Formatted Data Carrier

format c: or mkfs.ext?

Attingo is helping people affected by data loss from formatted data carriers on a daily basis. With over 27 years of experience, know-how and qualified technicians and engineers we reconstruct your data from all different types of formatted data carriers in our in-house laboratories. We are familiar with the following data carriers:

• RAID
• NAS
• Server
• Hard drives
• Flash memories (SSD, USB Stick, memory card)
• Windows (NTFS, FAT16, FAT32)
• Linux (exFAT, ext2 ext3 ext4, XFS)
• Apple (HFS+)
• Other filesystems (BTRFS, ReiserFS, ZFS, VMFS)

Data rescue is a matter of trust - confide in us!

In-house clean room laboratories, specifically designed physical and logical tools, ISO certified processes, professional expertise, trained technical staff and extensive experience with rescuing data from formatted data carriers are just a few of the ingredients of our success-oriented Attingo formula. We recover your lost data!

Your next steps after data loss:

• Don't apply power to the data carrier anymore in order to prevent consequential damage and increase the chances of a successful data recovery.
• If possible, tell us the exact model number or name and the capacity of your formatted data carrier.
• We advise you on our Diagnosis Services as well as the process of the data rescue. If you need an express data rescue our staff will be there for you all around the clock.
• Take a look at our packaging tips so your data carrier arrives safely at our laboratories.

How was the hard disk formatted?

Fast formatting:

The classic way of formatting a data carrier, especially when the operating system or the system drive is reset up, is fast formatting. The index (in the NTFS file system under Windows the MFT) and all information about the existing file structure are erased. The data are still on the ferromagnetic disks physically, but cannot be retrieved logically.

Mid level formatting:

The content of the hard drive is physically overwritten with zeros. Every usable sector of the data carrier is affected. In this case there is no chance of a successful data recovery, as soon as the low level formatting is completed (but it's not possible to erase 100 percent of a hard drive).

Unlike a deliberately performed mid level formatting, a fast formatting is often performed accidentally. A few careless clicks are enough.

If often happens that the user is asked to format the data carrier by the system, when access to the data is no longer possible or the data carrier is not recognised. In most cases physical damage (partial surface damage - defective sectors) are the reason why no files are shown, followed by the request "The data carrier has to be formatted".

Partition newly formatted:

This often happens when a system is being reinstalled, without backing up the data before (e.g. Outlook files or the favourites). If so-called recovery-CDs or recovery-partitions are used, the result can be more fatal than a simple formatting.

When formatting the media, no new data is being written and the original raw data is still recoverable. When using recovery-CDs or -partitions, the raw data is being partially overwritten and the original raw data is lost.

Attingo Data Rescue has developed special methods and processes in order to also recover formatted or deleted files from the Linux-filesystems ext, ext2, ext3 and ext4. The chances are indipendant from the size – whether only a few MegaBytes or several GigaBytes – and the fragmentation of the data.

Errors of Partition-Manager

Commonly Partition-Manager software is used to manipulate already existing partitions:

• Resizing a partition
• Splitting up or merge partitions
• Converting partitions (FAT32 -> NTFS)

These programs can crash during the process, which means that the so-called “runlists” are not recalculated. This is an index-like list within the file system, that indicates on which sector of the media which data fragment is located. Without these the data cannot be logically found by the operating system and the partitions are no more accessible.

Which measures were taken after the formatting?

The success of a data rescue is dependent on the measures taken after data loss.

Has power been applied to the data carrier after data loss?

This may have an effect on Solid State Drives with active "TRIM" command and affect the chances of a successful data rescue as well as the quality of the recovered data. The "TRIM" command sets deleted blocks free one after the other and there may also be temporary files which overwrite the existing files.

Have new files, programmes or software been installed in the data carrier?

The more data is saved on the data carrier after the formatting, the more files are overwritten and are irretrievably lost. A newly set up operating system may occupy a larger part of the hard drive than the previous version, due to updates made during the past months and years. With every new photo previous photos are overwritten on the newly formatted memory card. 

The fewer measures were takes after the formatting, the better are the chances of a successful data rescue.

Which file formats have to be recovered?

Fragmented files:

If the file structure is damaged, incomplete or the original run lists are missing after formatting and saving new data, the reconstructing of fragmented files may be complicated. Dynamic data which grow during the course of their application time (e.g. databases, virtual machines) or fragmented data (e.g. videos) may have considerable declines when it comes to completeness, usability and quality.

Anonymous files:

There are common file formats, which can be nearly completely recovered, but not the original file structure and file names. Those are called anonymous files, when only specified file types and defined headers are searched and all files on the data carrier, also logically damages fragments, erased files, shadow copies and outdated data segments are restored. The original file system is also important. Dependent on the file system used, different technology and tools have to be used for data rescue. The area, in which file and directory information is administered may vary from file system to file system.