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Whether you're a small small network-attached storage (NAS) devic or part of a corporate IT team managing extensive enterprise-class servers, experiencing a RAID crash is almost inevitable. Our team of RAID data recovery experts is here to support you in retrieving your valuable data from your device. We understand the significance of your data and are committed to helping you recover it successfully, minimizing any disruptions to your business operations.
While RAID systems provide some level of protection, it's crucial to understand that they are not a foolproof substitute for a robust backup strategy. RAID configurations, especially those utilizing inexpensive disks, can still experience failures, resulting in the loss of valuable data. At Data Recovery Group, our expert RAID data recovery engineers have encountered numerous cases of heavily damaged RAID arrays sent to us by clients across Canada. Each recovery case is handled individually, considering the unique range of potential issues that can arise. RAID failures can be triggered by various factors, including improper shutdowns, system crashes, power outages, or hard drive malfunctions. However, rest assured that our team is equipped to successfully recover data from any type of RAID failure.
Server RAID Recovery
In a typical RAID server setup, locally attached storage contains the Operating System and essential applications. Redundancy is achieved through data striping with parity, commonly using RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10 configurations.
When a fault occurs in the local storage, the server may fail to boot, displaying errors such as "Operating System Not Found" or indicating a damaged data array. A common cause is a failure of the RAID controller, resulting in the loss of the entire RAID configuration. This can leave you with what seems like a non-functional server, where all files appear to be missing, necessitating RAID reconstruction.
At our dedicated RAID recovery laboratory, we employ specialized techniques to reverse-engineer the array configuration. We utilize recovered metadata from the original RAID server hard disks to create a custom emulated RAID controller. This emulation creates a virtual controller that can reconstruct the data blocks into a readable format. Our expert team analyzes the feasibility of successful RAID data recovery, identifies recoverable files, and makes adjustments to the data storage configuration if any data bits are still missing. Subsequently, we leverage advanced hardware solutions to recover the data.
Our team utilizes cutting-edge hardware tools to mount the virtual controller and access the metadata in a readable format on an alternative server. This enables our engineers to securely copy the data from the damaged RAID drives. Leveraging high-performance hardware and ultra-fast network connections, we expedite the data recovery process while minimizing the risk of failure.
Once the recovered data is safely stored, we conduct further checks to determine the root cause of the failure. With an extensive inventory of spare parts, we can replace components like lost or formatted RAID drives to pinpoint the exact cause of the issue. In most cases, we recommend that our RAID data recovery clients replace the original hardware. After successfully recovering data from the RAID drives, we arrange secure transportation to return the retrieved data to the customer.
NAS devices have gained popularity as cost-effective solutions for network-attached data storage. Acting as private clouds, they enable secure and seamless information sharing among employees. NAS devices often include features that notify owners about hardware issues. Through email alerts, automated messages are sent out indicating drive failure, accompanied by instructions for obtaining a replacement drive.
NAS systems utilize various RAID configurations, including proprietary setups from brands like Netgear and Synology. Therefore, Data Recovery Group approaches NAS data recovery with a tailored approach. While logical issues or file system errors are possibilities, hardware failure, such as disk or component malfunctions, remains the most common challenge we encounter.
In cases where a customer remains unaware of a failed hard disk that broke down months ago, only to face another disk failure today, a complete data loss scenario emerges. To address such situations, Data Recovery Group thoroughly tests and fixes the NAS appliance to ensure full functionality. We then assess the disks, as faults typically originate from this component.
Utilizing our specialized hardware and data recovery software, we carefully examine the drive's internal components within one of our certified clean rooms. This process allows us to identify issues like parked disk read heads or damaged disk platters that may be the cause of the problem.
Storage Area Network (SAN) RAID RecoveryWhen a client's SAN encounters a failure, Data Recovery Group's engineers understand the challenges involved in retrieving their valuable files. SANs are designed by manufacturers to be highly fault-tolerant and resilient to hardware failures.
SAN devices serve as the backbone of many businesses' storage infrastructure, housing crucial production data, including entire virtual server infrastructures and core business systems. Popular choices for SAN storage include enterprise-class solutions such as IBM Storwize, Dell Equilogic, and NetApp.
Failed disks are often the primary cause of SAN RAID failures. In RAID 5 setups, when a single drive fails, the array must reconstruct the drive's content using the parity data from the remaining drives. It is common to observe RAID 5 health being flagged as "degraded."
If undetected, the failed drive can become stale. Over time, as the degraded server continues to operate, the files trapped on the failed drives become increasingly outdated. This can lead to stale data being reintroduced into the RAID volume, causing severe data corruption in the file system.
In such failures, a data recovery expert must restore the failed drive to a healthy state for the RAID to recognize it. Our cleanroom data recovery engineers are well-equipped to perform physical repairs on the disk. Once the RAID acknowledges the disk, our data recovery experts must act swiftly to clone the RAID data before the RAID completely fails.
Whether you need RAID data recovery due to unexpected RAID failures, deleted files, system crashes, lost partitions, or any other issue, it's crucial to entrust the task to data recovery experts. At Data Recovery Group, we provide fast, affordable, and customer-friendly RAID data recovery services. We offer our expert RAID data recovery services with a risk-free guarantee - if we can't recover your lost data, you don't pay. Period. Our cleanroom lab offers free evaluations, and we even cover inbound shipping costs. Rest assured that we can recover all your data without wasting your time or money.
Our data recovery experts operate in certified cleanrooms to prevent further damage to your RAID equipment. Data Recovery Group's RAID data recovery experts are ready to recover your data. Contact us today at 1-888-749-3786 for a RAID data recovery assessment with our data recovery engineers to ensure secure data recovery.
After the client has shipped the failing RAID device to our data recovery group's lab in London, Ontario, our skilled engineers initiate the RAID recovery process. They begin by carefully cataloging all the disks and conducting an initial assessment of the fault. Our team then performs an early diagnosis to identify the underlying cause of the failure.
At the Data Recovery Group, our RAID data recovery experts possess extensive knowledge of various popular models of SAN, NAS, and server data storage hardware. We are well-versed in handling different RAID parameters from major manufacturers, including Synology, Dell, HP, IBM, XenServer, SnapServer, Buffalo, Drobo, and FreeNAS, among others.
RAID arrays offer various configuration options, and Data Recovery Group is well-equipped to handle any type of RAID data recovery. Regardless of your system setup, we can successfully recover files from RAID arrays used in VMware, Hyper-V, NAS, SAN, and direct-attached server configurations.
RAID stands for “Redundant Array of Independent Disks.” A RAID system presents multiple disks to the operating system as a single logical data store and it uses disk mirroring and disk striping techniques to protect the files and/or speed up access to data. Disk mirroring is when the data is sliced up onto more than one hard drive, and disk striping is when data is split sequentially between disks, resulting in much faster read/write performance.