Dead SSD (seems to be a controller issue) any means of recovering data?


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I have a Sandisk Ultra 120GB SSD and it isn't being recognized at all.

 

I know that the data will be on the drive, alive in 0's and 1's because it's not a case of the drive being recognized but being F'd.

 

So I'm assuming this is a controller issue.

 

Are there any means to recover the data from the drive? or repair or replace the controller? 

 

Thanks :)

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When an SSD goes and SSD goes.

Really? can you briefly explain why to me at least so I can take the bad news better. 

wow. mark as solved asap! :rolleyes:

 

I take it you know better? 

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I take it you know better? 

i dont. im just expressing that the response wasnt exactly helpful. "when a car goes, it goes." "when a video card goes, it goes" "when a house catches on fire, it catches on fire"

 

the only thing i'd recommend is a professional service, like torolol said. if the controller is dead, which is certainly likely, then nothing is going to read the memory.

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i dont. im just expressing that the response wasnt exactly helpful. "when a car goes, it goes." "when a video card goes, it goes" "when a house catches on fire, it catches on fire"

 

the only thing i'd recommend is a professional service, like torolol said. if the controller is dead, which is certainly likely, then nothing is going to read the memory.

 

I'm looking into it, I don't see how the tech community hasn't worked out a way to do it at home.

 

I appreciate your facetious response to that guy btw, I understood the comment so don't worry :P 

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I would check to see if your power or sata data cable isn't just making a bad 'bite' onto the connector. I have a 60GB version in a PC that needs little or no effort to knock the cables off due to the ill fitting port design of SanDisk's SSD.

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I'm looking into it, I don't see how the tech community hasn't worked out a way to do it at home.

 

I appreciate your facetious response to that guy btw, I understood the comment so don't worry :p

 

I'm guessing it might be a froensic level recovery, requiring removal of the flash chips. Which means cash, which means, backups should have been in place if the data was important.

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I would check to see if your power or sata data cable isn't just making a bad 'bite' onto the connector. I have a 60GB version in a PC that needs little or no effort to knock the cables off due to the ill fitting port design of SanDisk's SSD.

 

I tried this, used new cables, used external usb adapter, fannied around with it, no luck muchacho :(

I'm guessing it might be a froensic level recovery, requiring removal of the flash chips. Which means cash, which means, backups should have been in place if the data was important.

 

Would you beleive me if I said I literally just put the important data on it, I restarted my computer and it wouldn't boot, then after hours of messing around, and putting it in other PC's etc I realised it had died. Didn't get a chance to backup. 

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I tried this, used new cables, used external usb adapter, fannied around with it, no luck muchacho :(

 

Would you beleive me if I said I literally just put the important data on it, I restarted my computer and it wouldn't boot, then after hours of messing around, and putting it in other PC's etc I realised it had died. Didn't get a chance to backup. 

Seems you've learned the important lesson that happens to all of us. The reason why backups are so important... After all, yesterday was World Backup Day.

 

Data recovery services are insanely expensive. You could possibly get a good result swapping the controller, but you'd need to find one with your exact firmware version if you were to have any hope of going that route. I'm still not sure how well that road would work on an SSD since there is probably a lot going on with how it manipulates the data stored on it. You need to know the solid line between what is contained on the controller PCB and what usefulness it has... Meaning, SSDs have to store information about the status of each cell. If that data is stored on the controller PCB replacing it could affect how the new controller treats the cells (it may think there are blanks where this is data and etc.)... Among other things...

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SSDs die hard and suddenly, and there's not really anything you can do. The only options are to try a different SATA cable or SATA port on your mobo, but that's just assuming the SSD is still alive and well. Kalint was right though.  If it's dead, it's dead.

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I'm looking into it, I don't see how the tech community hasn't worked out a way to do it at home.

The controller circuits and nand cells are most likely on the same PCB so it's effectively impossible to repair/replace. It would require finding replacement ICs, removing the old ones, and putting on the new ones. I'm sure there are other pitfalls I haven' thought of either 

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It really depends on how badly you want the data back and how much you're willing to spend; as LogicalApex pointed out it's insanely expensive.  If it's not the controller, it's possible to read directly from the NAND chips to recover data but it's not an easy task.

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Would you mind rendering that into a known language?

 

When an SSD goes and SSD goes.   ----->       When a Solid State Drive (SSD) dies, the SSD is, for all intents and purposes, dead.

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I never have any documents or music, videos on SSD C:. All documents are on D: which is a mechanical. The same copy of D: gets backed up to a NAS Raid6 of same capacity as D:. I pass a system image creation command of C: weekly. So if my SSD goes bad, I will simply buy a new one and restore C: completely from a backup. Takes mere 3 minutes to get a system back online the way it was. This strategy has been working flawlessly for me since 3 years.

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When an SSD goes and SSD goes.   ----->       When a Solid State Drive (SSD) dies, the SSD is, for all intents and purposes, dead.

 

Why, thank you for the clarification.

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