LaCie Rugged Drive Extremely Slow & Failing to Copy Files

A local plumber contacted us after their LaCie Rugged external hard drive became nearly unusable. The symptoms included:

• Files taking hours to open or copy, even for small documents.
• Severe slowdown in Finder (Mac) and File Explorer (Windows) when browsing the drive.
• Only able to copy two small files in 10 hours, with larger files failing completely.
• Vital business data, including job invoices, client details, and equipment logs, was at risk.

Since continuing to use a failing drive can worsen damage, immediate professional recovery was required.

Diagnosis & Evaluation

When the LaCie Rugged hard drive arrived at our cleanroom facility, we conducted a full hardware and software diagnostic. Our findings:

1. Severe bad sectors – The hard drive’s platters had thousands of unreadable sectors, slowing down read operations.
2. Firmware delays & disk timeout errors – The drive was struggling to process data, causing file transfers to take hours.
3. No mechanical failure – The drive was still spinning correctly, meaning a non-invasive recovery method was possible.

Because bad sectors can cause permanent data loss, we needed to recover the data before the drive degraded further.

The Recovery Process

1. Cloning the Drive to Prevent Further Degradation

Since the drive was rapidly deteriorating, we:

• Created a sector-by-sector image to capture all recoverable data.
• Used specialized imaging tools to bypass bad sectors without getting stuck.

2. Extracting Data from Corrupt Sectors

Since the bad sectors were preventing normal file access, we:

• Manually reconstructed damaged files using forensic-level recovery tools.
• Recovered partially lost documents and invoices by analyzing fragmented data.

3. Verifying & Restoring Business-Critical Files

Once data extraction was complete, we:

• Checked all recovered invoices, client records, and job schedules for accuracy.
• Repaired any corrupted files to restore missing content.
• Transferred the recovered files to a new external SSD for the plumber.

The Results: 98% Data Recovery Success

Thanks to our bad sector bypass and file reconstruction techniques, we successfully recovered 98% of the plumber’s business data, including:

✅ Job invoices and client details
✅ Equipment and service logs
✅ Financial reports and tax documents

The plumber was relieved to have their essential files restored, preventing financial losses and scheduling disruptions.

Why Choose Us?

With 25 years of experience and tens of thousands of successful recoveries, we are the leading external hard drive recovery specialists in Ireland and the UK. Our expertise includes:

✔ LaCie Rugged hard drive recovery
✔ Bad sector recovery & drive imaging
✔ Slow or unresponsive drive restoration
✔ Secure & confidential data retrieval for businesses

If your external hard drive is extremely slow, failing to copy files, or taking hours to open documents, stop using it immediately and contact us for expert data recovery.