Data recovery on ssd drives. Recovering an SSD disk: step-by-step instructions, tips

SSD Recovery | When a good memory gets into trouble

This time we contacted the Flashback Data laboratory, whose employees work on all types of data storage devices, but have special experience in working with flash memory. Representatives from Flashback Data agreed to show us what efforts a top-notch laboratory would take to save our precious flash memory.

SSD Recovery | Reading range

In its early days, Flashback primarily focused on replacing faulty chips, but over time this became increasingly difficult to do as manufacturers began using different components at different stages of production in the same model. Some devices now have encryption, which makes data recovery even more difficult. In this case, Flashback needed to be able to read memory directly, which in turn meant having an incredible number of ways to read chips from such a wide variety of flash memory available.

Note that when Flashback refers to "encryption", this state is typically unknown to the user. For example, around 2006, SanDisk began encrypting data on all of its drives, as Flashback co-founder and vice president Russell Chozick told us. Same as with automatic encryption hard drives, the controller encrypts all data stored in flash memory. Since there is no password to lock the encryption, the data is decrypted and retrieved from the media. So if the circuit board is damaged, Flashback employees try to move the controller and memory chips to a new device. “If the controller burns out, then it is almost impossible to get the data back, since it contains information about how exactly the data needs to be decrypted. If you cannot work with the controller, you are faced with a big problem.”

SSD Recovery | Types of Flash Memory

These dark gray TSOP48 chips have been typical components of USB flash drives and SSD/SD/CF memory cards for many years, but Lately they paved the way for other chips. The lowest sample in the picture shows back TLGA chip and you may notice that there are no pins on the side and the modules are located on the back side. Such chips are common for all types of flash memory and work in e.g. the latest smartphones iPhone.

During the rebuild process, Flashback employees insert TSOP48 chips into the readers, but the TLGAs must also be soldered. Obviously, the processes of analyzing and restoring information are much more complicated. So with the introduction of more compact flash memory into smartphones, the old “monolithic” formats seem simpler in comparison.

LaCie SD cards and USB devices also have monolithic chips. While most memory cards have separate controller and memory chips, a monolithic chip combines both components into one tiny module. Obviously, malfunctions of such devices can occur for any of a variety of reasons. If the controller stops working, technicians can still access the data through other means instead of using pins to connect to a card reader, smartphone or camera. In the photo, you can see how the device's case has been partially removed, as technicians need to remove some of the soldered black coating in order to find certain points to connect to logic analyzer. Once all the points have been identified, the card will be connected as shown in the following pictures.

To remove some of the coating, Flashback employees use surprisingly simple tools: sanding paste and a buffing wheel. Chemicals can be used to achieve this goal, but we were told that it is better to use a slow and thorough polishing process. Very thin contacts can easily be damaged during the grinding process. We initially asked to connect a LaCie drive, but then abandoned the idea after learning that such a job could take a technician all day.

SSD Recovery | Common flash drive errors

We've seen photos of damaged hard drives, most of which were damaged due to the head colliding with tracks in the magnetic media. Almost all SSD and flash memory damage that Flashback detects is invisible. In rare cases, you may see a burn mark on the circuit board, but in general, broken controllers and burnt fuses leave no visible marks. As a result, specialists have to work for a long time testing each resistor. In comparison, disconnecting the connector, as shown in the photo, is a piece of cake for repair specialists.

SSD Recovery | What about wear and tear?

We have previously written about the constant race between two processes - improving reading algorithms as capacity increases and reducing lithography, which is reminiscent of a tug of war. In particular, we are concerned that flash and SSD drives that have been in use for several years may show signs of wear and tear.

Fortunately, we are told that most of the SSD drives that arrive at the Flashback laboratory are not even a year old, so the NAND memory does not wear out. In fact, cases of actual wear and tear are extremely rare. Although with USB flash drives (especially older models with less advanced alignment algorithms), wear is a little more common. Reading from the chips works fine, but when checking the information, a lot of ECC errors occur, and no data can be retrieved. The presence of four red dots (further in the pictures) indicates problems with ECC. On the contrary, major wear problems will be marked with four green dots.

