Sara Lost Her Best Friend—and All Her Digital Memories of Him

Last summer, Sara lost her best friend. She had known him since they were small children—for almost twenty years. His death was sudden and devastating, and her collection of digital photos and videos taken over their years together became more precious than ever.

Two months later, Sara opened her Macbook Pro. The battery was running low. When she plugged it into a charger, she got a warning that the device accessory could not be read. Confused, she unplugged the laptop, shut it, and put it away.

It never turned back on.

Sarah’s laptop contained her collection of tens of thousands of photos and videos—including all of her digital memories of the years she spent with her recently deceased best friend.

She had no backup.

Watch Sara’s video above to hear the rest of her story in her own words, including what happened after she came to DriveSavers for help.

Video Transcript

Hey. My name’s Sara Wilson. I currently live in San Francisco, California, and I work at Google doing account services. My title is an Account Strategist.

My Macbook stopped working. I had opened it, and it was low battery, so I plugged it into a charger, and then it just said that the device accessory could not be read or wasn’t working. So I just unplugged it and shut my device, and put it away. The next day, I had opened it again to try to get it to work. I plugged it into a charger, and it just never turned back on.

So ever since I’ve had an iPhone, I’ve been using my computer to back up my photos and videos. So I had around 20,000 pictures and videos since 2008, if not earlier. My best friend suddenly passed about two months ago now, and all of my pictures—I’ve known him since I was a little kid—so all of my pictures throughout all those years were on my laptop and were pretty irreplaceable.

My experience with DriveSavers was genuinely one of the best customer service experiences I’ve ever been through. They not only were empathetic to my situation—I talked them through how sudden this was: I lost my friend, and then the next day, my computer stopped working; there’s no rhyme or reason. A bunch of places turned me down—said I need a new hard drive. They weren’t giving me much hope, but when I called DriveSavers, they were not only empathetic, but they were really clear and honest about what they were going to be able to do for me, and they really lifted my hopes at a time that I really needed it. Additionally, they got me back the entirety of my laptop when originally I just asked for photos and videos. So it was almost twenty years of data that they recovered for me, along with all of my photos and videos, so I couldn’t be more thankful.

I thought DriveSavers technical abilities were A-1. they told me that they were going to get back my photos and videos for me—or they were going to try their hardest. And not only were they able to do that, but they also were able to get back the entirety of my data. They also explained all the different options and cost options in terms of what kind of technical solutions I wanted, and I thought that was extremely helpful and showed their breadth of skillset and knowledge within the area, especially with Mac computers.

I would one-hundred percent recommend DriveSavers to anybody experiencing data loss and in need of recovery. I’ve already spoken extremely highly of them to my family and friends, and now if anyone ever experiences this, I will know exactly who to direct them to, and I’ll feel confident in doing that.