In-depth write-ups of real data recoveries we’ve carried out in Belfast — the fault, the diagnosis, the technique and the outcome, across hard drives, SSDs, RAID, NAS and more. Every job is diagnosed and recovered in-house. Names and identifying details are kept confidential.
HPE ProLiant · RAID 10, 8×1 TB SAS · Partition corruption · volume won’t mount
An engineering firm’s HPE ProLiant server dropped four virtual machines offline at once. The RAID controller could see all eight disks, but the RAID 10 volume simply refused to mount — a corrupt…
HPE ProLiant · RAID 10, 16 disks · Failed rebuild · bad sectors, 2 dead disks
A business’s 16-disk HPE ProLiant RAID 10 lost a drive, and the rebuild onto its replacement failed part-way — because other disks in the array had quietly developed bad sectors, and two had…
Lenovo ThinkSystem · RAID 5, 12 SAS · Wrong disk pulled mid-rebuild
A company’s 12-disk Lenovo ThinkSystem RAID 5 lost a drive, and during the rebuild the IT team pulled the wrong one — taking a second disk out of an array that could only survive losing one.
Huawei FusionServer · RAID 0 · Malware corruption · array down
A company’s Huawei FusionServer running RAID 0 was hit by malware that wrecked its partition structures and RAID metadata — and with RAID 0’s zero redundancy, the whole striped volume went…
Asustor Lockerstor · 6-bay, RAID 10 · Boot loop · NAS OS / firmware corruption
A veterinary clinic’s 6-bay Asustor Lockerstor NAS started restarting endlessly instead of booting, locking away years of patient records and invoices.
Synology · 4-bay RAID, SHR/Btrfs · Failed volume expansion · won’t mount
A business tried to expand the volume on a 4-bay Synology RAID server, the operation failed part-way, and afterwards DSM couldn’t mount the volume at all — business documents and project files…
QNAP NAS · RAID 1 (2-disk mirror) · Partition corruption · won’t mount
A law firm’s QNAP NAS in RAID 1 stopped mounting after a power failure — confidential case files locked away, the array showing as degraded.
Seagate Expansion · 2 TB USB HDD · NTFS corruption · CHKDSK loop
A retailer’s Seagate Expansion portable drive started launching Windows’ CHKDSK the moment it was plugged in, then handed back folders full of missing and scrambled files.
WD My Book · external HDD · Burnt PCB · power-surge damage
A photographer’s WD My Book gave off a burnt smell and small sparks, then wouldn’t spin up at all — with undelivered wedding photos on it.
Maxtor · internal HDD · Head crash · grinding, platter damage
A florist’s Maxtor hard drive started grinding and scraping, then went undetectable — taking the shop’s orders, invoices and stock records with it.
Hitachi · internal HDD · Firmware / translator failure
A Hitachi hard drive powered on and spun normally — no clicking, no grinding — but no computer would detect it, and it held the only copy of a couple’s wedding photos.
LaCie Big Disk · striped RAID 0 · Powers on, not detected by host
A designer’s LaCie Big Disk lit up and spun as normal, but neither macOS nor Windows would show it at all — and it held years of unbacked-up Adobe work.
LaCie Rugged · external HDD · Thousands of bad sectors · failing
A plumber’s LaCie Rugged had slowed to a crawl — ten hours to copy two small files, larger ones failing outright — with the business’s invoices and client records on it.
Buffalo MiniStation · USB HDD · RAW volume · “format this drive?”
A Buffalo MiniStation portable drive was unplugged without ejecting, and afterwards Windows insisted it needed formatting — the volume had gone ‘RAW’, with family photos and documents…
IBM 40 GB IDE · factory machine · Failing legacy boot drive
A printing company’s production machine ran on an ageing IBM 40 GB IDE drive — and it was starting to fail.
Samsung EVO · SATA SSD · Read-only mode · NAND wear-out
An estate agency’s Samsung EVO SSD would let files be read but not saved, changed or deleted — property listings and contracts frozen in place.
Fujitsu laptop · SanDisk M.2 NVMe · Overheating · crashes, firmware instability
A B&B’s Fujitsu laptop kept shutting down mid-use, ran hot to the touch, and stopped loading files — booking records and accounts trapped on an M.2 NVMe SSD.
Kingston DataTraveler · USB flash · Write-protected · controller failure
A teacher’s Kingston DataTraveler suddenly refused to save, delete or even format — “the disk is write-protected” — with a term’s worth of lesson plans and student…
SanDisk Ultra · 512 GB SDXC · exFAT corruption · broken video files
A production company pulled a SanDisk 512GB Ultra SDXC card mid-copy, and afterwards half the footage wouldn’t open — scrambled file names, “format required” errors, clips that…
MacBook Pro · soldered SSD + T2 · Won’t boot · SSD not detected, APFS damage
A designer’s MacBook Pro booted to a flashing question-mark folder — macOS could no longer find a startup drive — with client projects and no backup on board.
MacBook Pro · Fusion Drive (SSD+HDD) · APFS corruption · files disappeared
A student’s MacBook Pro lost its coursework overnight — documents gone from Finder, yet the storage still full — and Disk Utility couldn’t fix it.
Apple iMac · internal HDD (HFS+) · Error −36 · bad sectors, FS corruption
An architect’s iMac had started refusing to copy files, throwing macOS “Error code −36” and freezing, with years of AutoCAD drawings on board.
Sony Vaio · laptop HDD (NTFS) · File-system corruption · garbled names
A researcher’s Sony Vaio suddenly showed folders full of random symbols instead of file names, with some files refusing to open and Windows asking to format the drive — years of research at…
Business laptop · BitLocker (XTS-AES) · Failing drive · encrypted volume
A company laptop’s drive began failing while protected by BitLocker — an encrypted, unreadable blob to any recovery tool.
Business laptop · BitLocker + TPM · Recovery-key lockout · Windows won’t boot
After a routine firmware update, a company laptop booted to a blue BitLocker screen demanding a 48-digit recovery key nobody remembered setting — and Windows wouldn’t start.
Company laptop · NTFS / Windows · Deleted data & exfiltration timeline
A firm suspected a senior employee had taken confidential client and design files to a competitor shortly before resigning.
Company laptop · reset before return · Post-wipe recovery & reset evidence
An employee left under a dispute and returned a company laptop that had been factory-reset — seemingly wiped clean the day before it came back.
Post or drop in your device for a free diagnostic, with a note on what happened — an engineer reviews it and confirms your exact quote in writing before any work begins.
First step: get the device onto our Belfast bench. Wrap it well, tuck your contact details in the box, and post it over — the diagnostic costs nothing, and you’ll have a firm written price to approve before we touch a single sector.
Posting it? A tracked, insured service is best. Dropping it off instead? You’re welcome Monday–Friday, 9am–5:30pm — please still pack the device as above.
Not ready to send anything yet? Use the form to describe the fault in your own words and one of the engineers will come back with a quote tailored to your situation.
We will get back to you soon. If it is urgent, call 028 9002 0144.