There were also cases when specialists carried out an analysis, took out the chip, cleaned the lamella and put everything back in place, exacerbating the problem with reading the data, which now required more time. So wear and tear can indeed be regarded as a real danger, but there is no talk of any crisis here, although many might think about it.

SSD Recovery | Heat it up

Chips must be removed from the circuit board using a special soldering jig, and one of the main tools for this step is hot air. The picture shows how specialists remove the TLGA chip from a USB device. They control the temperature and air pressure, heating the device enough to melt the solder points. Such soldering stations also contain soldering irons, welding flux, ohmmeters and other diagnostic devices. Some of these stations occupy the Flashback main laboratory, which is approximately 465 square meters.

CONTENT

Solid state drives (or SSDs) are becoming more and more relevant today and are displacing the already familiar ones from the market. hard disks HDD. On this moment users who have an SSD installed use it to store system files, some necessary and important programs, documents, settings and the like.

SSD drives have become so popular due to the fact that they have no moving elements, unlike their HDD predecessors. Thus, errors, viruses and system shutdowns can greatly damage the stored data on such disks. And therefore files are deleted, disks are formatted, partitions are damaged and system files on such drives as often as on conventional magnetic ones.

But how can you recover lost data on a solid-state drive and is it even possible?

The way information is recovered on conventional hard drives is significantly different from how it can and should be recovered on disks SSD type. Information here can either be restored or not. But you can consider a data recovery method if you use special program entitled Hetman Partition Recovery.

The process of recovering data from a disk that has been deleted, which is made using SSD technology, is almost impossible.

In many cases, data that was deleted on purpose or accidentally cannot be restored. This conclusion may be scary, because many would not be ready to hear such an answer, but it is so. Distinctive feature, which the SSD drive has, unlike other traditional devices, is TRIM. This - special team V ATA interface, thanks to which the solid-state controller literally physically clears data blocks previously used to store deleted files. That is, the controller receives a command at the moment when a file is deleted, but the actual deletion of existing information does not occur instantly. However, now the controllers in SSDs work in such a way that the message that the data block is empty comes immediately when a deletion command is received, regardless of the fact that the data block can be cleared later.

And what can be done about this? In general, not much, but nevertheless. It can also be said that even this rule has an exception. When the TRIM command fails, either this option is not supported at all by the disk, in the operating system itself or in the interface between personal computer and an SSD drive, you can restore files as if they were saved on regular disk. But today, most SSD drives support the TRIM command. Exist Mac versions OS that do not support this function and therefore you can safely restore deleted files. In the same way, you can restore files on versions that were before Windows Vista. They also do not have TRIM command support. And also to general information we can say that this command does not have the capability and is not supported by USB and FireWire protocols. Because the data is from your external media can recover easily.

It is also not recommended to recover deleted files from already formatted SSD drives

There are two types of formatting - full and quick. If you use the full, then all the information stored on the hard drive is erased. But if you use fast, then only the partition table, which contains information about the files, is cleared. This allows a program called Hetman Partition Recovery to efficiently, and also quickly, recover lost and deleted files. But now, for users who have SSD drives, this number will not work. At the moment when the disk is formatted, and it does not matter whether it is full or quick formatting, herself operating system gives the green light to the TRIM command. Next, the SSD controller literally physically erases the information contained in the data blocks. And again, it must be said that such a procedure is not instantaneous, but nevertheless, many controllers are designed in such a way that the existing data is reset after the TRIM command is executed. If you do not take into account the exceptions mentioned above, then data after formatting the SSD disk is not restored. And even when I would have been chosen fast type formatting.

How to repair a crashed or damaged SSD drive?

If your SSD drive is damaged or has very serious damage, stops being read and is not seen by the system, then this is also a plus. Ironically, perhaps, at this very moment all files are securely stored on the disk, because the TRIM command had no place to be launched under the influence of the operating system. In other words, you can safely use the Hetman Partition Recovery program, which is designed to recover data from already corrupted, damaged, as well as from unreadable and inaccessible SSD drives. With this program you can get back all your lost data, or almost all of it.

