DAT Tape Media Recovery - Recover Data from Failed Backups

DAT and Tape Recovery Services

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Click here for the data recovery services information request form. (ACR Data Recovery)

Tapes of all sorts fail all the time. Most seasoned IT professionals have been through it, and all they can say is: "Thank heavens we had a local copy of our data on our hard drives when it happened".

Ensuring you have copies of your most valuable data is not an inexpensive thing to do, and it also takes some time. With a failed tape of any kind, you can expect it to take at least 3-7 days before you get any data back from data recovery professionals. This is simply due to the the nature of tape recovery. It takes longer than recovery from other media types, as the tape media often needs to be removed and reinstalled in a fresh working cartridge. The data then needs to be analyzed before the actual data removal and restoration process can take place.

Below are some frequent causes of data loss with regards to DAT and other tape media.

Damaged tape Media
Error
Restore fails
Tape appears to be blank
Overwritten Tape
Erased Tape
Drive Hangs
Snapped or creased
A creased or crumpled tape
Fire or Flood
Water damage
Media Error/Restore fails

When a dat tape or other tape drive fails, often the words 'READ ERROR' or 'READ FAILURE' appear on the screen and you cannot recover the remainder of your backup set. Data recovery companies have tools that can read all unaffected areas of the tape, and by using their recovery software, they can restore the files from your tape.

One potential problem with tape media are that a problem at one point along the tape might prevent access to ALL areas of recorded data further along the tape. A recording error or media flaw during the early part of a UNIX/Linux tar backup will prevent you from being able to restore data from the remainder of the set. Unfortunate, but true!

With tape drives, the assumption is made that the last thing you recorded will be the data that you want to retrieve. Once recording is completed, a tape drive records an end of recorded media indicator with no way to access any area beyond this. Removable media devices have to conform with specifications in order that they can read data from media written in other drives - hence the problem.

Tapes are designed to be used only as a sequential storage medium. They are not designed nor suited to random access operations. As with anything else in life, things can go wrong and problems can come out of nowhere sometimes. In almost all data loss situations that result from media failure, professional data recovery services are required.

Due to the wide variety of tape media available, please contact ACR Date Recovery, Inc. for more information on tape recovery software, and services. Or fill out their short online form.