You encrypted a folder with EFS, then something happened — a reinstall, a profile reset, an accidental deletion, a drive moved to another PC. Now the files are back, but every one throws Access Denied. The data itself is not damaged; the private key that unlocks it is simply missing. This guide covers why that happens and how to recover and decrypt EFS-encrypted files with RS Partition Recovery.
BitLocker To Go is the same encryption engine as system-drive BitLocker, applied to removable media — external HDDs, SSDs, and USB flash drives. The unlock mechanics carry over from our guide to recovering an internal BitLocker volume, but removable drives fail differently in practice: no TPM to fall back on, a visible FAT32 partition that gets mistaken for the whole drive, and a higher rate of physical disconnects mid-operation. This guide covers what's specific to external and USB drives.
Recovering data from a BitLocker-encrypted drive isn't the same problem in every case. A forgotten password with the recovery key still in hand is a five-minute fix. A corrupted partition table on an encrypted volume, or a system drive that lost its TPM binding after a hardware change, is a different situation entirely — the volume is still there, but locating and unlocking it takes more than typing a password into Windows. This guide covers both, for the system volume (C) and any additional encrypted data volume (D).
Two drives have failed in your Synology SHR-1 array. DSM reports the storage pool as Crashed and states that data cannot be recovered. SHR-1 data recovery after a double drive failure is the subject of this article — and the situation is more nuanced than DSM's message suggests. Whether your data is recoverable depends not on the count of failed drives alone, but on how they failed and what state the surviving drives are in.
You replaced a 4 TB drive in your Synology SHR array with an 8 TB drive. The rebuild started, ran for a while — and then stopped. DSM shows Degraded, Crashed, or the progress bar has not moved in hours. The NAS may have become unresponsive entirely. This article covers data recovery after an SHR rebuild crash: what actually happened inside the array, how to read the current state without making it worse, and how to get your files back.
