People who use external drives to store important data are usually worried about what they can do if the external drive dies. The main concern is whether it is possible to recover files from a dead external drive. We consulted our expert Mike McCory to give us a deeper insight into the possibility of data recovery.
According to McCory, it will depend on the kind of damage that the drive may have suffered. “Before you start panicking or even before you call the experts, it is advisable to carry out your own diagnosis.” He advises. “Many times I get people coming to me very distressed thinking they have lost all their Data Recovery but in the end, you discover the problem was not even with the external drive but their PC.” Mike points out.
Mike says if the drive is not making any strange noises, then you should investigate the ports on the computer try connecting it to the different ports and see if it will work. If it still does not work, try another computer. If on the other hand the drive is making a strange sound that it does not usually make, then that is a reason to have the external drive looked at by the experts.
“If you are good at fixing things you can try to open up the external drive and check for a loose connection, alternatively you can find the internal drive within the drive and connect it directly to the PC” The expert suggests.
This may be a little too technical for an ordinary user trying to recover files from a dead external drive and that is why data recovery experts would be the best option. So what happens at the Youtube data recovery service? We put this question to Mike McCroy and this is what he said.
“We usually investigate the reason for the death of the external drive, there are two causes usually,” he says. “You could have a physical problem related to physical damage or it could be logical, in connection with a viral attack or improper format of the drive.” He explains.
Once the investigation is done and the cause is determined, naturally they will attempt to fix it. McCroy, however, says that sometimes it is impossible to fix the dead external drive and so it comes down to trying to recover the information in a different way. “What many data recovery experts will do is try to retrieve the internal drive and then connect it to a PC or even install it on a PC and that should make it possible to recover files from a dead external drive.” He says.
So once anyone is faced with a dead external drive, all hope is not lost, it is indeed possible to recover the files as long as you contact the data recovery service. However our expert points out that at times the damage to the drive may have deleted the data and that may make it impossible to recover the files like in the case of fire damage.
