Different people will have different ideas about what a clean room is and why it is actually such an important factor for data recovery. Essentially clean rooms are controlled areas designed to be free from minute airborne contaminants which could be a speck of dust or even pollen for example. Entry to a clean room is gained via an airlock and operators generally use specialist protective garments.

For professional data recovery companies a clean room is an essential asset as hard drive repair often requires the use of exceptionally clean working conditions.

Outside air is filtered to prevent dust entering the room. Filters and processes will be in place inside the room to remove internally generated contaminants during production and working areas are often further filtered locally such as laminar flow bench.

There are different “classes” of clean rooms, with each class limiting permissible different numbers of particles per cubic meter, as well as the maximum sizes particles. Thus a Class 1 clean room is one where the number of particles should not exceed 1000 particles per cubic meter.