Shipping,

It is extremely important that your hard drive is packaged carefully to avoid any additional damage during shipment.

Handle a hard disk drive as you would handle an egg.
Handle failed hard disk drives with the same care as new drives.
Handle the drive by the metal body do not touch any of the electrical components unless you are properly grounded.

Use the original shipping materials, if you still have them. If not, they are relatively easy to replicate:

• Place the drive in an anti-static bag or a plastic freezer bag and tape closed.

• Wrap the drive with at least two inches of foam rubber or bubble wrap and tape securely.

• Do not use Styrofoam peanuts as they attract static electricity and allow the drive to settle to the bottom of the box.

• Pack the wrapped hard drive in a sturdy corrugated cardboard box twice the size of the drive and place more foam padding, bubble wrap or other anti-vibration materials around it.

• Insure the box for what you think all of your data is worth.

• Include your Name, address, e-mail address and phone number.

• Include information on what went wrong, your operating system and which files you need.

Note:
If your drive had a head crash it is very important that you include a list of which files we should go after first and their locations.
A head crash is a very serious failure and it rarely results in a 100% recovery with any data recovery company.
Normally a new set of heads last a fixed period of time and then they also crash.
Telling us you want "all my pictures" is not good enough.
Unless there is a directory in the root directory that says "Pictures" we could spend the entire run time just looking for your pictures and copying nothing.
If there is a very important spreadsheet or data file you need, please tell us the name and where it is.
Many times the second head crash is catastrophic and there is no way to continue after that point.
We could get 99% of your files but not the one file you are looking for.
If you tell us the files you want, we will go after them first.

Please read our terms and conditions.

Below are companies that will pack your hard drive for you.
Click image to find locations near you.

Make sure you tell them that a hard drive is a very sensitive piece of precision equipment. Make sure they use two inches of bubble wrap. An unprotected drive will not survive a three foot drop to a hard surface. Some drive actually have glass platters in them. If they break there are no data recovery places that will be able to help you.

Note: UPS Ground or Fed-Ex ground normally takes one day if you are within 200 miles of us.
You do not have to pay extra for overnight delivery.

US Priority Mail can take up to 2 weeks in NJ specially if you add delivery confirmation or signature.

Please call us and talk to one of our Engineers before mailing us your drive.

Correct Packaging:

Unacceptable packaging:

DO NOT USE ENVELOPES!!!!!!

This drive was packed in foam peanuts only. The drive sank to the bottom of box during shipment much like it would sink in water. The drive now has only 1/4 inch of packing material between it and the concrete steps it was slammed down on when it arrived. This is unacceptable.

This drive has good protection in two directions but poor protection in the other 4 directions.
The drive also is not in a anti static bag. This is also unacceptable.

Many drives come with special adaptor plates and hardware to adapt the hard drive to your computer.
You need these parts if you want to install a new drive in your computer.
Please remove the drive from the plate and remove all adaptors before you send it to us.

If you leave your adaptor plate on it will just go in our scrap pile.