To summarize, we can say that data that was lost on SSD drives is not so easy to recover, but it is possible if you follow all the instructions described above.

SSD Recovery | When good memory gets into unpleasant situations

SSD Recovery | Reading range

Note that when Flashback refers to "encryption", this state is typically unknown to the user. For example, around 2006, SanDisk began encrypting data on all of its drives, as Flashback co-founder and vice president Russell Chozick told us. As with automatic hard drive encryption, the controller encrypts all data stored in flash memory. Since there is no password to lock the encryption, the data is decrypted and retrieved from the media. So if the circuit board is damaged, Flashback employees try to move the controller and memory chips to a new device. “If the controller burns out, then it is almost impossible to get the data back, since it contains information about how exactly the data needs to be decrypted. If you cannot work with the controller, you are faced with a big problem.”

SSD Recovery | Types of Flash Memory

These dark gray TSOP48 chips have been typical components of USB flash drives and SSD/SD/CF memory cards for many years, but recently they have opened the way for other chips as well. The bottommost sample in the picture shows the back of the TLGA chip and you can see that there are no pins on the side and the modules are located on the back side. Such chips are common in all types of flash memory and work, for example, in the latest iPhone smartphones.

LaCie SD cards and USB devices also have monolithic chips. While most memory cards have separate controller and memory chips, a monolithic chip combines both components into one tiny module. Obviously, malfunctions of such devices can occur for any of a variety of reasons. If the controller stops working, technicians can still access the data through other means instead of using pins to connect to a card reader, smartphone or camera. In the photo, you can see how the device's casing has been partially removed, as technicians need to remove some of the soldered black coating in order to find certain points for connection to the logic analyzer. Once all the points have been identified, the card will be connected as shown in the following pictures.

SSD Recovery | Common mistakes flash drives

SSD Recovery | What about wear and tear?

SSD Recovery | Heat it up

Chips must be removed from the circuit board using a special soldering jig, and one of the main tools for this step is hot air. The picture shows how specialists remove the TLGA chip from a USB device. They control the temperature and air pressure, heating the device enough to melt the solder points. Such soldering stations also contain soldering irons, welding flux, ohmmeters and other diagnostic devices. Some of these stations occupy Flashback's main laboratory, which measures approximately 465 square meters.

SSD Recovery | Deleting memory

This SSD's controller is burned out, so Flashback's technicians carefully remove the memory chips, each of which is hand-numbered for tracking and easy data collection.

“Sometimes we never find out which components have failed,” says the company’s vice president. “We just know that this type of drive has a firmware glitch, or this error is most typical for it, so for us to work we need to remove the chips. Our clients are constantly in a hurry, so in many cases it is not possible to determine the exact reason why it burned out, but we know that the reading process will not work through the controller here, but it is not encrypted, so we have to. disconnect the chips, read them, and then restore them.

SSD Recovery | Disconnecting chips

Flash drives and SSDs aren't the only devices that experience heat. There is a constant flow through the Flashback service cell phones, such as this HTC Evo, which was drowned in a swimming pool. Services for recovering information from flash memory cost hundreds and thousands of dollars, so it becomes obvious that this phone was not given away to restore children's cartoons. Some of these phones are said to contain recent photographs of deceased friends or loved ones. Devices related to criminal investigations are regularly received, and if a criminal can destroy evidence, roughly speaking, under his feet, then it is possible to get it from an intact flash memory valuable information to conduct an investigation.

Now HTC smartphone Evo is two years old. New devices, such as the Samsung Galaxy and some others from HTC, often support eMMC technology, which contains a controller built into the memory module, just like an SD memory card. In this case, the recovery process can become even simpler.

