Optane died and now my data is gone.

[Jeryswan]

Hello

My work laptop has had issues for a while now. I believe the Optane portion of the SSD failed and now I can not find any of my data.  I was too cheap to pay for enough cloud storage and now I GREATLY regret it. Lesson learned. It has been shutting down on it's own periodiclly for a while now but has become more frequent here lately. Yesterday it shut down twice and when it restarted the last time, an error popped up stating there was no bootable devices. My initial thought was that the SSD died...

Steps taken: First we took the NVME SSD stick out to inspect it for damage and get the part numbers. The drive has 32GB Optane / .5TB NAND storage. Model # HBRPEKNX02502A. Afterwards, upon realizing the laptop still recognized the NAND storage, we reloaded Windows 10 onto the primary partition (partition 3) which showed as empty. That allowed us to access the desktop. After logging in and looking through Windows Explorer, we couldn't find anything. Where has my data gone? Attached is a picture of an error I have been ignoring for the last couple months. It would usually pop up after launching windows explorer.

Please advise.

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, @Jeryswan.

Thank you for contacting Intel Community Support.

We received your ticket regarding the Optane Memory error and missing data, I will be glad to assist you.

For the error shown in the screenshot, there are a few steps you can take in order to get rid of it which involves the removal and update of the related drives, you can find more details in the link below:

- How to Resolve Intel® Optane™ Memory Pinning Error: 'Unable to load DLL ‘iaStorAfsServiceApi.dll'' Encountered: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000056299/memory-and-storage.html

I was not able to locate the model you mentioned (HBRPEKNX02502A), so I'm currently assuming it is an OEM version of the Optane H10 32GB/512GB that came pre-installed in the system, if this is correct, the best option would be to check with the system manufacturer if they have any recovery methods to try to restore the system to a previous sate, recover the information or at least restore your system back to factory state to make sure it is up and running properly.

Unfortunately, there is no way for us to know exactly what happened to the files, if the storage portion of the SSD contained multiple partitions, let's say, 1 OS partition and 1 secondary partition for storage, that secondary partition, in theory, should still be there if the drive is being recognized properly, but this may depend on how the system was originally set up/customized by the manufacturer, and you can also check how it is shown in Disk Management.

I will follow up on December 15th or we can schedule a different date to follow up if necessary.

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, @Jeryswan.

This post is to follow up on your ticket regarding the Intel Optane Memory to check if I can help you with anything else.

I will follow up again on December 18th and close the thread, or we can schedule a different data to follow up if my assistance is still required.

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, @Jeryswan.

Good day,

This message is to follow up on your community thread.

I previously shared that there are some steps you can take in order to get rid of the error message along with the recommendation to contact the OEM or system manufacturer if this system had the Optane Memory H10 pre installed as they can provide you with any recovery methods or recommendations in your particular scenario.

The thread will be closed right now as there has been no confirmation from you, please open a new thread if you require further assistance as this one will no longer be monitored or contact us via one of the other support methods (https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/contact-support.html).

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician