Data Recovery Austin TX

How Data Recovery Works at PC Genie

Data loss is stressful. Whether it's years of family photos, critical business documents, a thesis you've been working on for months, or financial records you need for tax season — losing access to your files feels like a disaster. The good news is that in many cases, data can be recovered.

At PC Genie, we start every data recovery case with an honest assessment. We'll examine the drive, determine whether the failure is logical (software/file system) or physical (mechanical/electronic), and tell you plainly what your options are. We don't string people along with false hope, and we don't charge for recovery work that doesn't produce results.

Types of Data Recovery We Handle

Hard Drive Recovery (HDD)

Traditional spinning hard drives fail in two ways: logically and physically. Logical failures mean the drive's mechanics work fine, but the file system is corrupted, the partition table is damaged, or files were accidentally deleted. We recover data from these drives in-shop using professional recovery software and write-blocking hardware.

Physical failures — clicking sounds, grinding noises, drives that spin up but aren't detected — require a clean-room environment with specialized tools. We don't pretend to do clean-room work in our shop. If your drive needs that level of service, we'll tell you, explain the likely cost, and refer you to a reputable lab. That honest referral could save you hundreds compared to a shop that takes your money, fails, and then refers you anyway.

SSD Recovery

Solid-state drives fail differently than HDDs. There are no moving parts, so there's no clicking or grinding. Instead, SSDs can suddenly stop being recognized, throw read errors, or become read-only. The tricky part with SSDs is the TRIM command — modern operating systems actively tell SSDs to erase deleted data to maintain performance. This means the window for recovering deleted files from an SSD is much shorter than with an HDD.

If your SSD stopped working or you accidentally deleted important files, stop using the drive immediately. Don't install new software, don't save new files, don't run disk repair utilities. Bring it in as-is, and we'll evaluate what's recoverable.

Deleted File Recovery

Accidentally emptied the Recycle Bin? Reformatted the wrong drive? Deleted a folder you shouldn't have? If you haven't written much new data to the drive since the deletion, there's a good chance we can recover your files. The key is to stop using the drive as soon as possible — every new file written to the drive reduces the chance of recovery.

Corrupt Partition Recovery

Partition corruption can happen after a power failure, a bad Windows update, a failed dual-boot setup, or malware infection. The drive may show as unallocated, RAW, or simply refuse to mount. We use specialized tools to reconstruct the partition table and extract your data, even when Windows thinks the drive is empty.

RAID Recovery

For small businesses running NAS devices or server RAID arrays, a failed drive can mean downtime and data loss. We handle RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 recovery. We assess the array configuration, identify which drives have failed, and attempt to reconstruct the data. If the damage is beyond in-shop recovery, we'll be straightforward about it.

What We Won't Do

We believe honesty is more valuable than a sale. If your drive has physical damage that requires clean-room work, we won't open it in our shop and risk making things worse. If the data is likely unrecoverable, we'll tell you before you spend money. And if a cheaper recovery option exists (like a simple backup you forgot about), we'll point you to it instead of charging for recovery.