SSD Recovery | Hard drive vs flash memory

The so-called service area of a hard drive contains information that allows it to “communicate” with itself. To transfer data into read/write processes, it is necessary to provide information about where the bad sectors are located, how many there are magnetic heads, which ones are enabled and which ones are disabled, and so on. Such information is located on the platters in a special area, which is separated from the disk space reserved for recording user data.

In the case of flash memory, manufacturers also leave space for such a zone, which contains all the information about error correction codes, the presence of errors in sectors, the location of these sectors, and so on.

While a hard drive consists primarily of 512-byte sectors, flash memory typically uses 528-byte sectors, with 512 bytes dedicated to memory and another 16 to the aforementioned service area. SSD drives convert to user accessible sector size 512 bytes. But when Flashback reads the raw data, experts get information from both areas. The data is mixed, dumped into one pile and at the same time alternated. When specialists need to display available information, all its elements extracted from the service area must be removed.

SSD Recovery | Closer inspection

Sometimes specialists need to carry out a very thorough visual inspection chips and their fragile insides. The best tool Vision Engineering's Mantis microscope is considered for this type of work, and although it costs about $2,000, it helps restorers examine the design in 3D (using two light paths passing through one lens) at twenty-fold magnification. More natural and comfortable work with Mantis helps to detect problems that might not be noticeable using conventional microscopes. It also becomes an assistant during soldering work, during disassembly and repair.

SSD Recovery | Scanning stations

Once the chips are connected in such a way that they can be read external devices, Flashback employees place them in their own assembled configurations to read data. They are quite simple, although they have special systems that allow you to view different sectors, control operating time, and so on. If reading is slower than usual, it is possible to move to other uncorrupted sectors to get the available information as quickly as possible.

“We can move forward and backward,” says the company’s vice president. “We can have the device scan the MFT file table and display only the selected data instead of receiving free space, so that the work can be completed very quickly. Sometimes you have to struggle with a device that continues to fail even during the recovery process, sometimes there are clients who need to pull one or two out as soon as possible important file in a short time".

SSD Recovery | Mount selection

To connect chips to reading systems, Flashback uses a surprising variety of special mounts. In the picture you can see the type of adapter that was used to work with TSOP48 chips and a TLGA reader. Inside these adapters, each pin of the connector touches a pin on the memory chip. The adapter is screwed into the board for subsequent connection to the TSOP connector. At the bottom there is a USB interface for communication with scanning systems.

SSD Recovery | Data mix

Remember that memory chip that was removed from HTC phone? We may see it again, now with readout wires. The circuit boards were custom made to connect to a USB device. Holes in each corner help secure the chip to the board. Together with the TSOP adapter shown above, each of its pins touches one pin on the memory chip. But in such a mix, all the lamellas of the chips are open, so specialists can do desoldering instead of connecting to the connector. Since there are many monolithic chips and connectors, the Flashback needs to connect to specific points and solder them to the chip.

This is an eight-bit chip, as evidenced by the eight wires that are connected to the circuit board. In a 16-bit chip there would be twice as many of them.

SSD Recovery | Reading process for several hours

When connecting monolithic chips, a similar approach is used. Different devices different wires are needed, but the approach remains the same - each connection performs its own function. For example, in the right top corner 3.3 V power is supplied through the contact. Looking at this process, you begin to realize how time-consuming it takes to simply extract data from the chips.

SSD Recovery | Welcome to the world of chaos

Let's see what data recovery specialists work with. Here you can see the contents of the raw raw data from the SSD's Master Boot Record. Data is mixed using algorithms used by controllers to optimize read and write speeds, level out wear, and so on.

“When we read the chips, we received a whole bunch of raw data,” says the company’s vice president. “For example, here the memory chip has a 528-byte sector, where 512 bytes are used for data, and another 16 are used for storing information about this data and error correction . We call this area the service area. When you first view this data set in hexadecimal system"We have to find the data structures we know in order to figure out their location."

SSD Recovery | FAT under a microscope

Shown here file system FAT16 and boot sector

"Home boot record(MBR) is usually marked in sector 0, says Chozik. “Now it’s not there, but we can find it and determine the known data structure.” We know where it is located, how far it is from the boot sector, and so on. This can be seen in the following picture. This process is similar to collecting evidence. We find MBR, boot sector and FAT. Now we see structures that are familiar to us, and we must think about how to move them back together.

