A hard drive voice coil is a type of linear motor consisting of a coil of wire suspended within a strong magnetic field. When an electrical current passes through the coil, it interacts with the magnetic field, generating a force...

Stiction is a portmanteau of “static” and “friction.” In engineering, it’s used to describe the amount of force required to make something move while it’s in contact with another material.  In the data recovery industry, stiction is also used to...

If you’ve found this page, you’re probably running CHKDSK, Microsoft’s built-in utility for hard disk drives — and you’re wondering why it’s taking forever to complete.  First, a quick reminder: CHKDSK isn’t a data recovery utility. It can scan your...

Recently, we searched for “failing hard drives” to see whether the internet was dispensing bad advice regarding drive failures (and to see if our name came up). Google’s experimental A.I. answered our question — and promptly provided instructions that could...

We’re approaching the 70th anniversary of the hard disk drive (and despite a  popular misconception, hard drive sales are still going strong). Without HDDs, modern computing wouldn’t be possible, and when the IBM 350 was introduced in 1956, it jump-started...

Frequently, our clients will ask us about how the data recovery process works — and providing a quick answer can be difficult, because every case presents a different set of challenges.In some situations, we’re able to restore files by...

If your hard drive seems to “spin up,” but your computer can’t recognize it, you’ve got a problem — but in many cases, the solution is fairly straightforward (the quickest and most likely solution is to check your data connections)....

External hard drives (HDDs) are commonly used for backup and for additional storage. They provide more control over data than cloud storage services, and they’re significantly less expensive than external solid-state drives (SSD). But while external HDDs are inexpensive and...

Seagate Technology has announced a new hard drive architecture utilizing a “nanophotonic laser,” which leverages heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) technology to allow for extremely high capacities.  HAMR isn’t brand-new tech, and many other manufacturers are experimenting with similar lasers. If...

If you need data recovery, but you can’t quite afford it, you might consider putting your hard drive (or solid state drive, or other device) into storage until you’re able to get the money together.  Clients often ask us whether...