NVMe sticks are the fastest consumer storage ever sold, and also the most abrupt when they die: no sound, no warning, just a boot error where your storage used to be. M.2 and PCIe modules from every manufacturer are recovered here for Swindon, Marlborough and the towns in between.
Free diagnostic on every NVMe job. You get one fixed quote in writing before any work begins.
In most cases you only pay if we recover your data. Electronic and mechanical failures and chip-level work are 50% upfront, with the balance only if we recover your data, while BitLocker, ransomware, DVR and forensic jobs are paid upfront once you accept the fixed quote. You'll find full pricing on the data recovery cost page.
Every NVMe job starts by matching the symptoms to the fault, and these twenty cover almost everything that reaches the bench.
Controller or firmware trouble drops the module off the bus somewhere between shutdown and start-up. The data is still intact behind the silence.
A dead controller, a failed power stage or corrupt boot code, and only very rarely dead NAND.
When the translator collapses, enumeration returns sizes nobody could believe. That's service-mode repair territory.
The module has dropped out of the system's view, but once it's out of the machine the files are recovered straight from the stick.
Bare modules throttle, vanish under load and scramble their mapping after repeated bouts of overheating.
An interrupted firmware or Windows update leaves the drive unable to identify itself.
Flash keeps no diary, so flawless service right up to the moment of failure is the usual story.
Thin boards snap during upgrades and in unpadded envelopes, and track repair or chip-off gets past the break.
Burnt components around the edge connector are replaced at board level before imaging starts.
From the moment of deletion, freed blocks are being erased in the background, so cutting the power is what decides the result.
WD's mainstream Blue drives can drop off the bus without warning, and once on the bench they're candidates for service-mode work.
Samsung's patched defect still catches drives that were never updated, using up NAND life at an alarming rate.
SNV2S sticks ship with whatever controller and NAND were cheapest that month, and the combination inside decides the route in.
Steam Deck and other handheld drives bake in cramped enclosures. The format is tiny, but the recovery is completely standard.
Sabrent and Kioxia modules trip over their own firmware and drop off the bus; they are recovered through service mode.
Crucial's P3 (the CT500P3SSD8 and its relatives) can disappear after a sleep cycle and stay gone. Translator work brings it back.
WD's flagship runs hard and hot in gaming towers, and sustained heavy use ages it into stuttering and then disappearance.
DRAM-less sticks rely on the host system's memory for their mapping tables, and a bad interaction can corrupt the map without warning.
Budget modules hammer their pseudo-SLC cache until it wears through, and the drive then stalls, drops out or bricks.
Over-tightened screws and clumsy thermal-pad swaps flex the PCB and crack joints, which are reworked under the microscope before the drive is imaged.
An M.2 stick sits on the PCIe bus with a direct line to the processor. That's superb while it works and unforgiving when it doesn't, because there's no mechanical stage to limp along on first. Dense firmware runs everything over stacked NAND, and when the controller or its code stumbles, the drive simply stops answering while the files are still present in the silicon behind the silence. We go in through the manufacturer's service modes where the controller allows it, and read the chips directly with a rebuilt translation map where it doesn't.
Modules in 2280, 2242 and 2230 lengths, add-in cards, and Gen3 to Gen5: WD, Samsung, Crucial, Kingston, Sabrent, Kioxia and Solidigm drives are all workable, provided the module unplugs so it can be posted. The standing exception is soldered-down NVMe. Heat deserves a mention of its own: run hard without cooling, a bare stick throttles, falls off the bus and, over repeated episodes, scrambles its own mapping. Whatever caused it, the free assessment tells you what's recoverable before any money is discussed.
NVMe recovery is controller, firmware and chip surgery at PCIe speed, and the bench is specified to keep up:
Modules that no longer identify themselves are brought up in the manufacturer's service mode, where the firmware is mended and the translator restored before imaging, with the NAND never put at risk.
Unstable NVMe and PCIe drives are captured with hardware timeout control and retry logic that no software utility has.
Modules in 2280, 2242 and 2230 lengths, add-in cards and enterprise U.2 drives all connect natively, with active cooling on hand for sticks that drop out when they get warm.
Where a controller is beyond service-mode rescue, its NAND packages are lifted off and read one at a time.
Untangling the XOR, ECC and interleave brings the raw chip dumps back into line with the controller's map, and from there to your files.
Burnt power stages are repaired at component level, and cracked M.2 boards are reworked under the microscope.
Some regulars have a reputation: unpatched 980 and 990 PRO firmware uses up NAND life early, the SN570 and SN580 like to vanish between boots, the NV2 is a component lottery where the silicon inside decides the method, and the P3 family has a documented habit of disappearing after sleep. Lengths from 2230 to 2280, add-in cards, U.2, Gen3 to Gen5: every one is workable provided the module can be unplugged for posting. The only thing we turn away is soldered NVMe.
Most customers get a quote first, by phone or with the free online diagnostic, and then post or courier their media to us.
Sending a drive from a computer, laptop, MacBook, iMac, CCTV / DVR or server? Please remove the internal hard drive or SSD and send us just the drive (from a server, every disk, each labelled with its bay), as we don't offer a drive-removal service. We don't recover storage soldered to a motherboard (for example T2 and Apple Silicon Macs and some thin laptops), only drives that can be removed and sent to us. If you're not sure which kind you have, ring us first.
↓ Print the booking-in & shipping form (PDF)
Mark the package for the attention of Oxford Data Recovery and we'll ring you as soon as we've diagnosed your media.
Not sure what to send? Ring 0800 689 0668 first or use the free online diagnostic.
Free diagnostic, fixed quote, and in most cases you only pay if we recover your data. Start now or call the freephone.