Surrey, BC · Logical Recovery · File Repair · Partition Rescue
Your data is corrupted.
It's not gone.
Inaccessible files, a partition that disappeared, a drive asking to be formatted, or ransomware that encrypted everything — logical data loss is recoverable more often than physical failure. Your files are almost certainly still on the storage medium. We find them.
No Data, No Fee
Partition & File Recovery
Ransomware Assessment
Free Assessment
Recovery Track Record
23K+
Devices Recovered
10+
Years Experience
NTFS, APFS, exFAT, ext4, Btrfs, ZFS, HFS+
Ransomware assessment — no false promises
Files never browsed · erased after delivery
14935 100 Ave, Surrey BC · 604-767-1701
Physical vs Logical Classifier
Physical damage or
logical failure — it changes everything.
Recovery approach differs completely based on whether damage is physical or logical. This three-question tree identifies which you're dealing with — and what to do next.
Do you hear any unusual sounds?
Clicking, grinding, or beeping from the drive.
Is the drive detected by the computer?
Does it show in Disk Management, Disk Utility, or BIOS?
What does the drive show?
Select the closest description of what you see.
What We Recover
Every type of logical data loss
we recover from.
Logical data loss is recoverable more often than physical failure. Your files are almost certainly still on the storage medium — the directory pointing to them is what's damaged.
Corrupted MBR / GPT
The MBR or GPT partition table is how your drive knows where all your data lives. When corrupted — by a failed update, power cut, or drive error — the entire drive appears empty. The data is untouched. We rebuild the partition table without touching the data partitions.
Recovery rate
92%
Inaccessible Partition ("Please Format")
Windows or macOS asking you to format a drive that was fine yesterday. This is filesystem corruption — usually from an unclean unmount, power failure, or bad sector growth. Never format. The data is there. Bring it in.
Recovery rate
88%
Accidental Deletion (No Recycle Bin)
Files deleted with Shift+Delete, or from an external drive where there is no Recycle Bin. On HDDs the data remains until overwritten. On SSDs, TRIM may run within minutes. Stop all use immediately — every write to the drive can permanently overwrite recoverable files.
Recovery rate
73%
Ransomware Encryption
Ransomware encrypts your files and demands payment. We assess what version hit the system, whether a free decryptor exists, and whether shadow copies or backups survived. We never recommend paying — we first exhaust every technical alternative.
Recovery rate
41%
Corrupted Email / Database Files
Outlook PST/OST files, Thunderbird profiles, Access MDB, QuickBooks QBB — database-style files corrupt when the application crashes mid-write. We repair the internal structure and extract all accessible data including attachments and contacts.
Recovery rate
83%
Corrupted Media Files
Photos showing as grey squares, videos that won't play, RAW files that open as solid colours. Partial file corruption often leaves 90%+ of the image data intact. We repair the file headers and reconstruct the content structure.
Recovery rate
76%
How It Works
From corrupted drive to recovered files.
No surprises. All work happens on images — your original drive is never altered. Zero charge if we can't recover your data.
1
Stop All Activity
Do not write to the drive. Do not attempt repairs. Every write risks overwriting recoverable data. Power off if possible, then bring it in.
2
Safe Imaging
We create a bit-for-bit image of the drive before any recovery is attempted. All work happens on the image — the original is never touched.
3
Filesystem Analysis
We analyse the filesystem layer — partition table, directory tree, file allocation — to map what's recoverable and where it lives on the image.
4
Data Extraction & Repair
Deleted files extracted via file carving. Corrupted files rebuilt at the byte level. Database and email stores repaired separately with structure verification.
5
Verified Delivery
Every file verified accessible before handoff. Delivered on a new drive with a full recovery log. No recovery = no charge.
Critical: Read This Now
Never run chkdsk or Disk Utility
on a drive asking to be formatted.
The "You need to format the disk" or "drive not accessible" prompt means the filesystem is corrupted, not that the data is gone. Windows' chkdsk and macOS's Disk Utility First Aid are designed to repair filesystem structures — which means they can mark corrupted entries as orphaned and delete them.
When those entries are deleted, the file system links pointing to your data are gone. The data blocks may still be physically present, but recovering them becomes significantly harder and often requires file carving at the raw data layer rather than the faster filesystem-level approach.
If your drive is asking to be formatted:
do not click Format, do not run chkdsk or fsck, do not use Disk Utility First Aid. Bring it in for a free assessment — filesystem corruption is one of our highest-recovery-rate scenarios.
The visualizer shows the difference between intact filesystem metadata (recoverable) and metadata deleted by chkdsk (harder to recover). One click — permanent consequence.
