outhampton Data Recovery are the UK’s No.1 RAID 1 recovery specialists. If your mirror is degraded, out-of-sync, or offline—on a NAS, rack server, SAN shelf or DAS enclosure—our engineers provide free diagnostics, best-value options and 25+ years of enterprise-grade expertise across home users, SMEs, multinationals and government. We handle every platform and file system, including Linux RAID 1 recovery (mdadm/LVM), Windows Dynamic Disk mirrors, ZFS/Btrfs mirrored vdevs, and virtualised datastores. Whether you need fast RAID 1 disk recovery from Synology/QNAP or controller-based RAID 1 recovery on Dell/HPE/Lenovo, we reconstruct safely from forensic clones—never your originals.

Platforms we routinely recover

Below are UK-common brands we see most often. Model lists are representative “popular” examples we regularly encounter in labs.

Top 15 NAS / external RAID brands (with popular models)

1. Synology – DS224+, DS423+, DS923+, RS1221+
2. QNAP – TS-262, TS-464, TS-453D, TVS-h874
3. Western Digital (WD) – My Cloud EX2 Ultra, PR2100, My Cloud Home Duo
4. Netgear ReadyNAS – RN212, RN424, RR3312 (rack)
5. Buffalo – LinkStation LS220D, TeraStation TS3420DN / TS5400DN
6. Asustor – AS1102T, AS5304T (Nimbustor 4), AS6604T (Lockerstor 4)
7. TerraMaster – F2-423, F4-423, D5-300C (RAID DAS)
8. LaCie (Seagate) – 2big RAID, 6big (DAS used in mirrored workflows)
9. Promise Technology – Pegasus R4/R6/R8 (TB), VTrak D5000
10. Drobo – 5N/5N2, 5D/5D3 (BeyondRAID; many estates still in service)
11. Thecus – N2810 / N4810 / N5810PRO
12. TrueNAS (iXsystems) – TrueNAS Mini X, X-Series (mirrored vdevs)
13. Lenovo/Iomega – ix2-DL, ix4-300d, px4-300d (legacy)
14. Zyxel – NAS326, NAS542
15. D-Link – DNS-327L, DNS-340L

Top 15 rack servers/storage used with RAID 1 (with popular models)

1. Dell PowerEdge/PowerVault – R650/R750/R740xd; ME4012/ME4024
2. HPE ProLiant/MSA – DL360/DL380 Gen10/Gen11; MSA 2060
3. Lenovo ThinkSystem/DE-Series – SR630/SR650; DE4000/DE6000
4. Supermicro – 1U/2U storage chassis (1029/2029 series)
5. Cisco UCS C-Series – C220/C240 M5/M6 (+RAID module)
6. NetApp FAS – FAS2700 (mirrored aggregates in SMB)
7. Synology RackStation – RS1221+, RS3618xs
8. QNAP Enterprise (QuTS hero) – ES2486dc, TS-h1886XU
9. TrueNAS X/M – X20/X30, M40 (mirrored ZFS vdevs)
10. Promise VTrak – E-/D-Series
11. Fujitsu PRIMERGY – RX2540/RX1330
12. ASUS RS-Series – RS720/RS520 (LSI/Broadcom RAID)
13. Huawei OceanStor – 2200/2600 SMB deployments
14. Qsan – XCubeNAS/XCubeSAN (1/10/1+0 for OS/data)
15. Netgear ReadyNAS Rack – RR3312/RR4312

How RAID 1 fails (and why mirrors still need lab work)

RAID 1 mirrors replicate blocks; they don’t validate intent or correctness. A bad write, filesystem corruption, malware, or controller glitch is faithfully copied to both members. When a second fault appears during resync, the set can fall offline. Correct data recovery raid 1 requires: stabilising drives; cloning to lab-grade targets; selecting the correct timeline (which member is logically best); emulating the array; then repairing the filesystem/LUN from images only. For Linux RAID 1 recovery, we additionally reconstruct md superblocks/LVM metadata and mount read-only to extract.

Top 30 RAID 1 errors we recover (with in-lab fixes)

Each item includes a plain-English summary and a technical fix describing what we actually do—mechanical, electronic and software.

