HU · HUL-2026-0804LOGGED ✓
Ten years of family photos on a clicking 2TB Seagate
A matched donor head stack went in. We read the platters either side of the scored band, then rebuilt the photo library from the image, not the drive.
Data recovery bench · Hull · Beverley · Grimsby · Bridlington · East Riding
Data recovery in Hull. The disk stops; what was written on it usually stays there.
An external drive that clicks and never appears. A memory card the computer wants to format. A USB stick broken off at the plug. A Mac stuck on the flashing folder. A RAID short of a member. In most of those the files are still on the media, wherever in Hull it failed. Looking costs nothing, the price comes back as one written figure, and on most work a failed recovery produces no bill.
Most jobs: nothing back, nothing to pay
Twenty-five years at the bench
Recoveries start at £250 + VAT
GDPR compliant · ICO ZC173784
Prefer to phone?
0800 6890668
No charge to look · your own reference
HDR-2026-····
What sort of device is it?
Choose the nearest match. That decides what we test first.
No charge · no obligationUsually answered within the hour
Four Hull jobs, and what went home.
Read the whole casebook →HU · HUL-2026-0785LOGGED ✓
A NAS in Grimsby stopped part-way through a rebuild
Each disk was removed and copied before anything ran against the array. The rebuild then happened in software, on those copies, and all the shared folders opened as they always had.
HU · HUL-2026-0779LOGGED ✓
An entire wedding on an SD card reading empty
We took an image of the card before any software ran on it. From that copy the directory was repaired and every frame carved back at full size.
HU · HUL-2026-0768LOGGED ✓
A break-in, and a DVR that would not play back
We copied the recorder's disk through a write blocker. Its own video format was then decoded against the time codes, and the single hour the insurer wanted went out as a file by itself.
Start from the device,
or from the symptom.
Not on the list? Ring us →
Devices and media we work on
The internal diskTicking, grinding or dead quiet: donor heads, then reads at platter level→ External drives, big and smallFailed bridge boards; WD and Seagate portables dropped→ SSD & NVMeController dead: the NAND is read chip by chip→ MacBooks and MacsAPFS volumes, the T2 chip, Apple silicon Macs→ Arrays, servers & NASEach member imaged first, then RAID 1, 5 or 10 rebuilt in software→ The NAS boxSynology, QNAP, WD, Buffalo — every disk copied before anything else→ SD and camera cardsSD, microSD, CFexpress and CF cards reading as empty→ USB sticks and flashSnapped connectors; monolith chips soldered at the pads→Sorted by fault
Clicking or beepingUnplug it now. Every click removes more of the recording surface→ Nothing shows upIt will not spin, no light, nothing in the BIOS→ Files deleted or missingA hard disk holds on to it; on an SSD, TRIM clears it→ Wiped by a formatA format resets the index; the sectors below still hold data→ A ransomware attackWe never pay a ransom; originals often remain on the disk→ Locked out by BitLockerGiven your recovery key, a damaged volume can still be opened→ It took a knockThe outside looks fine; the heads inside are misaligned→ Water or fire damageDo not power it up, do not dry it — bag it wet and post it→Court & insurance work
A few of these disks
end up as evidence.
Most jobs end the day the files go back. Some do not: an insurance claim, a tribunal, an argument between an employer and staff. Those are handled as evidence from the moment the parcel is opened. Copies are taken through a write blocker, hashes checked, the exhibit given a reference, every step noted as it happens. We also say what could not be read, and why.
Reports written to be tested
Machines, disks and cards are copied first, then examined from the copy by a method recorded as we go. Solicitors, insurers, employers and private clients across the East Riding instruct us. You need the authority to have a device examined.
- Sector-by-sector copies, with the handling logged throughout
- Deleted material brought back, and a timeline of what was done
- Plain findings & an expert's report where instructed
- Staff misconduct; company files taken off site
Footage off DVR & NVR boxes
Clips deleted, or locked inside a recorder that will not start. Recorders write over old footage, and how soon depends on the box and its settings, so ring early. We index the disk by time code and export the part you need.
- Deleted clips the recorder has not yet written over
- Dead disks lifted out of DVRs and NVRs
- Exports put together for an insurer or a tribunal
- Proprietary formats: Hikvision, Dahua, Swann and the rest
What happens after it lands.
All seven stages →Book it in
Phone the bench, or work through the panel further up this page. You get a case number, and instructions for packing the device so it survives the post.
Send it over
Post it to the intake lab in Leeds — insured, tracked — or drop it in. Whichever you choose, the journey back is paid for.
The diagnosis
An engineer establishes what has failed and how much of it can honestly be read. That costs nothing, and commits you to nothing.
One figure, written
No chargeable work starts until you have that number in front of you, along with what we found.
The files come back
Anything recovered goes home on fresh media. We leave the case open until you have looked through the lot.
What people across Hull said afterwards.
Read the reviews →Many thanks to Hull Data Recovery and your data recovery engineers on the recent recovery of the HP RAID-5 data belonging to our client.
I was surprised how easy it was to accidentally delete what I thought were junk folders but actually contained some very precious photos and files.
Thanks to a very nasty malware ransomware virus, I thought all my business files were lost for good.
A drive left switched off loses nothing more.
A drive that is failing gets worse every time it spins up. Take it out of use, and let us tell you what can still be read. That part is free.