USB Flash Drive Repair/Data Recovery

[dr. d]

I can't believe this. My USB got corrupted ata. It's dead, not even read by my laptop. I tried it using another laptop, wala talaga. My friend said could be like a wire or power or something that was damaged? I have all my accounting there so I am desperate to retrieve the files. What's funny is I was planning on backing it up when this happened. And yes, I am stupid for keeping my files on a USB lang.

that also happened to me. after some time of non-use, mine couldn't be read.
it would appear, flashdrives do have a lifetime?

[_Cathy_]

I am desperate to retrieve the files That's 2+ yrs of accounting and I don't think I could backtrack it

[oj88]

Check FB Marketplace for data recovery services.

[_Cathy_]

Check FB Marketplace for data recovery services.

Thanks, chatted with an FB marketplace guy. Looks like a hardware issue nga. It's not detected at all, dati kasi when I insert my USB flash drive umiilaw. I used different ports and even a different laptop na.

[Walter]

Try to press and hold the USB stick while reading ... or wiggle a little ...

[oj88]

Thanks, chatted with an FB marketplace guy. Looks like a hardware issue nga. It's not detected at all, dati kasi when I insert my USB flash drive umiilaw. I used different ports and even a different laptop na.

From the sound of it, I don't think it's getting power. It may very well be just a cold solder on any of the power pins (Vcc or Gnd). If that's the case, it's a simple fix.

I would not try fumbling with it any further. Continued USB insertions/removals might really mess up the flash memory.

[_Cathy_]

Try to press and hold the USB stick while reading ... or wiggle a little ...

I did na

From the sound of it, I don't think it's getting power. It may very well be just a cold solder on any of the power pins (Vcc or Gnd). If that's the case, it's a simple fix.

I would not try fumbling with it any further. Continued USB insertions/removals might really mess up the flash memory.

This is what my friend speculates also. Would you know where I can bring this? (Makati or BGC or even Grreenhills) The FB guys kasi want me to ship the USB but I have too many private files there.

[oj88]

I did na



This is what my friend speculates also. Would you know where I can bring this? (Makati or BGC or even Grreenhills) The FB guys kasi want me to ship the USB but I have too many private files there.

Greenhills would be the place. Ask around... technicians there know each other and will point you to the guy who's been able to fix these things.

[LOLZ]

that also happened to me. after some time of non-use, mine couldn't be read.
it would appear, flashdrives do have a lifetime?

Good working flash-based drives can lose their contents if they remain unpowered/unused for too long (Usually manufacturers claim ten years). Usually their overall lifetime though is limited by the number of writes done to the device and why it'd best to leave some space for the drive to be able to wear itself evenly by doing new writes to that empty space and just marking overwritten parts of the data already on the drive as deleted instead of actually deleting and rewriting the data on the same set of blocks it was previously in.(many if not all devices nowadays already do this by reserving a chunk of your storage).

[oj88]

It doesn't seem like the Cathy wasn't using the drive, so failure from non-use is likely not the cause.

But the fact that even the LED doesn't light up makes it seem like it's a power supply fault. If that's addressed, hopefully the drive should immediately work again. I've had thumbdrives that failed on me that still powers up, but is no longer detected by the host computer.

[_Cathy_]

Yes I regularly use the USB drive. It's admittedly stupid of me that my files are on the USB drive instead of my laptop

[oj88]

Always have multiple copies if it's critical. My wife uses OneDrive + a USB Drive for backup.

[Motortrend]

Always have multiple copies if it's critical. My wife uses OneDrive + a USB Drive for backup.

Yup, redundancy is key. Sending it to oneself by email is not efficient and will eat into cloud storage (e.g., Google drive).

[oj88]

The laptop she uses is also backed up to my server using Veeam. So even if the current file gets corrupted, there's still a slightly older copy somewhere in retention she can come back to.

[Walter]

Yes I regularly use the USB drive. It's admittedly stupid of me that my files are on the USB drive instead of my laptop

It's actually a wise idea ... you can backup data to the cloud ... for smaller files, email yourself a copy ... or use Google Drive ...