Seagate data recovery
Seagate hard drives are available in CF (CompactFlash), 1.8'', 2.5'' and 3.5'' formats and they can have the following interfaces: SATA, SAS or IDE. Seagate hard drives, like any other hard drives, are prone to problems that lead to data loss. There are issues specific to Seagate hard drives:
Firmware malfunction (disk microcode)
Hard drives with firmware errors simply cannot be recognized by the BIOS after switching off and on again, or they are determined by the operating system with a capacity of "0 GB". The following series may be affected:
Seagate Barracuda 2,5'': ST5000LM000, ST4000LM024, ST3000LM024, ST2000LM015, ST2000LM007, ST1000LM048, ST1000LM035, ST500LM030.
Seagate 7200.11 Serie: ST31000333AS, ST3500320AS, ST3500620AS, ST3500820AS, ST31000340AS und weitere Festplatten dieser Serie
Seagate Barracuda 3,5'': ST8000DM004, ST6000DM003, ST4000DM004, ST3000DM007, ST3000DM003, ST3000DM001, ST2000DM005, ST2000DM001, ST2000DM008, ST2000DM006, ST1000DM010, ST1000DM003, ST1000DM005 and other hard drives in the series.
Malfunction of the read/write unit (read heads)
Read/write head failures are the most common mechanical problem with Seagate hard drives. An unpleasant feature in such cases is that if the read/write heads of Seagate hard drives fail, the surface of the magnetic disks is damaged much more often than those of other manufacturers. As a result of this head crash – caused by the read/write head touching down – the data disks often have medium defects on the surface, which could damage important system and data tracks. For this reason, proper operation of the hard disks is prevented and access to the various data areas does not take place. The mechanical damage to the respective read/write unit may also leave surface damage on the data carrier medium. These head crash marks made the data recovery process very difficult. The data recovery from a hard drive with a defect in the reading head is carried out if necessary under certain clean room laboratory conditions and using specially developed hardware and software tools.
Malfunction of PCB electronics Seagate hard drive
If a Seagate hard drive no longer has any functions, a defect in the PCB electronics can be responsible. After a metrological examination of a Seagate hard drive in the data recovery hardware laboratory, it is determined which components are faulty. If only the electronics of Seagate hard drives are damaged or, for example, the electrical contact to the read/write head is broken, we will repair this defect during data recovery or replace the entire assembly.
Motor unit malfunction
Seagate hard drives can fail if the motor assembly or motor chip is burned out. As a result, the spindle motor would get stuck. As soon as this happens, the start-up noises of the hard disk also stop because the motor is no longer turning. An error of this kind can only be corrected under clean room laboratory conditions. This requires reassembly of the disk spindle and is done by installing it in a hard drive with a working spindle motor. It is important to note that the plate spindle must not be disassembled. The conversion is carried out exclusively with the help of special tools for Seagate hard drives.
The plain bearing of the disk spindle of a Seagate hard disk has seized
If the plain bearing of the disk spindle of a Seagate hard drive has seized up, it is difficult to compensate for the sluggishness of the disk spindle bearing and the resulting imbalance. In this case, the disk spindle is completely rebuilt with the help of special tools during data recovery. An exact cause for the jamming of the disk spindle bearing can usually not be determined, as several criteria play a role in mechanical bearing damage.
Data recovery process
Be vigilant and do not attempt to salvage the data on the device yourself. This can make recovery impossible.
External Seagate Hard Drives
Seagate external hard drives contain ordinary SATA hard drives and therefore show similar errors or problems. In addition, with external hard drives there is a risk that the hard drive will fall and be severely damaged. Recovering data from a Seagate external hard drive is almost always possible. However, the complexity of the work and the completeness of the recovered data depend on what kind of damage caused the data loss.
What to do if a Seagate hard drive fails?
Repairing a Seagate hard drive when there is no important data to recover is not very useful or impossible. However, the data lost in the process can almost always be recovered. This work is carried out by trained engineers and specially developed software and hardware tools under clean room laboratory conditions. In the event of a drive failure, power should be removed immediately to prevent further damage. Also, programs for data recovery of lost information should not be used if there are doubts about the normal function of the hard disk. Such programs are designed to fix only logical problems on fully functional hard drives. The programs perform multiple scanning processes that can be extremely harmful to a physically damaged hard drive. For example, if a hard drive has unreadable sectors or the mechanics aren't working properly, the seek operations can irretrievably destroy its magnetic surface. As a rule, a defective hard disk is not recognized by the system, which means that all data recovery programs are useless for it.
Our success rate for a successful data recovery from Seagate hard drives is over 95%.
Data recovery from storage media from other manufacturers
All orders are processed exclusively in our Berlin laboratory. The data recovery from mechanically defective hard drives takes place within a dust-free environment of our clean room workbench of clean room class 100.