be damaged due to some hardware or software failures. If the system does not start at all, you must use removable media with the installation distribution kit of the system or special recovery disks when booting from which it is possible to call the command line (as a rule, the Shift + F10 key combination is used in boot recovery mode). Please note that now we are talking exclusively about deleted or damaged system files and software errors in the hard drive in the absence of mechanical damage, in the detection of which the given methodology is not recommended to be used under any pretext.
First, you need to check the hard disk for errors and bad sectors by running a diagnostic tool in the command console with automatic correction (chkdsk N: / x / f / r, where N is the letter of the disk or logical partition). After that, you should check and restore system files using the sfc / scannow command.
If no solution gives an effect, it makes sense to restore or even rewrite the bootloader using the Bootrec.exe toolkit with additional attributes that are entered through the space after the main command (“/ fixmbr” and “/ fixboot” for recovery, “/ rebuildbsd” - for complete rewriting). It is possible that this method will bring the operating system back to life, after which it will be possible to directly engage in “pulling” damaged or deleted information from the hard drive or external media.
Categories of programs used for data recovery
But the situation with the hard drive does not always develop in such a favorable way. With mechanical damage, it is unlikely that it will be possible to restore the operating system. That is why, to recover data from a damaged hard disk, you will have to use additional utilities, which can be relatively arbitrarily distributed in the following areas:
- direct restoration of damaged information on a problem disk;
- creating an image for further file recovery;
- recover deleted data after formatting;
- resuscitation of HDD in case of critical failures of both mechanical and software nature.
Next, we consider several major programs from each category, which are considered the best in their field.
What conditions must be observed before recovering data from a damaged hard drive without fail?
Now a little more attention! If it is about damage to the hard drive itself, it is strictly forbidden to make any manipulations with it, and the software used must be installed on another hard drive or an external USB-HDD. In addition, to recover data from a damaged disk, it is desirable to remove it from the system unit or laptop, put it in a special external pocket and connect it to another computer. The exception is situations if one of the disks is a RAID-array or is external. In the case of using applications for the usual recovery of deleted files, say, after formatting, you can install them on the hard drive (preferably in a logical partition), but copying the information to the partition that you plan to work with in the future is not worth scanning before starting (to restore some files may fail due to overwriting of sectors in which their parts were stored).
Recovering data from a damaged hard drive: ZAR program
Now we proceed directly to “pulling out” the necessary information and use the Zero Assumption Recovery utility for this, which should not be downloaded or installed on the problematic HDD (as mentioned above, we initially assume that the disk is connected to another PC). For the application to work correctly, you must immediately turn off the antivirus (the utility will inform you about the need to deactivate it).
In the launched program, first click the “Data Recovery for Windows and Linux” button so that it can find all the media connected to the computer, and then mark its media and initiate the start of the scanning process. Found folders will appear in the results, which should be checked.
At the last stage, the process of recovering data from an external hard drive will be reduced to copying the found content to another place, to which you need to specify the path and click the start recording button (“Start copying the selected files”). At the end of the process, the stored information can be used.
Hiren's BootCD bootable media actions
Another technique used when it is impossible to boot from a problematic hard drive is to use the Hiren's BootCD external bootloader. It’s quite easy to pre-create such a medium from an image in any convenient program like UltraISO (for optical disks) or Rufus (for flash drives).
After loading the utility’s own interface with the choice of a graphical Windows-like mode (and when starting up it on a computer with a problematic HDD), in the main menu you should use the Information recovery item, specify the type of action (for example, recovering deleted data from a hard disk, partitioning it into sections, etc.) with the choice of one of the tools presented in the submenu. Please note that you should not use the built-in Recuva applet (it will not give an effect anyway). It is better to use the DiskDigger utility, restoration of photos (PhotoRec) or system objects (Restoration).
Overwriting HDD contents to other media in DataRescue DD
Restoring data after formatting the hard drive, programs belonging to the class of the utility described above make it quite simple. However, their use is not always possible, because with obvious damage to the hard drive, “fetching” information can be very problematic. Sometimes files may be found, but will be marked as those that cannot be restored. In this case, recovering data from the hard drive after formatting is unlikely to be possible, but it is precisely when the hard drive is damaged that the restoration is much more convenient to perform with the DataRescue DD program.
The essence of its work is to select a problematic HDD, and then, using one of the tools, create a disk image and save it on another medium (for example, external). The advantage of this approach is that absolutely all files are included in the image, regardless of the degree of damage. The image can then be deployed using the applications designed for this. If you fail to recover some important damaged components, you can either perform file extraction or disinfect the created image in WinRAR, which, by the way, can recognize images as regular archives.
Hard drive resuscitation
Finally, the saddest situation is that the hard drive may not show any signs of life at all, for example, because it has begun to “crumble”. According to the vast majority of ordinary users, nothing can be done with such a device. This is not entirely true.
Specialists to bring the hard drive to life (at least for a while) recommend using the HDD Regenerator utility, which allows you to restore the health of any drive due to the so-called magnetization reversal. True, this application works exclusively in DOS mode, but it can be downloaded from removable media, and it’s quite simple to use. Upon completion of all processes, it will be possible to directly proceed to the search for lost information.
How to extract information from a failed HDD using R-Studio?
And here R-Studio - the best program for recovering data from a hard disk - comes to the first place.
Any ordinary user can use it, because you just need to select the desired drive or partition, run a scan, the parameters of which you can configure yourself, and then save the results to a logical partition or any removable media. And it is this application that allows you to find deleted and deleted files as a result of full formatting. It is not surprising that user and expert reviews indicate that the utility shows stunning results and finds such long-standing objects, the existence of which the user is not even aware of.
Brief Summary
So, as regards the choice of the necessary software, not a single specialist will be able to advise you on anything concrete, since everything depends solely on problems with the hard drive. However, for each specific case described, the above programs are the best solution and allow you to restore lost data or even bring a very badly damaged hard drive to a working state. It remains to add that, of course, the Victoria HDD application can be attributed to the most powerful tools, but it was not considered solely because for the average user it may turn out to be too difficult to master.