Ever had this happen

[Galdorf]

Customer brings in his pc i would like this formatted,i say is there anything you need on this laptop before we format because everything will be gone.

Customer says no there is nothing on it i need to be saved so i format and reload his OS then hour later he calls back all panicky i forgot about all my pictures.

So i run recovery software and get all his pictures back and charged him extra for recovery.

This has happened so many times i think i am going to make an image just in case lol.

 

[vermonter]

Oh yes, this has happened to me enough times that I automatically backup their document folders, desktop, and bookmarks. Its amazing to me how common it is for computer users to not know what valued data resides on their systems.

 

[Doctor Micro]

LOL... yes, more times than I can count. Like vermonter, I backup the documents directory, pictures, music, favorites, extract their MS Office keys at a minimum. If they use Outlook Express I log on to their email and export their account to an .iaf file and their .wab contact file also. If they don't need any of that, I pitch it after about a week. People just don't think, and they also have a misconception about what a format and OS reload really is (or more importantly, what it is not).

Usually, it's the guy who brings it in for a N&P job, and more often than not, in a day or two, the wife says, "Hey, what happened to [fill in irreplacable file names here]. That's when I get the frantic phone call.

 

[seedubya]

Take one old XP PC, add 1 sata and 1 pata removeable drive tray, add acronis true image, and decent sized hard drive. Voila - 1 data backup station. Functionality can easily be extend by the addition of other imaging and disk management utilites and even data recovery software. Every computer business should have at least one. We have 3, simply because I'll often have 3 different systems requiring imaging on the bench.

 

[thebeardedone]

Take one old XP PC, add 1 sata and 1 pata removeable drive tray, add acronis true image, and decent sized hard drive. Voila - 1 data backup station. Functionality can easily be extend by the addition of other imaging and disk management utilites and even data recovery software. Every computer business should have at least one. We have 3, simply because I'll often have 3 different systems requiring imaging on the bench.

That is great advice for us new to the business. Nice one, seedubya

I can imagine that you would get a lot of people that would realise that they need some data of the drive after it has been n&p, so its best just to back up the important files without even asking.

 

[Doctor Micro]

Take one old XP PC, add 1 sata and 1 pata removeable drive tray, add acronis true image, and decent sized hard drive. Voila - 1 data backup station. Functionality can easily be extend by the addition of other imaging and disk management utilites and even data recovery software. Every computer business should have at least one. We have 3, simply because I'll often have 3 different systems requiring imaging on the bench.

This is exactly what we do on 3 worstations (2 XP Pro, 1 W2K), plus a couple of USB/eSATA drop-in caddies and external USB enclosures with the covers removed for easy swap in/out. All these workstations have a permanent network connection to a 4TB NAS.

 

[angry_geek]

+1 on Seedubya and others. We make an image of each drive before any kind of repair where data loss could happen. We hang on to the image for a month or until we start running low on space. You'd be surprised how many images you can keep on a couple of terabyte drives.

 

[ComputerRepairStpete]

Yes this happens almost of 50% of repair orders customer didnet know what resides in computer then give a call after 3 to 4 hours and I run recovery software.