The master boot record (MBR) is a boot sector on a storage device that contains information about how the device is partitioned.  The MBR also contains instructions for locating the operating system (OS). The computer accesses the MBR, then follows...

Hard drives store data magnetically — the read/write heads float above platters, which are disks coated with a thin layer of magnetic material.  The actuator heads rely on magnetism, so it’s logical to wonder whether another magnet could interfere with...

If you’ve accidentally formatted your hard drive before backing up important data, the data may be recoverable — provided that you turn the drive off immediately. Don’t install software (including an operating system) and keep the drive powered off until...

If you absolutely need data from a failed hard drive, solid-state drive, or other device, the safest course of action is to contact a professional data recovery provider. Each attempt to recover the files could exacerbate corruption or permanently erase...

If your external hard drive causes your computer to freeze, operate slowly, or fail to boot, there’s a good chance that you’re dealing with corruption of the filesystem or a physical hard drive issue. Other issues can also cause these...

At Datarecovery.com, we discourage the use of data recovery software. Software can exacerbate issues like hard drive head crashes, potentially causing permanent damage (and preventing a successful recovery, even if the drive is treated in a professional data recovery laboratory). ...

A hard drive’s seek time is the time that the head assembly takes to travel to a specific track on the platters where data can be stored. Since seek time varies depending on which track it needs to access, “seek...