DIY Data Recovery

Can I do the recovery myself?
There are some cases where doing a data recovery yourself is possible. If you are in a situation that you do not have the funds and you want to save as much as you can it is possible however, you need to be extremely cautious, if the data is important we suggest you go straight to a professional company and read no further. However if the data is something you think you have lost but would be happy to have back then read on.

Advice: do not run utilities that try to repair the disk!! This causes more harm than good.
There are only a few simple types of data recovery techniques that we would even bother mentioning that a non data recovery professional can try.

Logical recovery Deleted data, corrupt file system

Doing a data recovery yourself is not as simple as it sounds. First you need a complete separate system from the hard drive you want to recover data from. This is because you put the data at risk of being overwritten if you install the software on the drive. Do read the deleted data section for more detail. Also to recover data you will need to save to a separate drive for the same reason. There are many available software on the market that deal with deleted data or corrupt file systems. Basically all doing the same thing, the more expensive perform more advance functions that the average user may not ever need.

Advice: If the drive seems like it is not performing 100% do not keep scanning the drive. This puts the drive under stress and could change a straightforward data recovery to a unrecoverable one.
There is also some free open source programs mainly on Linux, however they are still in development and in early stages, but can be useful in some situations.

Attention: If the data is important do not risk it

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