Computers are used much more rigorously than a decade back. We are almost trying to banish paper from our lives. Majority of our work is being done through computers, and these are much prone to failure. Failures of computers occur due to many reasons and it invariably leads to a loss of data. Such failures occur when you least expect it and data loss results in when you are hardly prepared for it. Many computer users create a back up to prepared for data loss eventualities. However, 80% of them find the created backup useless when they need it the most.
There are many causative factors for data loss. The three major reasons are explained here.
- Hardware problems
- Logical Errors
- Failure of the Operating System
Hardware Problems
Upon powering on your computer you might suddenly hear buzzing, clicking, rattling or scrapping sounds. These are the noises that emanate when the electronic board, motor or magnetised platters get damaged due to an electric failure or a head crash. Alternately, the hard disk might also refuse to spin. 44% of the lost data is due to the damage of the computer parts.
Use the computer in a clean area, free of dust. Electric surges damage the motor and using an UPS is the best protection you can offer to your computer. However, in spite of taking the requisite protective measures you may happen to experience data loss due to hardware problems. Yet, this is not cause for concern for data lost due to hardware problems is recoverable. Damaged hard drives are opened in class 100 clean rooms by the data retrieval experts. They work successfully, by either imaging the drive or by replacing the worn out parts.
Successful data recovery cannot be guaranteed always. The latest hard drives are quite resilient yet, they cannot be worked upon if they are extremely damaged. Retrieving data is a virtual impossibility if the data gets written over.
Computers are prone to other types of problems also.
Logical Errors
You might power on your computer and find that the files, folders and partitions missing. This is a logical error. These might also manifest as incorrect, partial or nil data in the files.
Such problems are a result of the malicious acts of people who introduce viruses that damage data. This makes the program operate incorrectly. The computer compiles and interprets the entered data but makes a wrong execution. However, losing data due to logical damage is not cause for much concern. For, one redeeming feature is that files lost thus enjoy greater recovery probability. The data exists on the hard drive. You might just be denied access to it. Computer Forensics (or Digital forensics) experts are able to help if you are concerned that you have suffered a malicious attack.
Recovery of small textual files is complete. Files that contain graphics require undamaged File Allocation Table (FAT) for a perfect recovery. Your large files can also be recovered if they are allocated on consecutive clusters. However, files that enlarge with time are fragmented. Recovering fragmented files is difficult.
Failure of Operating System
The operating system (OS) is a software program for managing the hardware and enabling its communication with the computer software. OS manages the varied resources of a computer like the processor, disk space, memory, etc and without it the computer would be non functional.
Corruption of the operating system is indicated by cross linked files, file system corruption, lost clusters or invalid file directories. Strange error messages get generated or large quantities of files may get corrupted. The hard disk might also appear as if it has never been formatted.
When such problems occur it is not the failure of the hard drive rather it is some external force at work. Viruses commonly alter the major structures of the disk so they appear either invalid or empty. Running an anti virus software is necessary. Using the right disk utility is important. If a wrong disk utility (one not designed for Windows 95 is used on a window 95 system) it could corrupt an otherwise normally functioning disk. The hard disk might not have been set up correctly in the BIOS. Finally, the hard drive might have some problems, though these might get manifested in other ways too.
These are the major problems that might damage a computer and lead to a loss of data. Data recovery is possible, but user caution is the best safeguard. Always create a backup for your important data.