Chozik notes that sometimes experts fail to find any of these structures, usually because of the algorithm included with the device. Some algorithms invert all data bits. If such an approach is discovered, then specialists know how to carry out the reverse process. Some algorithms will touch each byte instead of an entire sector, so each byte will be located on a different memory chip. This requires a byte-by-byte rejoin rather than a whole sector rejoin. Some algorithms will use ciphers that further complicate the process. For a process performed by a computer, recovery is quite often done manually.

SSD Recovery | Joint return

Let's take a closer look at the data in the sector where information is scattered across several memory chips. You can see what the first part of each sector looks like.

In the hexadecimal number system, the designations are arranged in the following order: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 1A, 1B, 1C and so on. On chip #1 you can see that the order is broken twice - first between the values 09 and 0E, and then between 11 and 16. What happens to the corresponding data? The answer is on chip #2.

SSD Recovery | In order

Specialists need to reunite these separated 2112 bytes (4 sectors of 528 bytes), and when this happens, the result will look the same as in the picture below.

Now imagine that there are 64 memory dumps that need to be combined. Why 64? Because a separate chip can have more than one dump, but, for example, four at once. So take 16 chips (for example, on an SSD drive), multiply their number by four - that’s what you get total number dumps (exactly 64).

SSD Recovery | Before and after

It may be hard to imagine what all this byte-level fluctuation actually looks like at the macro level. Empty cell in the table (or a damaged file) cannot fully reflect the entire situation.

This picture from Flashback illustrates this. In some examples, the header and some of the data are intact, so they may appear close together but be jumbled, resulting in image artifacts.

Taking a corrupted JPEG file, technicians use ECC correction and block movement to reorder the data and remove bit errors that were processed by the controller. They are also re-sequenced and clear the service area of collected data to ensure a clean, uninterrupted flow of data.

SSD Recovery | Final result

After several hours of repairs and various manipulations, even using algorithms that help automate data collection, Flashback employees provide the data in the form of files and folders. Everything is in order. The pressing question remains whether the data has been fully recovered and whether it corresponds to its original form.

This can be partially checked using file headers. SD memory cards and similar storage devices typically contain a ton of images that are easy to visually check for errors. ECC errors in separate files It is quite easy to detect - with other file types it can be more difficult. Utilities are able to tell specialists using the header that the file has been disinfected, but they may not note bad sector, which is clearly visible to the observer.

“For most clients, we focus on practicality,” notes the company's vice president. “We ask what they need to get and test the files if they ask for it. If it turns out that we cannot restore the directory structure, we we have to do this using the file header. This is like a “raw” recovery, where we do not get file names. We will pull out the data, and we will get even more than people expect, since we can also restore it. deleted information. Sometimes we see that the FAT table is completely damaged, and then we have to proceed with this type of recovery."

SSD Recovery | What's more important?

In one of the articles about data recovery, one of the readers noted in the comments that essentially anyone could get into this business and that Flashback operates on a different level compared to more well-known services. Proof of this fact can be found in the results and client list, which includes a wide range of commercial and government organizations.

According to Chozik, Flashback's leading experts have more than 15 years of experience in the data recovery industry. The company has invested hundreds and thousands of dollars in equipment and parts to carry out these processes.

“It’s very difficult to learn this business on your own,” he says. “It took years for the R&D department to reach the heights that we have achieved. Our company is not as small as it seems: we are almost 465 square meters in size, and We have a high level of security. There is also a four-level biometric control with round-the-clock surveillance. In order to combat static, the laboratory uses a grounded floor. copper wires, so there is no risk electrical damage. We have a special area protected by bars to store data that is used as evidence in investigations. Also, special clean workstations with laminar air flow (Class 10 and Class 100 levels) are designed for hard drives. The forensic laboratory is the only private ASCLD laboratory with international accreditation (ISO 17025)."

