Conclusion
I don’t know too many people who would be OK with losing all of the data on their laptop or desktop. Considering the fact that data loss is 100% preventable what is stopping you from arranging for the safety of your critical files, pictures, and data? Cost ranges anywhere from right out free to mildly expensive but since there are free solutions available we suggest you decide to start using something. The eventual loss of a hard drive in inevitable so each day after purchase is a gamble as is every day you decide to put off backup.
In the end what is worth more; your data or a few well placed dollars to ensure your files remain in your possession?
What about data carving? There are a few open source tools that are quite powerful when it comes to files that are thought to be corrupt. Most of these corrupt files can be reverse engineered easily and at literally no cost….. Thank you open source. I have recovered thousands of photos for clients using dd and a few open source tools to carve the data off of the drive.
Of course data recovery companies charge an arm and a leg because it can take several hours to days to recover.
I would obtain a fresh hard drive (new or used) and load an OS on it. Once you have a working OS, attached the original hard drive as a slave hard drive and recover your data by pulling the data from the drive. If the data is corrupt, there isn’t much to be done. If the original hard drive is dead (not spinning or has the click of death), there is hard drive recovery companies that you can send your hard drive to and they will recover your data, but ready to pay a pretty hefty price tag though.
So what do you guys recommend someone do if they don’t have an image to restore from? Or lets say their backup image doesn’t actually restore like you would think it should. We all know that malware can play havoc on system images and restore points in Windows. How would you guys recommend an end user recover data?