1. Second disk fails during resync
   Summary: Degraded mirror begins rebuild; surviving disk throws UREs or dies.
   Fix: Thermal/electrical stabilisation → adaptive imaging of the most consistent member (head-map, zone targeting, ECC-aware retries). Mechanical (donor heads) or firmware (translator rebuild) on the weak drive for partial clone. Virtual mirror from images; journal replay (NTFS/EXT4/XFS/APFS) to restore consistency.
2. Silent corruption mirrored to both members
   Summary: Bad writes (driver bug, PSU ripple) replicated across the pair.
   Fix: Bit-level comparison of member images to locate divergence windows; prioritise pre-fault regions. Filesystem surgery: MFT mirror restore (NTFS), alt-superblocks (EXT4), xlog replay (XFS), APFS object map validation; carve secondary evidence when metadata is lost.
3. Wrong disk swapped / stale member reintegrated
   Summary: Healthy disk pulled; stale disk inserted; resync propagates wrong data.
   Fix: Forensic timeline (SMART hours, FS timestamps), signature/entropy analysis to identify the authoritative member. Emulate RAID with block-range veto for contaminated ranges; mount read-only; export.
4. Controller/NVRAM loses array metadata
   Summary: BIOS shows “foreign config” or no virtual disk.
   Fix: Dump on-disk superblocks; reverse-engineer offsets/sector size; emulate controller in software; validate against boot sectors/superblocks; mount.
5. Bad sectors on last good disk
   Summary: Remaining member has rising pendings/reallocations.
   Fix: Head-select imaging with time-boxed retries, cooling cycles and skip-on-error; target critical FS structures first; rebuild directory trees from secondary indexes and journals.
6. Firmware BSY lock / microcode bug
   Summary: Disk stays busy, times out, no ID.
   Fix: Vendor terminal to clear BSY, reload SA modules; if needed ROM transplant; immediate conservative cloning with increased error thresholds; pair with second image.
7. Translator corruption / 0 LBA / slow SA
   Summary: LBA map broken; drive crawls.
   Fix: Regenerate translator; disable background ops (offline scans, power-up recalibration); image by head/zone; rebuild mirror.
8. PCB failure / TVS diode short
   Summary: Surge kills PCB; no spin/detection.
   Fix: Donor PCB + adaptive ROM/NVRAM transfer; rework TVS/fuse; verify preamp current; clone on conditioned bench PSU.
9. Head crash / media damage
   Summary: Clicking, partial ID, rapid failure.
   Fix: Head stack swap (micro-jog-matched donor); calibration; multi-pass imaging (outer-to-inner, skip windows, later return); fill holes with FS repair; never power-cycle unnecessarily.
10. Motor seizure/stiction
    Summary: Spindle locked; disk silent or buzzes.
    Fix: Platter transfer or motor transplant; servo alignment; low-stress cloning; mirror assembly from images.
11. Backplane/SAS expander resets
    Summary: Link CRCs drop disks intermittently; mirror desyncs.
    Fix: Bypass expander; direct-attach via clean HBA; replace suspect cables; image each member; reconstruct outside the enclosure.
12. HPA/DCO capacity mismatch
    Summary: One member has hidden LBAs; resync truncates volume.
    Fix: Detect/remove HPA/DCO on images; normalise capacity; define virtual mirror at canonical size; verify GPT boundary integrity.
13. Mixed sector sizes (512e vs 4Kn)
    Summary: Replacement disk causes misalignment/partial resync.
    Fix: Normalise logical sectors in images; apply offset correction; rebuild mirror virtually; run FS integrity checks.
14. Power loss mid-write (journal tear)
    Summary: Journal half-committed; dirty volume.
    Fix: After cloning, replay journals/logs; where logs corrupt, offline metadata surgery: MFT mirror, alt-superblocks, XFS phased repair; export.
15. Filesystem driver/OS bug
    Summary: Orphaned files, invalid metadata.
    Fix: Read-only mount of reconstructed mirror; FS-specific repair (ntfsfix + MFT record patching, e2fsck with journal options, xfs_repair staged); inode-based export before directory fixups.
16. BitLocker/LUKS/SED encryption complications
    Summary: Encrypted mirror won’t unlock after incident.
    Fix: Recover mirror images; use customer keys/TPM captures; validate header copies; decrypt against images; export plaintext data.
17. Linux mdadm RAID 1 won’t assemble
    Summary: md shows inactive/unknown; superblocks inconsistent.
    Fix: Linux RAID 1 recovery: dump md superblocks; compute correct UUID/role; assemble read-only; if LVM: restore PV/VG metadata or map manually; mount EXT4/XFS/Btrfs with safe flags; copy out.
18. QNAP DOM/firmware corruption
    Summary: NAS won’t boot though disks are fine.
    Fix: Pull disks; image externally; reconstruct md/LVM (or ZFS on QuTS hero); ignore DOM for data path; extract shares and iSCSI LUNs.
19. Synology SHR-1 metadata loss
    Summary: SHR mirror layers present but volume won’t mount.
    Fix: Reassemble md layers; btrfs-rescue / chunk map rebuild or EXT4 journal replay; checksum-verified copy-out.
20. Drobo pack inconsistency (single-disk redundancy mode)
    Summary: BeyondRAID mapping damaged; mirrored intent unclear.
    Fix: Parse translation tables; emulate layout; locate mirrored slices; reconstruct namespace; export.
21. NVMe/SSD mirror member read-only
    Summary: SSD flips to RO; namespace missing.
    Fix: Vendor toolbox to unlock/clone; if controller dead, chip-off NAND and rebuild LBA map; pair with other image; recover.
22. SMR band corruption / write cliffs
    Summary: Shingled HDD stalls; band remaps fail; desync.
    Fix: Zone-aware imaging with long rests; rebuild mirror from best image; FS reconciliation.
23. Controller cache/BBU failure
    Summary: Write-back cache loses in-flight writes across both members.
    Fix: Disable cache; reconstruct from verified clones; targeted write-hole closure with directory/journal reconciliation.
24. Windows Dynamic Disk (LDM) mirror breaks
    Summary: LDM metadata damaged; mirror offline.
    Fix: Rebuild LDM from on-disk/secondary copies; re-map extents; mount NTFS; export.
25. LVM RAID1/mirror failure
    Summary: LV won’t activate; thin-pool metadata damaged.
    Fix: Restore archived LVM metadata; manual LV mapping; recover thin-pool metadata where present; mount read-only; export.
26. VMFS datastore on mirrored LUN corrupt
    Summary: ESXi reports invalid/failed datastore.
    Fix: Rebuild mirror; parse VMFS; repair VMDK descriptors/extents; restore VMs.
27. Service DB corruption (SMB/NFS index)
    Summary: Shares appear empty; files still present.
    Fix: Mount volume directly; rebuild share maps; bypass service DBs; inode-based export; rebuild indices post-recovery.
28. Human error: cloning over the good member
    Summary: New clone overwrites healthy disk.
    Fix: Attempt partial rollback via unallocated residue analysis; otherwise recover from snapshots/cloud sync/shadow copies; deep file carve for remnants.
29. Time skew / NTP rollback impacting clusters
    Summary: Journal conflicts, stale nodes write over new data.
    Fix: Isolate most consistent node image; export consistent snapshot; reconcile application stores (DB, VM) from logs.
30. Physical shock/helium leak (helium drives)
    Summary: Acoustic anomalies; rapid read instability.
    Fix: Mechanical triage; matched donor head/motor; calibrate; staged imaging with reduced seek aggressiveness; rebuild mirror and verify.

