Lost Data on Your Hard Drive? Here's Exactly What to Do Next

Whether you accidentally formatted a drive, watched a 'No Bootable Device' error appear, or heard a click-of-death from an external HDD — what you do in the next hour matters more than which company you call. Here is the same checklist we follow at our workshop.

1. Stop using the device — immediately

Every new write on a drive risks overwriting the very sectors holding your deleted data. Power the device off if you can, and unplug external drives.

2. Don't run recovery software on the original drive

Free tools like Recuva or PhotoRec are excellent — but only when installed on a different drive. Installing them on the affected disk overwrites the very data you're trying to save.

3. Identify which type of failure you have

• Logical (accidentally deleted, formatted, file system corruption) — best DIY chance, software can usually help.
• Light physical (drive mounts intermittently, slow, SMART warnings) — needs a clone first, then recovery from the clone.
• Heavy physical (clicking, not detected, won't spin) — DIY will make it worse. Stop and call a professional.

4. Don't trust 'free recovery' chains

Reputable recovery services will quote in writing with a no-data-no-fee guarantee. If a shop quotes blind, or asks for payment upfront before opening the drive, walk away.

5. After recovery — set up a 3-2-1 backup

Three copies of every important file, on two different media types, with one off-site. Cloud backup (iCloud, OneDrive, Google Drive, Backblaze) counts as the off-site copy and costs less than a coffee a week.