Good Evening,
I am new to posting on the board, but have been a long time viewer. I appreciate all the help that the community provides, and hope that everyone is doing well.
Today I come to you all with an issue regarding a
Seagate ST2000DM001 2TB HDD (PN# 9YN164-568 , FW CC96 , Date 12027 , DOM 07/2011 - with PCB #100645422 REV A and PCB ROM firmware 25FS406 , 01, 1RH00). The drive was removed from an external Seagate enclosure after the owner reported that the external enclosure had experienced intermittent connectivity issues. The owner described that the external enclosure (which lays on its side), would sometimes experience issues that would require him to jimmy the USB cable until it was detected by Windows. He further reported that the drive saw a decrease in performance and began taking long periods of time to read/write data. As a result, he asked that I help him transfer the data off the drive and onto a new one.
Day 1 - I received the drive (in the enclosure) and did not observe any signs of damage to the outer enclosure. No water damage or broken plastic was seen. I inspected the power and USB ports on the enclosure and they appeared to be clean and free of bending or damage. I attempted to plug the external drive into a Windows 7 and Windows 10 PC, both of which failed to recognize the drive. After a bit of manipulation with the USB cable and turning the external enclosure onto its other side, it was detected as G:\ drive by Windows. However, after a lengthy period of time (~10 minutes), the contents of the drive were still not readable. Windows reported that the disk could not be accessed one of the times and the other time it said the drive was not formatted. Both times I could heard the hard drive spin up and the arm engage, with no significant ticking (only an occasional tick of the arm moving across the platter, but not striking the housing).
Day 2 - I removed the hard drive from the enclosure and observed that the exterior of the drive appeared to be in good order. The pins appeared to be clean, no signs of damage or moisture were observed on any part of the pins, underneath the PCB, or on the case itself. I plugged the drive into a Windows 10 PC using SATA cables and took note that Windows took approximately 5 minutes to boot (usually 10 seconds). Once Windows had booted, the drive was not recognized. I restarted and experienced the same in the BIOS, with a long post time and the drive not recognized. I cleaned all the contacts with QD Contact Cleaner and a coffee filter, including underneath the PCB and the SATA pins. The problem persisted and the drive was not recognized. Again, I could hear the hard drive spin up and the arm engage with the same occasional ticking of the arm moving across the platter.
Day 3 - I removed the PCB and examined it for damage. I viewed a small amount of corrosion on the board (see attached photo), but no overt signs of damage. He claims that there was never any moisture or liquid in contact with the external HDD, and the corrosion is unexplained. I cleaned all contacts on the board using QD and the coffee filter, making sure that it was completely dry before re-attaching. The HD contact points for the motor and data were both also cleaned the same way. Despite this, the drive still was still not recognized with SATA connections to the PC. I further tried another external enclosure and observed the same (no discovery of the HDD).
Day 4 - I opened the top of the hard drive, exposing the platter and arm. The arm was in the home position and not laying across the platter. I did not observe any signs of damage or moisture to the platter, the arm, or inside of the HDD. Powering the HDD on with SATA as well as the external drive with the top off yielded the same results. The discs spun beautifully and the arm engaged properly with typical twitchy movement from the head. The arm slid across the platter with ease and did not appear to get hung up or show any mechanical issues/defects. After initial startup (from being powered on), the arm would repeat the same movement over and over (see attached video).
Day 5 - I got creative and remembered after remembering he said he experienced intermediate connectivity issues before the drive failure. I used the new external drive enclosure with the HDD and turned the HDD on its side with the letter "S" in Seagate facing up and the last letter "e" in Seagate pointing down. (see attached photo). Upon powering it up, the drive was detected in windows as G:\. However, attempts to read the drive met with long wait times (around 5-7 minutes) followed by the message in Windows that the drive could not be accessed. Furthermore, R-Studio reported seeing the drive, reported it to be a 2TB HD, and reported the brand correctly. However, upon attempts to "scan" the drive, I received the error that the drive was unable to be scanned. The very interesting part is that when I lay the drive flat, or on its other side, or upside down, it doesn't detect it whatsoever. Only when laying on its side with the "S" in Seagate facing up, will it be detected by Windows at ALL. I have tried jiggling and manipulating the SATA connection to achieve different outcomes with this, but have still not been able to read the data. Sometimes, it will not show the drive at all, and manipulating the external enclosure onto an angle is the only way to get it to recognize. For this alone, I suspect the PCB as it would be the only logical assessment of the intermittent connectivity issue.
Day 6 - I am many hours of research in and have only found several possible solutions including the following:
1. Replace the PCB and transfer the ROM chip from the old PCB to the new one of the same type.
2. Replace the Arm/Head from a donor drive of the exact same type.
3. Remove the platters and insert into a brand new donor drive of the exact same type
a. (this can be tricky as there are TWO platters in this type of drive and I will require the special tool and negative air environment to do properly)
4. Short Circuit Method (I am not quite sure HOW to do this successfully when the drive is NOT being detected sufficiently to time the short circuit to bypass the firmware load.
a. I assume this requires a serial cable and/or additional hardware and the appropriate com port terminal software (I am not sure which to use for both)
b. Perhaps someone can assist with this, if it is a viable option?
5. Send away to a data recovery specialist (this is absolutely the last ditch effort as I would greatly prefer to fix this for him given that money is a serious issue for him).
The overall goal here is for me to recover his personal files, mostly family photos and work documents. I don't care about the physical drive itself which will be destroyed after successfully backing up his personal files.
Thank you all very much in advance. I truly appreciate it.
I am seeking assistance with my problem and if anyone here has guidance for me to follow. Assuming that I shall replace the PCB on this drive, I believe that switching the ROM chip to the new PCB would be required. I am "decent" with soldering, but not a professional by any means.
PLEASE CLICK HERE FOR THE VIDEOhttps://youtu.be/x9lGMrOk-bUThank you all again.