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EDR / Places we cover / Bideford

EX39 · Long Bridge to East-the-Water · Bideford

Data recovery in Bideford. Twenty-four arches into town; one tracked parcel out to Bristol.

Bideford is located on the western side of the tidal Torridge. In the parish, the population at the time of the 2021 census was approximately 18,000 people. Over the Grade I listed Long Bridge is East-the-Water, and Torridge District Council is at Riverbank House. The failed drives sent to us from here belong to professionals that work within those areas: a planning consultant with ten years of drawings on one external drive, a fabricator's stick of welding photographs for work done at the Navantia UK yard at Appledore, in Northam parish below Bideford, a caravan park office in Westward Ho! with an ageing tower holding the pitch ledger, and a photographer's card from an estuary wedding. According to Torridge District Council's statistics, the number of residents aged over 65 increased by 30% between the 2011 and 2021 censuses. Much of what we receive from EX39 is the drive from a retirement-age machine with no backup copies of anything. Since no passenger trains have left Bideford since 1965 and we do not keep a counter in Bideford either, after a quote a failed drive will typically be sent via a tracked and insured parcel. It is then the parcel, rather than you, which travels along the A39 and the Link Road to the M5 motorway. From there it continues on its way to the Bristol laboratory, where diagnosis occurs upon arrival. If you would prefer to hand-deliver it there yourself, it is possible during our hours, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm. No appointment is needed. There is also no charge for same-day diagnosis.

Tracked in or dropped off · return post free Diagnosis free when it arrives One written price, fixed

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What Bideford loses, and what to do before it travels.

Not there? Head for the triage →
What's wrongWhy it's common locallyStep one
A planning consultant's external hard drive, with ten years of drawings, now clicks.A ring of one-person practices is fed by Riverbank House casework, each on a single unbacked disk.Unplug it: a clicking external drive gets imaged on the bench. Never turn it back on at home.
A caravan park office tower that stops at the maker's logoWestward Ho! and Appledore parks and lets have all bookings and the pitch ledger stored on a single ageing PC.Turn it off, keep it off and skip the startup repair
A USB memory stick from an overall pocket, asking to be formatted.Welding photos and certificate scans by fabricators, marine electricians and NDT inspectors around the Appledore yard are stored on a stick.Don't format it; get a quote first, then post the stick as it is.
A wedding card reads 0 bytes back at the desk.Wedding and estuary photographers can fill a card in one day, and nothing else holds those framesYou need to pull the card and shoot the next job with a fresh one.
A chart-plotter card for an Appledore vessel, now unreadableThe marks were always documented nowhere else but on this card.Don't have the plotter format it. First get your quote, then send the card on its own.
Posting it to us: get a quote first, by phone or with the form, then post it (with tracking and insurance) to our secure intake laboratory in Bristol. We will take care of the return postage. Please include the completed shipping form in the box as well. Alternatively, you can drop it off at our laboratory during the hours of Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm, with no appointment needed. Packing guidance can be found on our contact page.

A Bideford case in four parts.

The A39, the Link Road, then the M5 northThe route from Bideford passes over the Torridge Bridge along the A39 to Barnstaple, then continues as the A361 North Devon Link Road through South Molton to Junction 27 (where you can get on the M5) and north into Bristol; however, the parcel is usually going to make this journey, not you. Get a quote first, before sending your drive; then pack your drive in an appropriate size box and ensure that it is sent via a trackable service and that adequate insurance is taken. Alternatively, if you prefer to drop off the drive at the lab yourself, we accept drop-offs during our hours (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm). No appointment is needed. Our laboratory is located in central Bristol at Bristol Data Recovery, Castlemead, Lower Castle Street, BS1 3AG, and the return leg is paid by us.
A stopped practice or park goes firstIf there is a problem with the drawing office issuing or the park taking a booking at that time, tell us this when you make your initial call to us. Then the matter would go in as priority and would be reviewed upon delivery of the parcel, and it will be imaged throughout all of our working weekday hours, giving you a timeline that we are comfortable with as soon as possible after diagnosis.
Two disks or more: out of the box, numberedThe small server located in an office in a park does not go anywhere as a whole, and a NAS that sits behind a practice will only travel as one unit if its disks cannot be removed. After receiving a quote, the disks are removed and each one is labelled with its corresponding bay number; then they are posted to us together, along with any that the box has marked as "failed". The rebuild button is never selected, since all of the individual drives would be imaged at the bench and the array would then be rebuilt using those images.
One fixed figure, and a VAT invoice to fileDiagnosis is free when your package arrives. The next step is an unchanging amount in writing: a single, fixed price of £300 + VAT for one drive, and either a stick or card at £250 + VAT. All devices with two disks are priced starting at £500 + VAT. No charges will be incurred until you agree to pay for our service. Your complete VAT invoice, along with all of the restored data (files), will be returned to you by post, and the postage back to EX39 is paid by us.

Next to Bideford.

Each town we cover →
Barnstaple → Braunton → Holsworthy →

What Bideford wants to know first.

Do you cover East-the-Water, Northam, Appledore and Westward Ho!, or only Bideford itself?

It's all of it. The area includes Bideford and East-the-Water, followed by Northam, then Appledore and Westward Ho! over the parish boundary, and also Abbotsham and Instow, then Landcross, heading south along the A386 to Great Torrington. From there it goes out towards Hartland. The towns of Barnstaple and Holsworthy each have their own page. We do not have a counter in Bideford; after a quote, everything is delivered to us via postal service or dropped off at our intake lab in Bristol for processing (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm, no appointment needed); therefore, a drive from an Appledore cottage and one from Mill Street would be considered the same job.

My laptop slid off the van seat on the way back from a site and it clicks now. Is the Revit model gone?

Typically not, as long as you keep it turned off from here. Drops are likely to hit the heads of the disks, and each subsequent attempt will drag the heads across the disks, so no more attempts, no rescue software and no freezer. Get a quote first, prior to taking the drive out of your computer and sending just the drive (not the laptop); the price band is the one for a single drive. We open the disk on our workbench, perform a read-only imaging operation and pull the model from that image rather than pulling it from the damaged disk.

Is there a counter in Bideford where I can hand a drive over?

No, and we made sure of this. All of the work will be carried out from a single lab in Bristol instead of at counters, and no-one sits in Bideford waiting for you. First get a price quotation by calling us, or complete the quote request form, then send it to us (tracked and insured) from whichever post office counter in the town suits you best. Or, if Bristol is on your route, bring it into us yourself, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm, with no appointment needed. We are located at: Bristol Data Recovery, Castlemead, Lower Castle Street, BS1 3AG, right in the centre of Bristol. Once your package arrives we will issue a case number, and we will pay the cost of postage to have it returned back to you.

The PC with our holiday-let bookings on it is a big old tower. Do I have to post the whole thing?

No. If you or someone nearby has the ability to take the side panel off the tower, the drive is the flat metal unit with two cables coming out the back. Unplug both, unscrew it and then pack it up well; once you have your quote, send just the drive with the shipping form. If that seems too complicated, a local computer shop will be able to remove the drive from your machine within minutes: only the drive comes to us, never the whole tower. The price is £300 + VAT for one drive. Whichever option you prefer, turn it off now and keep it turned off.

More like this in the casebook.

Synology NAS recovery → NAS boxes → PCs & laptops → All the areas we cover →

Bideford usually needs a post office counter, not one of ours.

Shut it down. Say what you think happened. Take no decision until the free diagnosis comes back.

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