Our in-lab workflow (how we actually recover your mirror)

1) Forensic intake & stabilisation

• Record controller/NVRAM config, slot order, SMART, PSU quality.
• Do not power-cycle weak disks. Electronics: TVS/fuse checks, donor PCB with ROM/NVRAM transplant. Mechanics: head swaps, motor/platter work, SA module repair (translator/adaptives).

2) Imaging—always first, always read-only

• Clone each member to certified lab targets using adaptive, head-select imaging (ECC-aware retries, timeout tuning, zone cooling).
• SSD/NVMe: vendor toolbox unlock; chip-off NAND when required to rebuild LBA maps. Originals remain untouched.

3) Virtual array reconstruction

• Derive exact offsets, sector sizes, HPA/DCO, capacities; decide which timeline is authoritative when members diverge.
• Emulate controller or assemble md/LVM read-only for Linux RAID 1 recovery; validate by filesystem signatures and entropy tests.

4) Filesystem/LUN repair & extraction

• Read-only mount of NTFS, EXT4, XFS, Btrfs, ZFS, APFS, HFS+, ReFS, VMFS.
• Journal/log replay or manual metadata surgery (MFT mirror, alt-superblocks, XFS phased repair).
• Export to clean media with hash verification (per-file or per-image) and optional recovery report.

5) Hardening after recovery

• Replace suspect pairs together; standardise 512e/4Kn; validate UPS/BBU; schedule scrubs; SMART/TLER policies; independent backups (RAID ≠ backup).

Why Southampton & Norwich Data Recovery?

• 25+ years specialising in data recovery raid 1, from 2-bay NAS to 32-disk racks.
• Full-stack capability: mechanical, electronic, firmware and filesystem.
• Advanced tools & parts inventory for donor heads/PCBs, ROM programmers, SAS/SATA/NVMe HBAs, expander-bypass kits, and enclosure spares.
• Safe methodology: clone first, emulate/assemble virtually, mount read-only.

What to do now

1. Power down—avoid repeated resyncs or swaps.
2. Label disks in order; pack in anti-static sleeves in a padded box.
3. Contact our Southampton RAID engineers for free diagnostics—UK-wide courier or local drop-in the same day.

Southampton Data Recovery – Contact our RAID 1 engineers today for a free diagnostics.