SSD Recovery | Not so small

The Flashback data recovery lab consists of three rooms. Large space the first one is filled with computers, soldering stations, devices for recovery, visualization and firmware. There are also servers for data storage and similar tasks. There are thousands of hard drives in another room, different versions firmware and a lot of the most different devices in case you need it printed circuit board, internal read/write heads or anything else. It is worth noting that it is really clean here and there is forced air circulation for working with hard drives.

Another level of security is maintained in the so-called forensic area, which has already been discussed, and the cage in which the relevant drives are stored is fixed to the floor and equipped with motion sensors.

But this is not the most important thing in the article: it introduces you to the processes that occur behind the scenes of large companies involved in data recovery. Restoring is not just a plug-and-copy process, the amount of work seems simply prohibitive. Of course, we all hope to never become clients of such services, but if we suddenly have to use the services, then this is the data recovery process that your devices will be forced to go through.

About the reliability of SSDs.

It would seem that there are no moving parts - everything should be very reliable. This is not entirely true...

Data recovery with Solid State Drive(SSD)

Data recovery from any SSD drives! Solid State Drives (SSDs) appeared relatively recently, but have already gained great popularity. The advantage of SSDs compared to traditional storage devices hard drives At first glance, they are obvious: high mechanical reliability, absence of moving parts, high read/write speed, low weight, lower power consumption.

SSD is a solid state drive (English SSD, Solid State Drive or Solid State Disk), a non-volatile, rewritable storage device without moving mechanical parts using flash memory. An SSD completely emulates the operation of a hard drive.

About the reliability of SSDs.

It would seem that there are no moving parts - everything should be very reliable. This is not entirely true. Any electronics can break, SSDs are no exception. The low resource of MLC chips can still be dealt with somehow by ECC error correction, redundancy, wear control and shuffling of data blocks. But the biggest source of problems is the controller and its firmware. Due to the fact that the controller is physically located between the interface and the memory chips, the likelihood of it being damaged as a result of a failure or power problems is very high. In this case, the data itself is in most cases saved. In addition to physical damage, which makes it impossible to access user data, there are logical damages, which also impair access to the contents of memory chips. Any, even minor, error or bug in the firmware can lead to complete loss of data. Data structures are very complex. Information is “spread out” across several chips, plus interleaving, making data recovery quite easy challenging task.
In such cases, the controller firmware with low level formatting when re-created service structures data. Manufacturers are constantly trying to improve the firmware, correct errors, and optimize the operation of the controller. Therefore, it is recommended to periodically update the drive firmware to eliminate possible failures.
In an SSD drive, as in a HDD, data is not deleted immediately after the file has been erased from the OS. Even if you overwrite the top of the file with zeros, the physical data still remains, and if you take out the flash memory chips and read them on the programmer, you can find 4kb file fragments. Complete erase data should be expected when data equal to the amount of data is written to the disk free space+ reserve volume (approximately 4 GB for 60 GB SSD). If a file lands on a “worn out” cell, the controller will not soon overwrite it with new data.

Basic principles, features, differences in data recovery from SSD and USB Flash drives.

Recovering data from SSD drives is quite labor-intensive and long process compared with portable flash drives. The process of finding the correct order, combining the results and selecting the required collector (an algorithm/program that completely emulates the operation of the controller SSD drive) creating a disk image is not an easy task.
This is primarily due to the increase in the number of chips in the SSD drive, which increases the number many times possible options actions at each stage of data recovery, each of which requires verification and specialized knowledge. Also, due to the fact that SSDs are subject to much more stringent requirements for all characteristics (reliability, performance, etc.) than for mobile flash drives, the technologies and methods of working with data used in them are quite complex, which requires individual approach to each decision and the availability of specialized tools and knowledge.

Article taken from open sources: http://hardxdisk.blogspot.ru/p/blog-page_5651.html

Back in the days when mechanical hard drives with spinning platters were the standard, you could just give your old hard drive to a friend, hear “Thank you,” and be done with it. With modern solid-state drives, things are not so simple.