Filesystem Metadata State Visualizer
Active file entry
Corrupted entry (still recoverable)
Deleted by chkdsk
Free / empty
Drive shows "Please Format" — data intact, filesystem corrupted
Filesystem & OS Coverage
Every filesystem. Every OS.
Logical recovery requires understanding the exact filesystem. We work with every major filesystem and OS combination in-house at our Surrey lab.
NTFS — Windows
Windows 7/8/10/11 internal drives · external USB drives · MFT repair
APFS — macOS
macOS 10.13+ · iPhone/iPad backups · HFS+ to APFS migration issues
exFAT — External Drives
External HDDs · USB drives · SD cards · cross-platform drives
ext4 / Btrfs — Linux
Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Arch · server filesystems · journal recovery
FAT32 — Flash Media
SD cards · USB drives · legacy devices · cameras and dashcams
HFS+ — Legacy Mac
macOS 10.12 and earlier · older Time Machine backups · PowerPC era drives
ReFS — Windows Server
Windows Server 2012+ · Storage Spaces · enterprise server volumes
ZFS / XFS — NAS
Synology, QNAP, FreeNAS · TrueNAS · Linux NAS pools
NTFS
APFS
HFS+
exFAT
FAT32
ext4
Btrfs
ZFS
XFS
ReFS
VFAT
F2FS
Why RecoveryMaster
We work on images.
Your original is never touched.
The most common mistake in data recovery is working directly on the damaged drive. We don't — and that's the difference.
01
No Data, No Fee — Period
If we can't recover your files, you pay nothing. No partial fee. No assessment charge on failed jobs. We stake our payment on our own success rate — on every case, every filesystem, every OS.
02
100% In-House, Never Leaves BC
Your drive stays at our Surrey lab throughout. We never broker it to another lab in another province. Faster turnaround, direct technician access, and full accountability at every step.
03
Professional-Grade Equipment
PC-3000, R-Studio, UFS Explorer, and forensic file carving tools — the same professional-grade software used by data recovery specialists worldwide. Not consumer apps run on a general-purpose PC.
04
Direct Technician Access
You speak with the technician actually working on your drive — not a call queue or a support ticket. Direct status updates from intake through delivery, in plain language.
05
Complete Privacy
Your files are never opened or browsed. File integrity is verified by checksum and file-structure analysis only. All working copies are permanently erased from our systems after you confirm receipt.
06
2–5 Business Day Turnaround
Most logical recovery cases complete in 2–5 business days. Complex ransomware assessment or multi-volume database repair may take up to 7 days. Quote within 24 hours of arrival.
Honest Advice
What to do right now —
and what never to do.
Some repair tools are designed to fix filesystems — not recover your data. They can and do permanently delete entries that we could have recovered.
Do these things
- Power off the drive as soon as you notice data is missing or inaccessible
- Write down exactly what happened and what you've done since — this helps diagnosis
- Check Windows Shadow Copies (right-click file → Properties → Previous Versions)
- Check macOS Time Machine if it was enabled — may already have your files
- Call us before doing anything else — a 10-minute phone assessment is free
Never do these things
- Do not run chkdsk, fsck, or Disk Utility First Aid on a corrupted drive
- Do not format the drive even if prompted — "format required" is not data loss
- Do not pay ransomware — come to us first to assess your technical options
- Do not reinstall the OS on the same drive — this overwrites recoverable data
- Do not use consumer recovery software if the drive is making unusual sounds
Common Questions
Corrupted data recovery —
straight answers.
No false promises about ransomware. Honest answers about what's recoverable.
No — never. This message means the filesystem is corrupted, not that the data is gone. Your files are almost certainly still there. Formatting would make recovery much harder. Bring the drive in.
We assess every ransomware case individually. For some strains, free decryptors exist (via No More Ransom project). For others, we check if shadow volume copies survived. If neither applies, we are honest about it rather than giving false hope. We never recommend paying without exhausting every technical option first.
Physical damage means hardware failure — clicking heads, dead controller, damaged platters. Logical damage means the data is there but the system can't find or read it correctly — corrupted filesystem, deleted files, ransomware. Logical recovery generally has higher success rates and costs less.
chkdsk repairs filesystem structures, which can mean moving or deleting entries it considers orphaned — sometimes including your files. This is one of the most common ways recoverable data gets made harder to recover. Bring the drive in immediately — we can often still recover from this state.
Yes — inaccessible partitions are one of our highest-recovery-rate scenarios. The partition table or filesystem is corrupted, but the actual data blocks are almost always untouched. We rebuild the partition structure from the raw data and extract your files.
Most logical recovery cases complete in 2–5 business days. Complex ransomware assessment or database repair may take up to 7 days. Quote within 24 hours of arrival. Emergency same-day assessment available.