Consumer Education
Honest Data Recovery Companies
I would rather you use one of these companies than overpay a marketing machine. These are independent labs run by technicians who do the work themselves, publish their prices, and charge based on the repair, not the perceived value of your data.
If you are reading this and thinking, "why would a business recommend its competitors?" it is because the data recovery industry has a problem. Companies that spend millions on Google Ads and Apple referral partnerships charge multiples of what an independent lab charges for the same work. The equipment is the same. The procedures are the same. The difference is overhead. I would rather lose a customer to an honest competitor than see them get overcharged.
Companies I Recommend by Name
iPad Rehab
Jessa Jones, PhD · Honeoye Falls, NY
Jessa Jones holds a PhD in Human Genetics and Molecular Biology from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. She runs iPad Rehab out of Honeoye Falls, New York, specializing in iPhone and iPad data recovery through board-level microsoldering.
Apple banned her from their support forums for telling customers that water-damaged iPhone data is recoverable. CBC News investigated the ban in 2019 and confirmed Apple's support channels were telling customers recovery was impossible when it was not.
She has recovered data from devices that DriveSavers declared unrecoverable.
She trains other independent repair technicians through her Practical Board Repair course, and her team includes trained former stay-at-home parents. Law enforcement agencies trust her for forensic data recovery work.
Desert Data Recovery
Tim Homer · Phoenix, AZ
Tim Homer started in IT in 1998 and opened Desert Data Recovery after realizing Phoenix customers had to ship drives out of state for recovery. Every recovery is performed in-house at their Phoenix lab. Your drive does not leave the building.
Tim founded datarecoveryprofessionals.org, a group of independent, owner-operated data recovery labs worldwide. Members are unanimously voted in based on proven expertise. It is not a directory you pay to join. Each member has demonstrated their skills through professional forums, training courses, and documented recoveries.
The lab runs a Class 10 cleanroom on-site and is equipped with PC-3000 UDMA, VNR NAND Chip Recovery hardware, PC-3000 Flash, PC-3000 SSD, and multiple DDI4 imagers. Tim is a Certified Data Recovery Engineer and is active on the r/AskADataRecoveryPro subreddit, where group members help people diagnose issues and determine whether DIY recovery is feasible or professional intervention is needed.
$300 Data Recovery
Brian Cometa · Los Angeles, CA
Brian Cometa founded $300 Data Recovery in 2007. No diagnostic fee. No data, no charge.
The lab is equipped with PC-3000 and an in-house cleanroom for head and platter work. Brian's brother Tim Bryson handles cleanroom operations, and senior engineer Nathan Irvine has been with the company since the early days. Between them, they have recovered over 29,000 devices since 2007.
With 740+ Yelp reviews, an A+ BBB rating, and a AAA rating from the Business Consumer Alliance, this is the highest-rated data recovery company in Los Angeles. The reviews consistently confirm the pricing model: the company charges what it advertises.
Data Recovery Professionals Group
If none of the companies above are near you, check datarecoveryprofessionals.org. This is not a directory you pay to be listed on. It is a group of independent, owner-operated labs whose members are unanimously voted in by existing members. Each person in the group has proven their technical ability through professional forums, training, and documented work.
Tim Homer founded the group because he saw the same problem I see: customers searching Google for data recovery and landing on whichever company bid the most on ads, not whichever company does the best work. The group gives independent labs a way to collaborate, share techniques, and refer customers to each other when a case falls outside their specialty.
Members are based in the US, UK, Germany, Netherlands, Japan, Australia, Brazil, and more. The associated subreddit, r/AskADataRecoveryPro, is a good starting point if you want free initial guidance from vetted professionals before committing to a lab.
US Members (partial list)
Full member directory: datarecoveryprofessionals.org/members-overview-1
What These Companies Have in Common
Owner-Operators
The person answering the phone is either the person doing the recovery or works directly alongside them. There is no sales floor, no account manager, and no call center between you and the technician working on your drive.
Published Pricing
Each of these companies publishes price ranges on their website or makes their pricing model obvious from the company name. No hidden fees. No "call for quote" opacity that lets them charge based on how desperate you sound.
No Data, No Charge
If they cannot recover your data, you pay nothing. No diagnostic fee. No "attempt" fee. No cancellation fee for deciding not to proceed after seeing a quote.
Real Labs, Real Equipment
PC-3000, cleanrooms or validated clean benches, donor drive inventories, and micro-soldering stations. The same tools that DriveSavers and Ontrack use, without the marketing budget that inflates the price.
Why These Alternatives Exist
When you search Google for "data recovery," the top results are companies that spent the most on advertising. A single click on a "data recovery" ad can cost the advertiser $150 or more. That money comes from somewhere. It comes from you.
Companies like DriveSavers, SecureData, and Ontrack are not incapable. DriveSavers has real technicians and real cleanrooms. The problem is the business model. DriveSavers maintains over 20,000 referral partners according to their own website. Gillware publishes 15-20% referral commissions on their partner page. When a company spends millions on Google Ads, maintains Apple referral partnerships, and pays commissions to thousands of IT shops, every customer absorbs that overhead.
Some companies take it further. SecureData lists over 200 "locations" that turn out to be drop-off counters at unrelated retail stores. Your drive gets shipped to a centralized lab in another state. You could have shipped it yourself for less.
