Data Recovery - Surface RT

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networkn

Networkn
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#196669 8-Jun-2016 16:36

Hi.

I have had a customer turn up with a dead Surface RT, with some precious photos they thought were backed up but weren't.

It won't switch on, and doesn't seem to want to take a charge.

Anyone do data recovery on them?

Dynamic

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#1568061 8-Jun-2016 16:45

We use and like these guys http://www.datalab.co.nz/ for data recovery, though have never hit them with anything other than a spinning drive.

Being a DIY kinda guy, I would do some youtubing and discuss ripping it open with the customer if it looked relatively straightforward, possibly swapping parts with another donor device. I expect this would be a cheaper approach than data recovery at chip level.

“Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including this, I suppose.” Douglas Adams

LennonNZ

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#1568063 8-Jun-2016 16:47

It'll be hard.. the Original Surface RT has ram which was soldered to the Motherboard!

Dynamic

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#1568070 8-Jun-2016 16:52

Very true.... but if the client decides to invest some money into trying to recover the data, swapping a fully charged battery into the unit might be enough to get the data off even if the charging circuitry is faulty.

“Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including this, I suppose.” Douglas Adams

LennonNZ

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#1568077 8-Jun-2016 16:54

Go buy a working S/H one from trademe ($200) and swap the motherboard...

There are some nice teardowns on how to take them apart.

nathan

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#1568085 8-Jun-2016 17:03

if they've logged on with a Microsoft account the data will be encrypted with Bitlocker, and you'll need their recovery key too

nathan

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#1568086 8-Jun-2016 17:04

LennonNZ:

It'll be hard.. the Original Surface RT has ram which was soldered to the Motherboard!

since Surface RT is a SoC the storage is actually eMMC

HP

Shop now for HP laptops and other devices (affiliate link).

CamH

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#1568089 8-Jun-2016 17:05

We repaired one to get the data off it one time, however it might be worth taking it to Payam Data Recovery up on Queen Street - They've done great work on USB drives for us before.

networkn

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#1568590 9-Jun-2016 12:13

CamH:

We repaired one to get the data off it one time, however it might be worth taking it to Payam Data Recovery up on Queen Street - They've done great work on USB drives for us before.

Would you consider doing another?

Did you require the encryption key?