Southwest Stars Data Recovery Press Releases

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Data Recovery to the Rescue

San Antonio, Texas, Sept 11 -- It's astonishing, really, just how much of our lives we can fit inside a hard drive. We entrust our checkbook registers, photographs, special projects, e-mail, Sales contacts, Tax records, Customer Databases and much more to our computers for safe keeping. If it can be digitized, it's in there.

When that data is lost, due to a fire, flood, electrical damage or some kind of disaster, it makes people panic. It's serious enough that some psychologists have dubbed it "data-loss trauma."

That's where Lila York comes in. For the past few years, she's worked as the data recovery specialist for Southwest Stars (http://www.swstars.com/), a company based in San Antonio, Texas that offers data recovery for computer hard drives, floppy disks and other digital storage media.

Like in 2000, when a St. Louis business lost seven years of computer data in a blazingly hot warehouse fire.

"It appeared that everything was lost," Lila said. "They had customized software. They'd made changes throughout the years. There was no way they'd be able to recreate it. The emotions I observed were hopelessness, panic, shock, and numbness at the prospect of losing everything."

York was able to calm the business owners while engineers worked on the melted computer. Luckily, they recovered data and put the company back in business just two days after the fire. It's a happy ending, but not unusual. Southwest Stars facilities claim a 90 percent success rate.

"The majority of our customers are corporate users, but 10 percent are small business or individual users," she said. "I've talked to collectors who've lost their entire databases. I've talked to large Corporate Clients. I've even talked to a Minister who lost five years of Sunday sermons when his hard drive crashed."

York said the loss of data strikes hardest against home-computer users or owners of small businesses, people without a lot of resources to help them recover from a computer disaster.

"The emotions are much more extreme," Lila said. "There's a sense of despair, hopelessness and anxiety. A home user doesn't have the resources that a corporation does to either recoup or recreate the data."

Avoiding such problems and emotional toll means taking precautionary steps, York said. For example:

1. Back up data. If you can't afford to lose it, make at least one copy. If it's "mission critical" data for your small business, make two copies.
2. Consider keeping backup copies off-site, which will protect you if your home or office gets hit by a fire, flood, earthquake or other disaster.
3. Don't rely on floppy disks for long-term backups. Use more reliable methods, such as custom-made CDs.
4. Remember, if you make a backup copy, then delete the original file from your hard drive, you no longer have a backup copy.

What should you do if disaster strikes? Southwest Stars recommends:

1. First of all, don't panic. Data often can be recovered, even in what appears to be impossible situations.
2. Don't install data recovery software after you've lost data. The act of installing the new software can over-write your lost data, making it impossible to recover.

There are more tips and suggestions for users of PCs and Macintosh computers on the Southwest Stars Web site. York recommends printing them out now, so they're handy in case your computer crashes or data gets lost.

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CONTACT INFO:
Southwest Stars Corporation
Lila York
5511 San Pedro Avenue
San Antonio, TX 78212
USA
Phone: 210-734-2272
Fax: 210-493-0126
Email: datasavers@swstars.com
URL: http://www.swstars.com