OnTrack Data Recovery ? Care with Your Mac

Today, the traditional personal computer is slowly being replaced by new platforms, and at the forefront of this technology, is Apple with their Macs. Television, mobile phones, and most importantly, computers are all part of Apple’s product offering. Despite revolutionary new designs and form factors, much of the core technology remains the same. The hard drive is one of these technologies, and whilst seemingly simple, they have one of the highest failure rates for any hardware in Mac computers such as the Macbook Pro, Macbook Air, Mac Mini or regular Mac desktops.

According to the IDC Digital World Study, in 2011 alone, over 1.8 zettabytes (1.8 trillion gigabytes) of data were created, and this is expected to grow by 75x in the next decade. This is exciting, but also raises many questions – hard drives are mechanical and certainly don’t have a long life span, accidents happen, and data loss and the subsequent hard drive data recovery or hard drive repairs are something that almost everyone has had to deal with in the past.

The difficult part is how do you avoid this, and what happens if it happens to you?

Not many people realise the value of backing up their computers, assuming that retrieval can be simple. This is rarely the case, and professional data retrieval from a failed hard drive can cost upwards of $ 1000. Often, data loss can be avoided by observing some simple signs, and if files are lost, they can sometimes be found by using simple crashed hard drive data recovery tools. To start at the basics, a hard drive is the storage of the computer – on it is contained the operating system, such as Apple OS X, as well as any music, videos, documents, and applications you may own.

Whilst most modern operating systems are quite reliable, data corruption, in which unintended errors occur when writing a file to the disk, is common, and often it means that the file will be inaccessible.

If you don’t have a backup of this file, then you may not be able to use it again, meaning that you have lost your data. There are many ways you can lose data, however one of the most common along with corruption, is simply accidental deletion. Both of these can be fixed or recovered through the use of crashed hard drive recovery tools. Kroll Ontrack Easy Recovery Pro, which enables the user to both repair files and recover files that have been deleted in the past – a lifesaver if you ever lose important files.

The other, admittedly more complex side of data loss, is when the hard drive fails, either due to mechanical fault or by being damaged, and this means that a hard drive recovery tool couldn’t be used. Hard drives do not last forever – largely because they contain moving parts, spinning at over 7200 RPM which in turn generates heat.

Whilst they are often seen as very reliable, these problems still occur very commonly on Apple computers. To keep up with demand, Apple uses several manufacturers including Hitachi, Western Digital and Seagate to supply their hard drives, meaning that there can be inconsistencies in quality. There are many signs that can mean your hard drive is failing, with the most obvious usually being it making strange sounds such as grinding or screeching. This usually means that the head has crashed, or the motor has stopped working, and as a worst-case scenario, this could mean that one of the platters has slipped, and it is literally being ground to dust. If you ever hear these noises, it is a good idea to quickly back up your files to either an external hard drive, USB, or cloud service.

If all else fails, it can then be taken for hard drive repairs, such as those offered by Ontrack Data Recovery. Hard drive repairs can generally retrieve your important data, but there is always a chance that the loss may be permanent. It is recommended strongly to backup any important files. 

 


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