Date Added: April 30, 2016 04:41:38 PM

A Hard drive’s role is to keep storage of all the data on your computer, but when a hard drive crashes, it is important to know about the usage and steps required for recovery/repair. One must be aware of which devices use a Hard Drive or Flash Memory, why the drive fails, and the necessities used for the repair.

To start off, many different devices carry hard drives or flash memory. Computers, laptops, network drives, iPads, iPhones, and camcorders all use some kind of traditional drive or flash memory. When it comes down to medium and large businesses, they tend to use servers. Servers can have one or multiple drives like raid arrays. Some companies sometimes also just use the basic drives like laptops and desktop computers whether it is a PC or Mac. However, Flash drives are different from regular hard drives even when it comes to price. For example, devices that use a flash drive include digital cameras and camcorders. The basic concept of operation is the same and flash technology is growing. This is why flash drives are seemingly more expensive. Fortunately, as the supply increases overtime, the prices will decrease.

More so, it is important to be informed on why the drive fails in the first place. There are many ways a hard drive can fail whether it occurs electrically, physically or internally. Electrical surge is the largest enemy of hard drives. An electric surge can damage components or parts of a flash drive or it can corrupt its firmware that controls flash storage operation. The same will occur to a regular drive that has a software chip responsible of running platters and reading/writing heads. Physical Damage is a close runner up to electrical surges. It is responsible for portable and laptop drive failures and wear and tears. Because traditional drives use moving parts, the drive surface or heads become weak and start showing signs and symptoms of defect over time. In the case of flash drives, wear and tear play the same role but in a different style. Flash drives have certain usage counts which means the more the drive is re-written, the more decrease in its life occurs and one day will it can fail abruptly. Lastly, manufacturing defects can be a common issue with material quality and software playing a role in this kind of failure.

Furthermore, it is also important to know what is involved in hard drive surgery. Donor drives, surrounding environment and costs can determine the steps taken after hard drive failure. Hard drive surgery is necessary when a storage device fails and the procedures for the regular and flash media differentiate. Regular drives have moving heads and surfaces and a donor drive is needed for repair. The donor drive must be very closely matched to the patients drive. The requirement for donor drive is very strict. The donor drive must be exactly the same as patient drive which cannot be found in hard drive stores. The surgery usually involves head replacement, motor replacement or moving platters to another drive. The head transplant requires extensive experience and perfection. A slight mistake can destroy the data permanently. Another important aspect is the environment in which the procedure is taking place. There must be the availability of a clean room or environment. A dusty space will destroy the thin layer between the head and surface and cause damage. Lastly, the prices and costs of these repairs vary depending on the availability of certain items required for repair. Donor drives are more expensive compared to regular drive prices because of the demand for this costly data recovery. Normally a donor drives costs 3 to 4 times more than a regular, new hard drive. Such drives are in short supply and are unique in most cases, which explain the high expense.

Overall, knowing about hard drives and their repair process can both prevent and recover the data that could be lost in the future.