Nobody repairs a USB stick and hands it back working — the parts cost less than the labour. What matters is getting the data off once, and how that is done depends entirely on something you cannot see: whether the stick is built as separate components or as one sealed package.
$ mdr diagnose /dev/sdb → Device: SanDisk Ultra · 64 GB USB → Status: SNAPPED — connector torn off, not detected → Client: confidential · Manchester, Greater Manchester $ mdr engineer-working → Connector: re-soldered · pads rebuilt → NAND: read direct · controller bypassed → Imaging: 61 GB / 64 GB · 100% read $ mdr verify → ✓ documents — 8,400 files → ✓ photos — 12,600 files → ✓ drive recovered — data back
A stick that reads only when held at an angle has cracked solder joints, and every insertion flexes them further. A stick that offers to format itself has a damaged file system or a failing controller — and accepting that offer writes through the very component that is failing.
The honest answer to what most people actually search for.
Nobody repairs a USB stick and hands it back working. The components are surface-mounted on a board the size of a stamp, often sealed in resin, and the economics are absurd — a replacement costs a few pounds. What can be done is to get the data off, once, and that is a different job entirely.
How that is done depends on one thing you cannot see from the outside: whether the stick is built as separate components or as a single fused package. Everything else about the recovery follows from that.
Superficially identical sticks can present completely different prospects.
Worth explaining, because it is where the time goes on the harder jobs.
Pulling data directly off flash — whether by desoldering a chip or reading through test points — does not produce files. It produces a raw dump that has to be de-interleaved across the flash planes, corrected for ECC, and unscrambled according to the arrangement that particular controller used. Only then does anything resembling a file system appear, and only then can the files be carved out.
That work is manufacturer-specific and it is the reason two sticks of the same capacity can differ by days in turnaround. It is also why a stick that still enumerates and simply will not mount is a far quicker job than one that is electrically silent.
One price whatever the construction turns out to be.
USB sticks and memory cards are from £250 +VAT, confirmed after a free 48-hour diagnostic, with most jobs no fix, no fee. Hardware-encrypted sticks are the exception we will tell you about immediately: without the password nobody opens those, and we would rather say so than charge you to find out.
Send the stick exactly as it is — don’t straighten a bent connector, don’t open the casing, and if a piece has broken off, send that too. Drop-off at Peter House on Oxford Street, Manchester, or post it insured.
Get the stick to us, and tell us a brief fault description. The diagnostic that follows costs nothing, and one figure goes in writing before any work begins.
Nothing starts until the stick to us is on the bench. Pack it properly and put your contact details in with it. The diagnostic that follows costs nothing, and one figure goes in writing before any work begins.
Posting it? Use something tracked and insured — whatever is on the drive is worth considerably more than the postage. Bringing it in? Weekdays, 9am to 5:30pm, and it still wants packing as above for the journey.
Not sure it is worth sending? Tell us about the stick and fault, plus anything already attempted — an engineer reads every one of these and comes back with an honest view of the odds and a price band, before you post anything.
We’ll be in touch shortly. If it’s urgent, call 0161 871 0788.
The technical questions we get most about failed USB sticks.
Not economically, and not in a way that returns it to service — the components are surface-mounted on a tiny board and a replacement costs a few pounds. What can be done is recovering the data off it once, which is a different job.
No. That message normally means the file system header is damaged or the controller is failing, not that your data has gone. Formatting writes through the failing component and makes the recovery considerably harder.
Almost certainly not. The break happens at the solder joint, and the memory on the other side of it is generally untouched. Snapped connectors have the best odds of any USB fault. Send the broken piece too.
One where the controller and flash are fused into a single sealed package, standard on most modern sticks. There is no separate chip to remove, so recovery goes through internal test points on the package using the correct pinout for that exact part.
Because raw flash is not a file system. A dump has to be de-interleaved, ECC-corrected and unscrambled to that controller’s arrangement before files appear, and that work is manufacturer-specific. A stick that still enumerates is far quicker than one that is electrically silent.
From £250 plus VAT for sticks and memory cards, fixed in writing after a free 48-hour diagnostic, with most jobs no fix, no fee.
Flash sticks are either discrete — a controller and separate memory chips — or monolithic, where everything is a single sealed package read through its test points. The make tells us which to expect.
Names with an arrow have a guide of their own — brand-specific faults, and what they mean for a recovery.
£250 +VAT, agreed before anything is opened. Snapped connectors usually break at the furthest point from the memory, which is why these recover as well as they do — and why repeatedly pushing one back into a port is the thing that costs you.