Data recovery for NAS
Network-attached storages (NAS) emerged in an environment with large amount of information as a powerful solution for shared access to a storage. These systems found their principal implementation among corporate users where general centralized storage provided to several workstations was required. Being an advantageous solution for quite reliable data back-up and access from more than one computer compact NAS devices have gained wide popularity among home users as well.
NAS systems function as file servers dedicated to nothing more than providing location for shared data storage and data access. They don't perform any operations of typical server such as e-mail, authentication or file management. NAS device consists of a control board which provides network access to data and from one to several disks that can be organized as a RAID-system. This independent device with its own operating system doesn't require any external computer to manage its file system and restricts access to its disks. Despite high reliability of NAS-systems, like any technical devices, are exposed to failures and outages. Software malfunctions, control board failures or simply human errors such as accidental file deletion or inappropriate software upgrades may result in loss of crucial information. Normally, NAS devices don't provide access to the storage, except for NAS using iSCSI protocols. Thus, to recover data from a NAS it's required to get disks out of the device and connect them to a PC for recovery. You will find most comprehensive solution for retrieval of data lost from NAS in UFS Explorer Standard Recovery. This software recognizes most presently applied file systems including those of NAS-systems. Embedded plug-ins for recovery and reconstruction of RAID will be helpful in the event when NAS disks are organized in a RAID-system.
More detailed information about recovery from NAS systems you will find in Mass NAS: Typical data organization and data recovery article.
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