Data Recovery Case File · Trust, Practice & Honest Limits · Order and Economics
A Dozen Devices Is a Dozen Assessments, and the Order Decides the Cost
Her enquiry is a project rather than a fault. Two laptops, several memory cards, an external drive, four or five tablets and four or five phones, all described as dead, none of them tested — and "it's purely photos I want, no other files." The narrow objective is what makes this tractable, and the sequence in which the devices are approached decides most of what it costs.
| Media | Approximately a dozen devices of mixed type and unknown condition — two laptops, several memory cards, an external drive, multiple tablets and phones; photographic content only required |
| Reported situation | Multiple devices retained and described as dead · condition of each unknown to the owner · two laptops · several memory cards · one external hard drive · four to five tablets · four to five phones · photographic content required from any of them · no other content wanted |
| Fault class | Mixed portfolio of undetermined condition — cost and feasibility varying by device class; declared scope permitting a common approach and a triage order |
| Equipment used | Devices triaged by expected difficulty and cost before any work was committed · cards and external drive assessed first as the cheapest and most likely to yield · laptop drives removed and read independently of their hosts · phones and tablets assessed last with board and key dependencies established · recovered images de-duplicated across devices and delivered as one set |
The decode: what order to take them in, and why the scope helps
Why the objective being photographs only is the important sentence: it makes one approach work across every device. Images carry recognisable openings and are found by searching content directly, regardless of what system wrote them or how the device was arranged.
Why that matters across a mixed portfolio: without it, each device would need its own filesystem handled, its own applications understood, and its own arrangement reconstructed. Photographs are the one content type that recovers the same way everywhere.
Why the devices should not be treated as one job: they differ enormously in cost and prospects. A memory card and a phone with soldered encrypted storage are at opposite ends of both, and averaging them serves nobody.
Where to start, and it is the cheapest end: the memory cards and the external drive. Cards are quick to assess and frequently yield everything; an external drive is a single well-understood device — and cards in particular often hold the photographs that were on the phones, since that is where phone cameras used to write.
Why the laptops come next: their drives come out and read independently. Whether the machines power is irrelevant, so two dead laptops are two ordinary drive assessments rather than two repairs.
Why the phones and tablets come last: they are the most expensive and least certain. Storage is soldered, content is encrypted against board-resident hardware on anything recent, and each is an individual job — the opposite of the cards in every respect.
Why the order saves money rather than merely organising things: the photographs are likely duplicated. The same images frequently exist on a card, on a laptop that received them, and on a phone — so recovering the cheap devices first may satisfy the objective before the expensive ones are touched.
What should therefore be agreed at the outset: that the work proceeds device by device with a decision point after each stage. She should be able to stop when she has what she wants rather than commissioning everything at once.
Why de-duplication matters at the end: a dozen devices produce enormous overlap. The deliverable should be one set with duplicates removed, or the result is unusable in a different way.
What must not happen meanwhile: no attempts to power the devices to see which work. Dead is a description rather than a diagnosis, and the first power-up on an unknown device is the moment worth spending deliberately.
On the bench
Devices were triaged by expected difficulty and cost before any work was committed — photographic content carrying recognisable openings and recovering identically across device types, so a declared photo-only scope permits one approach throughout. Cards and the external drive were assessed first as the cheapest and most likely to yield, laptop drives read independently of their hosts, and phones and tablets last, storage there being soldered and encrypted against board-resident hardware. Recovered images were de-duplicated across devices.
The outcome
Devices triaged by difficulty and cost, the cheapest assessed first, and recovered images de-duplicated into a single set. Free assessment, one fixed written figure including VAT, quoted per device with a decision point after each stage. The decode: wanting photographs only is what makes this workable, because images recover the same way from every device class. Start with the cards and the drive — the same pictures are often on several devices, so the cheap ones may finish the job.
A collection of old devices and one thing you want from them
Don't power any of them to see which work — dead is a description rather than a diagnosis, and the first power-up on an unknown device is worth spending deliberately. Have them assessed in cost order with a decision point after each stage, so you can stop when you have what you want: memory cards and external drives first, since they're cheapest and most likely to yield; laptop drives next, since those come out and read whether or not the machines power; phones and tablets last, being individual jobs with soldered, encrypted storage. The same photographs are often on several devices.
Don't power them — call Manchester Data Recovery on 0161 871 0788; devices triaged by difficulty and cost, cheapest assessed first, images de-duplicated across devices into one set.
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Our case files are drawn from genuine enquiries received by our laboratory over the past ten years, anonymised to protect client confidentiality. Each one describes the diagnostic and recovery procedure our engineers apply to that fault, using the equipment listed.