RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks, and it’s a standard disk visualization approach for managing several disks in a single unit.
However, integrating and handling multiple disks means there are chances of several unknown data losses. Here, RAID alone can not help. Hence, having a RAID server data recovery tool is essential to recover any lost data.
So, let us take you to the extensive guide on RAID data recovery and how employing the services can help get back the lost data. But firstly, we will begin with the basics.
Reasons for RAID Data Loss
Although each RAID data rescue is different, there are some typical reasons behind the loss of data. These include:
Human Mistakes
The data loss can happen accidentally or due to malicious intent. Here, the raid data server recovery experts can analyze the reasons for information loss like reinstallation or reformatting.
Power Outages
Power outages, surges, and cycling can all damage RAID systems. Thus, it results in data loss. Unsynchronized disks may be reintegrated into a degraded RAID array due to power concerns, rendering it ineffective.
Natural Calamities
Water, dust, fire, and other natural particulates tend to damage the RAID systems in a fraction of seconds. Here, extracting and rebuilding all the data requires the right tools. Thus, saving the RAID system that is influenced by natural calamities.
Automated Issues
Individual drive failure is not possible with the RAID systems. However, RAID when running in a degraded state and the workload of other drives increasing leads to drive failures. Additionally, it can cause complete damage to the RAID system. Here, employing a data recovery company with experienced tools and experts would be the ideal solution. They can help in better rebuilding and file system repairing from the RAID systems.
How RAID Data Recovery Works
RAID disks are the best data storage option for businesses and residential users alike. This multi-drive storage solution provides advantages such as higher capacity, faulty tolerance, and dependability.
Although RAID provides data redundancy, it may occasionally fail to enable information access. Data redundancy indicates that the majority of the data is available in multiple locations to facilitate fault tolerance.
RAID uses specific software and hardware and merges the physical drives into one single unit. Add-in cards or motherboards come into use to create hardware solutions. Some, on the other hand, may manifest as big corporate SAN or NAS servers. Such a disk is typically used on servers, although it can also be utilized on workstations.
Guide to RAID Data Recovery Process
Now, we will talk about the steps to be followed for the RAID recovery procedure. This will help you understand how the data restoration takes place.
Create a backup of all drives
This is a common approach when it comes to any type of data recovery process. Making copies of all drives makes the recovery procedure go more smoothly for the specialists.
Perform a diagnostic on each drive
A data recovery professional will conduct a diagnosis on all drives to determine whether any of them are broken or damaged. They also inspect the working drives to ensure that there is no damage and nothing is left unaddressed.
Determine each RAID drive metadata
Following the detection and correction of all faults, the recovery engineer will do a metadata check. Each RAID drive’s metadata includes information on its kind, size, and order. It also displays the most recent data pushed to the device. Of course, it is vital to determine which drive has the maximum workload.
Recreate the physical RAID array
The next step is to determine the array’s logical units. The data recovery expert will reproduce the physical disk layout and the information tree. This way, the specialist will be able to see any files or data structures that are seeable even after the failure.
Rebuilding the physical RAID system layout helps assess how much data can be recovered. Usually, the storage drive with immense capacity will comprise more logical units. Here, reviewing and rebuilding such units increases the timeframe it takes to recover.
Retrieve data using the filesystem
The logical units we discussed before also aid the RAID data recovery expert in examining and using the RAID’s filesystem. A system like this helps to map the array’s logical structure to file locations. When the RAID system fails, it’s necessary to find this filesystem. The reason for this is that it contains all of the data location information that was lost due to the RAID failure.
A raw recovery will come as the solution in case of filesystem failure. It only comes into use when the recovery engineer is unable to create a file directory because of more severe damage. This procedure checks the full array for files matching the file type.
There can also be chances of no data restoration in case of several RAID system failures.
Retrieve and inspect sample files
When all these above steps are completed, the expert of the data recovery company will retrieve the lost file and see if it is working fine.
Several RAID levels utilize data striping and distribute the information across multiple locations to provide redundancy. Thus, making it a necessity to rebuild the data tree precisely. Here, the testing steps come as the next step to verify the success of rebuilding and availability of functional data before the complete data extraction takes place.
Before performing the complete data extraction, the testing procedures will be carried out. This will help to check the efficacy of rebuilding and the availability of required information.
Recover all data available from the RAID array
The recovery professional retrieves all available data from the RAID in the final step of RAID recovery. This copies all of your data to the healthy drive and gives you access to it.
Frequently, a list of recovered files is sent to you to assure that the files are the ones that were lost due to RAID failure.
So, this is how the RAID fat recovery process takes place. However, the RAID configurations, hard drive count, and failure complexity can be factors that may vary from one case to another.
Summing Up
So, this is all. Now that you are well aware of the RAID data recovery, you will experience no permanent data loss. You can contact Data Recovery CBL company for getting assistance regarding any sort of data loss. All the specialists here are available 24*7 to assist with the RAID server data recovery needs. We are a leading company that assures safe data recovery for all types of data loss. The services provided by us include NAS data recovery, Backup tape set recovery, SAN data recovery, and Server RAID array recovery.
In simple terms, having the best data recovery labs to industry experts makes it ideal to choose us to retrieve your data back from failed RAIDs. Additionally, our skilled specialists comprise the expertise and knowledge to perform efficient data recovery.
