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Data recovery and disk repair questions and discussions related to old-fashioned SATA, SAS, SCSI, IDE, MFM hard drives - any type of storage device that has moving parts
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Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 12:09

Hello guys..

Anyone tried to use Seagate ROM for WD as an example example?

Or vise versa?

:wink:
thank you

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 12:11

Why?

Other than to brick a PCB what could you hope to accomplish?

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 12:14

data-medics wrote:Why?

Other than to brick a PCB what could you hope to accomplish?


Writing WD ROM file to Seagate ROM chip will kill the pcb?

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 12:30

I think the confusion is more in your original question. So, you are asking if anyone every tried to use the ROM chip from a Western Digital PCB on a Seagate PCB with the Seagate ROM written to it.

I can't see why it wouldn't work, assuming the voltages and capacity of the ROMs are compatible.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 12:39

lcoughey wrote:I think the confusion is more in your original question. So, you are asking if anyone every tried to use the ROM chip from a Western Digital PCB on a Seagate PCB with the Seagate ROM written to it.

I can't see why it wouldn't work, assuming the voltages and capacity of the ROMs are compatible.


I Guess you are right here, it is more clear when i highlighted it in colors the 2nd. time...

Now Why asking this Q.

Am focusing more in 1MB ROM such asin 2.5" M9T , Kahuna_5400, Roosewood 8C....... you should know the rest in 3.5"

I got a case where 1MB WD rom is damaged, means by damaged is 100% (not readable even by the programmer) and wanted to use Compatible ROM chip for it from my DB (as a rom fw)

Got my point here?

:wink:

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 13:33

yes, but it depends on particular FW
If both chips are 1.5V I see no problems

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 16:44

There is no such thing as a Seagate ROM chip or a WD ROM chip. Neither company makes "ROMs". At the very least, look up the respective datasheets. Then compare the supply voltages by measuring the appropriate points on the respective PCBs. Also, I suspect that the actual supply voltage may be 1.8V rather than 1.5V, but ICBW.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 17:52

You could just do away with them and create your own emulator; it’s not exactly rocket science.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 18:44

If possible and you can get same part number, better.

Bootloaders can be finnicky sometimes.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 19:07

FW might be checking unique id from ROM ?

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 8th, 2018, 19:44

einstein9 wrote:
data-medics wrote:Why?

Other than to brick a PCB what could you hope to accomplish?


Writing WD ROM file to Seagate ROM chip will kill the pcb?


I guess I misunderstood what you were saying. I was thinking you were referring to writing the ROM code of a WD drive onto a Seagate PCB or vice versa.

I can't see why the physical ROM chip used would make any difference as long as it matches the relevant specs.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 9th, 2018, 1:14

In my opinion question would be better with specific part numbers included, not so general. Otherwise answer is simple: "it depends"

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 9th, 2018, 5:07

The question from the OP is unclear for me. I am talking about the manufacturer ID for the ROM-chip.

Excerpt from datasheet for M25P40:

Read Identification (RDID) data-out sequence

The Read Identification (RDID) instruction allows to read the device identification data:
- Manufacturer identification (1 byte)
- Device identification (2 bytes)

A Unique ID code (UID) (17 bytes, of which 16 available upon customer request). (2)

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 9th, 2018, 5:34

WD PCB with 512K ROM. Patient ROM is 256K.

PC3000 WD utility won’t write 256K ROM to donor board w 512K ROM thru SATA. You need to do it via boot ROM (thru com port). The MID and size is checked and if OK, clear to go.

Again, it's unclear for me what the OP is trying. But of course, you can use any vendors ROM that meets the specifications.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 9th, 2018, 6:14

See this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=29113

The OP received a 7200.11 patient with an Atmel AT25F4096 4Mbit SPI Serial Flash Memory (which had been replaced by another DR company). The drive wouldn't spin with this ROM.

He then physically transferred the Atmel IC to a donor PCB (whose original ROM was an ST M25P40VP), but the patient HDD did not spin with this combination either.

However, after copying the Atmel ROM contents to the ST M25P40VP IC on a donor PCB, the drive did spin up. The OP concluded that the 7200.11 PCB was somehow incompatible with the Atmel ROM.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 9th, 2018, 10:39

Depending on the bootloader, it can be compiled with support for some specific flash IDs. Then, when it doesn´t recognize the id, it will error out somehow.

As always, depends on many things. :)

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 10th, 2018, 4:05

Hello guys again,,,

seems this subject is interesting for so many...
i`ll start from the begining here

@ Spildit, My Android tool or even my 3k experience has nothing to do with this my dear, its just a Question based on a case fact here, i tried it but did not work (with one sample) but seems i know now why didn`t work (based on my testing it here).

@ guru I didn`t get ur point here

@ rogfanther & Arthur, you are probably right here (it can be compiled with support for some specific flash IDs)

@ HaQue, sometimes we don`t have stock of avail. part #`s, thats why i asked in general

@ fzabkar a very good example here,,,, Thnx

Now FYI guys in general, Samsung drives will not accept any ROM chip other than some specific models, if you do try you will see drive stays in BZ and will never spin.
for Samsung i got it... but not yet for WD & Seagate.

sorry if i forgot to reply to any of you here...

have a good day

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 10th, 2018, 11:12

Yes, I´ve experienced this in routers and computers.

In my opinion, it is no so much due to the way the software works, as it is laziness of programmers. It would be a more quality work for the bootloader identifiy the characteristics of the flash chip, then work accordingly to those. But as people just take an already jumbled code from some obscure chinese factory, they just change the IDs/descriptions of the flash chips in the code and send an ever more confused firmware version out of the door.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 10th, 2018, 18:11

AISI, the OP's statements are extremely vague. There is no suggestion that he has actually tried to match the characteristics of the chips, eg voltage, clock frequency, single/dual/quad I/O, etc. It could very well be that his mismatches were electrical rather than ID related.

Re: Anyone tried this?

March 11th, 2018, 4:22

@ fzabkar,

You might be right and could be wrong also,, my 1st. Question was: ANYONE TRIED USING....etc
the answer could be YES/NO regardless of the details.

am doing my research and was wondering if someone tried/did it before, i did not ask for details (but good to know things i wasn't aware of)

and rogfanther has a point here about the ID related thing which i believe YES based on my research.

Just think about this: Why WD/Seagate (for example) are using Diff. Chips on their PCB`s? (if they are all the same in function)

and in case i wanted to use any other chip (Winbond, Macronix, ISSI) for the same PCB saying IT SHOULD WORK is not enough coz its not.

And am asking my self "WHY?"
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