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Dead Hard Drive Recovery

What Does Dead Hard Drive Recovery Mean?

Dead hard drive recovery is the process of recovering, restoring and copying data from a hard disk that is technically dead, unusable or inaccessible.

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It involves the use of manual and automated methods to recover a dead hard drive experiencing software- or hardware-based problems.

Techopedia Explains Dead Hard Drive Recovery

A hard drive can be considered dead due to two primary reasons:

  • Logical/software problem such as a damaged file system or firmware
  • Technical/hardware problem such as a faulty drive controller board or IC malfunction

Typically, dead drives with logical errors such as bad file systems can be viewed on a Linux system as long as the file system is Windows based. Moreover, some data/disk recovery software can bypass file systems and can directly access the data. Dead hard drives with hardware problems can be recovered by repairing or replacing faulty components.

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