RAID data recovery: just how reliable are RAIDs?
RAID data
recovery is a term that is regularly entered into search engines. Vitally, this
serves to disprove the widespread and damaging myth that RAIDs are a sure-fire
way of keeping vital data safe and are an unassailable means of preserving
digital files. RAIDs can and do fail and, whilst they offer a degree of
protection that will at times allow an IT professional to retrieve lost data
without the need to enlist additional support following a failure, there are
certain to be times that the assistance of RAID data recovery experts
will be needed.
The majority of RAID setups offer additional protection
against data loss, the only exception being RAID 0 which offers improved
read/write speeds, only. Other arrays reduce the risk of data loss by either
containing at least two drives that store the same information (i.e. a clone
drive) or a parity drive which, in the event of data loss, can be used to
rebuild and recreate what’s been lost. Now, we know you’re probably thinking that
this would be perfectly sufficient but, sadly, RAIDs’ ability to continue to
operate following one drive having failed is often behind arrays failing in
their entirety.
When a single drive fails, a RAID can continue to perform
the same functions as usual but with limited functionality. Once a single drive
has failed, however, the likelihood of another failing increases significantly and,
as RAIDs are rarely checked and the symptoms of a single drive having failed
can be difficult to spot, when one drive fails, the entire array often follows.
With RAIDs often deployed in servers, they consistently
store data that is vital to businesses’ everyday operations and, should they
fail, this can be highly detrimental and rebuilding and/or recovering the files
that were once stored on it is likely to be a time-consuming process whether
undertaken in-house or by RAID recovery specialists such as Fields Data
Recovery. As the latter are usually able to recover data more rapidly, however,
it’s generally the preferred option for businesses desperate to get their data
back.
How much does RAID
recovery cost?
Sadly, this is one of those questions that simply can’t be
answered until the reason for failure has been determined and the best means of
recovering the data has been decided.
With businesses operating on precise budgets, we appreciate
that this is less than ideal – it’s one of the reasons why we offer a
free RAID data recovery diagnostic to all potential clients.