Samsung HM500LI

[managerharry]

Trying to recover data from a Samsung HM500LI drive that was removed from a Lacie Rugged enclosure. The usb port had broken off the interface board. Pulled the drive out and hooked it up to test, it did not respond or identify and got very hot. Removed the PCB and found a chip underneath had burned. In photo below it is circled in red.

I'd like to try a PCB swap with ROM transfer but where is ROM chip on this model?

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[fzabkar]

The "chip" is actually a coil.

The MCU appears to have embedded flash.

Is there a burn mark on the MCU? Is the Vcore test point shorted to ground?

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MCU_mark.jpg (59.38 KiB) Viewed 5851 times

[pcimage]

I’d say that MCU is toast, so this PCB isn’t realistically repairable.

As fzabkar says, there is embedded flash (I.e. no external ROM chip to transfer).

Luckily these drives don’t have “adaptive” data in the flash, so if you can find a PCB with exactly the same FW (firmware) version you should be good to go, assuming the preamp isn’t cooked.

The problem is finding a suitable PCB, with right FW version.

[managerharry]

I checked the MCU under microscope and it is definitely burned as well. So I will look for a donor board with matching firmware. Thanks as always.

[pcimage]

Sometimes the label shows the FW version.

[managerharry]

Hmm, firmware is not marked on the drive label. With a dead PCB I guess I'd have to just try and match date as closely as possible and hope to get a matching firmware?

[managerharry]

Label pic

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