This happened some time ago...last year in August or sooner. My drive was acting all crazy and I had all my client (except one) files backed up, but not my personal stuff. I was in the process of backing it up when it started acting wonky. So, I tried the freezer thing, thinking the elements were overheated and sticking, but no luck.

So, I took it to Data doctors, where I had to pay out a couple of hundred dollars for the diagnosis, but agreed to pay thousands if they could reteive the data. After about a week, I get the call that the images and files are not salvagable. I cried and cried and cried. (our youngest and new little baby) had been born just months before and ALL of the images from the first parts of her life were lost....I felt as though my house had burned down. I was very sad, but have moved on.....sort of. I was looking at her today and how big she has gotten and wanted to look back at her when she was a newborn, and the realization that I cannot do that...sunk in.

Then that is when my brain said, "OSP....I should ask all the brainiacs on there what I should do" so here I am asking...do you think the files are gone, or should I try a different data recovery and which one?

OH please! Oh Please! Oh Please!

EDIT: HAVE I ALREADY ASKED THIS??? SORRY IF I HAVE

hi!
i just had 950GB recovered and used KROLL ON TRACK in fountain valley, ca. There was an initial fee of 100-150 i think to do the diagnosis and they said they'd give me a record of all the files that were recoverable...ha! i told them to forget listing them because there would be thousands! Turned out, nothing was lost and they recovered 750,000 files!!!! I had 75% backed up on an external (of course not the most important!), but it would have been more time consuming and costly for me at that time to go through and figure out what i needed, so i ended up forking out the cash. I think it was about 2700.00, and that included a 1.5 TB drive. It only took about a week. I told them i hope i don't have to see them again , but that i would definitely mention them to anyone asking.

ps. the guy at the apple store in newport mentioned he'd never heard of kroll not being able to recover images as long as the data was not scratched. When i was there, the dude pretty much said the same, even data that is burned in a fire, or submerged in water is recoverable most often. I hope that is encouraging, i'm sure a lot of us can relate to the feeling in the pit of your stomach about this!
Good Luck!

mel

18350 Mt. Langley st., Suite 110
Fountain Valley, CA 92708
P.714-641-0530
www.krollontrack.com
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for something a bit more random: http://inspiredbyaburrito.blogspot.com/

Thank you so much for the info....I will have to check them out. I really thought I was over it, but I am not. To many memories of the first days of her life. At the same time, I know I am blessed that she is with me each day that she is (and our other two for that matter!)

I am going to check them out!

Great post Mel!

Good luck Tawnya!