Data Recovery Digest

If you buy a hard drive from Seagate then you have the choice to sign up to their Rescue and Replace service. How much this service costs depends on the type of hard drive that you have, but Seagate claim that it will cost a fraction of the price that it normally does to recover all of your data.

The Rescue and Replace plan offers the following features:
• Data recovery from anything that has caused hard drive failure, be it viruses, software issues or any other corruption.
• Cover if the drive mechanically fails, perhaps through an electrical fault. This begins as soon as the original manufacturer warranty expires.
• Protection against accidental damage, but check your terms and conditions for certain exclusions.

Depending on how the drive has failed, recovery can be attempted either remotely or in Seagate’s recovery lab. If it is the latter then the data will be stored on a different device and sent back to you. If the recovery can be done remotely, Seagate plan to get this done within seven days. If the drive needs to be sent off for in-lab recovery, then this can take up to fourteen business days from when they receive the device (the plan includes the cost of shipping, both sending the device and receiving it back).

Seagate claim that they use “commercially reasonable efforts” to recover data, but acknowledge that recovery is not always possible. If this is the case, they will provide an explanation as to why they could not recover your data.

Once you make a recovery claim, you will be assigned a case manager who will be on hand to answer any of your questions (within support hours). At any time you can login to their website and view the status of your case.

The only time you can purchase the plan is during the first year of owning the drive and while the original warranty is in place. The plan is only specific to the device you register it on and cannot be transferred to other drives.

Your plan can be cancelled at any time with a full or partial refund. If you cancel within the first 30 days of purchase then you’ll be refunded the full amount, minus any cost of claims. After 30 days, the refund amount will be prorated and reduced by any costs of repairs, along with a 10% administrative fee.

Hard drives do go wrong and don’t last forever. As such, you might find it worthwhile to invest in the Rescue and Replace plan. However, it is likely to be more cost effective to set up an effective backup plan of your own. Cost aside, using a recovery service will never guarantee that your data is going to come back. With a backup plan, you know for a fact that everything you’ve backed up is available to you and easy to restore from. You might have to buy a new hard drive if the failure is mechanical, but even that might be less than Seagate’s plan.