In many cases used solid state drives no longer as fast as the new ones, although still faster than the most modern hard drives. The most a big problem when selling SSDs after a long period of use, it comes from the inconvenient characteristic of NAND flash memory: previously written cells must be erased before new data can be written to them. If an SSD is forced to reuse cells to store data instead of using new ones, performance drops sharply.

To avoid this problem with NAND flash memory, modern SSD controllers use a number of techniques, including creating additional volumes that users cannot use - a technique known as over-provisioning. There is also a command called TRIM, which tells the SSD when blocks of memory are no longer needed and can be merged and erased.

Sounds good, doesn't it? But there is one problem.

Not all garbage collection (as the erasing of used cells and merging data in NAND memory is called) is created equal. The build can be inconsistent, and some older operating systems—Windows XP in particular—don't even support the TRIM command. Thus, the most frequently used NAND cells may remain on the SSD longer than you suspect.

In Windows 7 and 8, users don't have to worry about all this. The performance of modern SSDs should not noticeably deteriorate for many years, perhaps longer. But there are several scenarios where these idle cells can cause a hit to SSD performance, such as long-term use in an environment without TRIM support (such as XP), after the disk is almost full and large amounts of data have been deleted, or simply by changing partitions and formatting. .

Yes, simply deleting files, changing partitions and formatting the drive does not work the same as on an HDD. These operations take place over high level than those where garbage collection is carried out. In fact, due to the complete lack of utilities that perform a full garbage collection, there is only one way to return an actively used SSD to a pristine state so that it becomes as good as new - the ATA secure erase command.

Secure erase

The feature, built into every ATA-based drive (SSD and HDD) since 2001, erases everything on the drive and marks the cells as empty, restoring any modern SSD to factory performance.

Once upon a time, it was possible to trigger secure erase only through utilities command line, such as HDparam in Linux or HDDerase in DOS, developed at the University of California at San Diego. But now many manufacturers of solid state drives and hard drives provide free utilities, such as OCZ's ToolBox, Samsung's Magician or Seagate SeaTools, providing the ability to securely erase.

Although the command itself is standard, many utilities only work with drives from their own company. If the manufacturer does not provide a secure erase command, you can use the DriveErase utility included with Parted Magic.

Additionally, secure erase is not routine for most users. technical maintenance. If you are using Windows 7 or 8, you do not need to apply it unless you need to clean up the disk. If you're using XP, only perform secure erase when you really notice a drop in performance. Evidence of this is short-term hangs of the interface or freezes when saving files.

Here's how to recover your SSD step by step.

If you have data on your drive that you want to save, run backup to another medium. If we are talking only about files, you can simply drag them onto a flash drive or external HDD, or use a backup program.

If you have a working operating system that you would like to keep, you will need to use a disk imaging program such as Acronis True Image or R-Drive Image, which copies everything. Do not use Windows program System Recovery, if you are restoring data on a different disk. It will not recover smaller drives, and sometimes struggles even with similarly sized drives that have plenty of free space.

Before you begin, disable all other drives and boot from your flash drive to perform the erase procedure to avoid accidentally overwriting the wrong drive. Parted Magic is an excellent choice because the program works as a bootable flash drive. If unplugging your other drives seems like a daunting task, make sure you select correct disk, which needs to be erased. Secure erase is irreversible.

Now run the secure erase feature. The exact method depends on the program. A guide to erasing using Parted Magic is easy to find online. Some SSDs use an advanced version of secure erase by default, which even removes service data.

The secure erase process will take modern SSD just a few minutes. On hard drives it can take several hours.

Once the process is complete, partition and format the drive if you intend to use it again. Parted Magic provides a convenient full-fledged editor for this task, but you can use Windows utility Drive Management (Control Panel > System and Security > Administration > Creating and formatting partitions hard drive) to solve the same problem. Most often, users create a single partition and format it in NTFS.

You can then return the copied data back to blank disk and enjoy high speed his works.