Here at EADR, a scenario that arises most days is when a client brings in their external hard drive or USB flash drive to us for recovery, stating that they have put all their data on to their “back-up” device.
External drives are fragile and can fail
External hard drives (and USB sticks) are excellent devices for storing/transporting data from A to B and although they are designed for this purpose, it should be remembered that they are still very fragile pieces of equipment that do not take kindly to being knocked, dropped or bumped around in the bottom of a bag. Very often, we see drives that have mechanical failures due to this type of treatment, or on a different level, have become corrupt and inaccessible due to not being ejected safely, or the wrong hard drive power cable being used.
However, by far the biggest mistake that people make with their “back-up” devices is that they move all of their valuable data on to them to free up resources elsewhere.
Moving data doesn't mean it's backed up
Perhaps their laptop or desktop computer is running slowly or more commonly they are trying to free up some space so they can fit more current or ‘live’ data onto their working computer. The crucial point here is that if it is your ONLY copy of your data that you are moving, then it is NOT going to become a back-up by simply transferring it to an external device. If you have 20,000 photographs of your gap year in Asia on your laptop, or your complete business database is on your desktop computer then the wisest thing to do is to frequently make a copy or update the back-up which should be stored away from your working copy on your PC. That way, if disaster strikes and you lose one copy, then at least you have a back-up (or indeed the originals) to go back to.>
Remember, if it’s your only copy – it’s NOT a back-up no matter where it’s placed.
EADR Can Recover Data From Your External/USB Drive
A data recovery specialist should be able to help you recover your lost items from most, if not all of the above data loss scenarios if you are in the unfortunate position of not having a back-up, but it can be a costly lesson to learn - contact us for help.