The independent labs on this page do not play that game. They operate single labs, do all work in-house, and let their reputation drive business instead of paid ads and referral commissions.
What Data Recovery Professionals Have Documented
The independent data recovery professionals I recommend above are not just cheaper. They are the people who fix what the big-name companies send back. Here is what they have documented publicly.
Drives Returned with Components Removed
A data recovery professional on r/datarecovery (posting as Zorb750, a recognized specialist in the subreddit) documented a WD drive returned by SecureData Recovery missing its EEPROM after the customer declined a ~$3,000 quote. The customer needed an attorney letter to get the part returned. The drive had never been opened. The actual issue was a firmware fix.
Firmware Modified After Quotes Declined
The same professional documented a Toshiba drive returned by SecureData with all heads disabled in firmware after the customer refused a $2,000 to $3,000 quote. Separately, he reported recovering half a dozen smartphones where SecureData had quoted four-figure recoveries, but the actual problems were dead batteries or other superficial issues.
Tim Homer of Desert Data Recovery described on Reddit a case where a news crew sent a perfectly working drive to a data recovery company, received a $2,000+ quote for "head failure," and got it back with the heads physically mangled. Tim also explained how firmware-level changes work: "A simple change of a few bits in a critical module and the data is no longer recoverable and you cannot find out why."
Volume of Drives Arriving from the Same Source
Brian Cometa of $300 Data Recovery stated on Reddit that he receives about a dozen drives per week that went to one particular company first. He confirmed seeing drives arrive in worse condition than when they left the customer, though he declined to name the company.
Devices That Worked Fine After Being Returned
Multiple customers on r/datarecovery have reported receiving high quotes from SecureData for devices with minor or nonexistent problems:
- A student was quoted $1,760 for a water-damaged iPhone. SecureData offered to drop the price to $900 if the student removed a negative review about the Brooklyn drop-off location. The phone worked when plugged in after being returned.
- A customer was quoted $2,080 for phone recovery with a 99% success guarantee. They declined, took the phone to a local shop, and a $160 screen and battery replacement restored all data.
- A customer reported that SecureData required them to submit favorable BBB and Google reviews, plus a video testimonial, before returning recovered data. The initial quote was $2,000 economy or $4,000 rush, which was bargained down to $1,000 with the review conditions attached.
Review Manipulation in the Industry
In 2023, NBC Bay Area and Fake Review Watch investigated review patterns at DriveSavers. Yelp removed over 100 DriveSavers reviews and placed a "Suspicious Review Activity Alert" on the listing. The investigation found reviewer profiles that were also reviewing unrelated businesses (locksmiths, plumbers) in patterns consistent with paid review networks.
The companies I recommend on this page have review counts built over years of actual customer work. $300 Data Recovery's 740+ Yelp reviews span 18 years of operation. Desert Data Recovery's 68 Yelp reviews reflect a smaller operation that does not solicit or incentivize reviews. When you read their reviews, you see specific descriptions of failures, pricing, and outcomes, not generic praise.
Non-Refundable Fees at Other Companies
Some data recovery companies charge non-refundable "engagement fees" even when recovery fails. BBB complaints against PITS Global Data Recovery document a pattern of ~$900 fees characterized as down payments, which are not refunded when recovery is unsuccessful or when customers decline the final quote.
Every company I recommend on this page operates on a no-data, no-fee basis. If they cannot recover your data, you pay nothing. No diagnostic fee. No engagement fee. No attempt fee. That policy tells you everything about how confident a lab is in its own work.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does Rossmann Group recommend competitors?
I would rather a customer use iPad Rehab, Desert Data Recovery, or $300 Data Recovery than overpay at a marketing-driven lab for the same work. The data recovery industry is better off when honest shops send customers to each other instead of letting people fall into marketing machines that charge five times the going rate because of advertising overhead.
What is datarecoveryprofessionals.org?
A group of independent, owner-operated data recovery labs worldwide. Founded by Tim Homer of Desert Data Recovery. Members are unanimously voted in based on proven expertise. It is not a trade association or a listing service. Members share techniques, beta test equipment for DR hardware manufacturers, and refer cases to each other when a job falls outside their specialty.
How much do honest data recovery companies charge?
Independent labs publish their pricing upfront and charge based on the actual work performed. Contact each company directly for current rates. Marketing-driven companies charge significantly more for the same procedures because their cost structure includes advertising, referral commissions, and sales floor overhead. See our pricing breakdown for the full explanation.
Are these companies better than DriveSavers?
DriveSavers is a legitimate lab with real capabilities. The issue is not competence. It is pricing. iPad Rehab has recovered devices DriveSavers declared unrecoverable. Desert Data Recovery and $300 Data Recovery use the same PC-3000 equipment DriveSavers uses. The work is equivalent. The price difference funds advertising, not better outcomes.
What if I am not near any of these companies?
Most of these labs accept mail-in drives from anywhere in the US. Check the Data Recovery Professionals member directory for a vetted lab closer to you. Or send it to us. We accept mail-in drives from all 50 states.
Related Pages
Need Data Recovery?
Whether you use us, iPad Rehab, Desert Data Recovery, $300 Data Recovery, or any datarecoveryprofessionals.org member, the important thing is that you go to an honest lab. If you choose us: free evaluation, published pricing, no data no charge.