Over the years of work in Dataretrieval.com Data Recovery Lab we have amassed a small collection of myths about data loss and recovery. Some of them are actively spread around on different computer and not really forums; so we hope this article will be useful to those seeking help when the drive failed or data is lost. So, a posting about how NOT to make a difficult situation even worse. 1. Shockproof housings for external drives This is a marketing ploy - rubberized housings do not save a hard drive from damage, for example, after a fall. They, of course, look beautiful and impressive, and make the hard disk itself look reliable which instills confidence in the customer - that is why he purchases them. However, they only slightly reduce the overstress on HDD parts during impact or fall. This can save provided that the height is low (up to about 50 cm for 2.5" hard drives, up to 20 cm for 3.5" drives), and the drive is turned off. When turned on, the drive almost always breaks down, because max overload on a working drive is 5-7 times less than on the off one. We conducted a crash test for 2Tb drives by Samsung, Hitachi, WD, Seagate. We dropped them when turned on from a height of 5 cm, then 10 cm, then every 10 cm. All drives except Samsung broke at 15 cm. "Samsung" broke at 40 cm owing to rubber dampers between the drive itself and the housing. All drives were external 3.5" ones. 2. If the hard drive malfunctions, knock at it with, for example, a screwdriver at the boot time To achieve such an effect you can also tap the drive on the floor. The only thing is that it will not be a repair for your drive. As a result of such workaround, small particles of what breaks off inside will scratch the drive, and it will be impossible to recover the data. You can destroy data especially reliably, if you turn the drive on and then drop it from the height of about one meter (see previous paragraph). Nice notches will appear on its surface, after which it will be impossible to recover data. 3. There is vacuum inside a hard disk - Or, as some of our customers say, "there is inert gas". So if you happen to disassemble the hard drive, you will be sucked into it due to the fact that the air of the room will be sucked in the vacuum space of the hard disk. This a good myth; I'd hate to dispel it: maybe, this could dissuade some of the "do-it-yourselfers" from making their data "unrecoverable" by dismantling the drive? However, in fact, there is just clean dust-free air inside the drive, so that nothing gets in the space between the drive and the head. 10-15 years ago drives were indeed made completely sealed; you could even spill water on them, submerge, then wipe off the electronics board and use it again - the water would not get inside. In modern hard drives, there are always holes in HDA body or top cover with the notice «DO NOT COVER THIS HOLE»; underneath you can find air filters against undesired particles. This change was made by manufacturers due to implementation of the new production technologies, falling production costs and other reasons. If such a drive is dipped into water, it will get inside the HDA through the filter. Read the more here: https://www.dataretrieval.com/data-recovery/fifteen-myths-about-data-recovery-and-loss.html
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