Hi guys, excuse my English, I have used Google Translate to try to write so that my message can be perfectly delivered, and in this way I can solve a problem I have with an HDD.
 I am writing to you from Barcelona, ​​Spain.
I will summarize my problem: I transferred an ic bios (firmware) from one pcb to another pcb and the pc still doesn't recognize the disk.
If you read the details of my problem, maybe you can help me solve it. I will detail it step by step
After reading many pages about recovering data from an hdd that is not recognized by the pc, by transferring the firmware (ic bios) from the old pcb to a new and identical pcb, I decided to do it and try to recover my data . Firstly, the disc before or after the firmware change does not make noises such as: Grinding, Buzzing, Failure, Crash, or Weird Sounds. The disc makes the same normal sound as when it was recognized by my pc.
I used the disk in a USB box, one day when turning on the PC I realized that the disk was not recognized, I tried several times connecting it directly to the PC, or in another usb box and it did not work either.
Some friend told me to remove the pcb from the hdd and check the circuits, and I noticed that there was a half burned and half loose diode:


I found in internet a pcb with the same characteristics and bought it to do the firmware transfer.

My disk is a: Seagate ST1000DM003
P/N 9YN162-500
Firmware F/W CC4B
PCB Board: 100664987 REV B
capacity 1tb.

I am going to name the pcb of my hhd as Pcb A, and the one I bought on internet as Pcb B
(If you look closely you will notice that 3 diodes are missing on the pcb A (my hdd) this is because I read that if a diode burns or is damaged you can remove it and the disk will work again but no voltage protection, so i removed the diodes, but the pc did not recognize the hhd).




So I went to an electronic technician, I explained what he should solder, and he did it, the ic bios from Pcb B to Pcb A (€ 30)
(By the way, look at the red arrow in the image, that little drop of metal covering that hole? the other ic bios (firmware) did not have that metal drop, welding error or is it not a problem?)

The Ic bios (firmware) is: winbond 25Q40BWS05 (i think is S05 the last 3 characters)
In both pcb I found some differences of some circuits or chips (I don't know how to call them)
and I don't know if that's the problem.




After I realized that the change did not work, I went to another technician and he tested the pcb with a Multimeter (the diodes, etc.) and said that the board was apparently ok, ... but I don't know ...

so my questions:
metal drop is the problem?
PCB differences?
the ic bios (firmware) is damaged??
Thanks for the help you can give me, I will be waiting for some solution from all of you.

Hello,

the solder in that via (metal drop as you call) is not a problem, IC3 is B64002, you got the number from the head transfer pad, which is irrelevant.
I think there is nothing wrong with your pcb, it is probably some firmware corruption. I don't mean the flash chip that you've got moved to the new pcb, it is probably fine if the drive spins up. I mean the larger part of the frimware which is on the platters and read by the bootFW located in that chip.
Moreover this series of drives are prone to serious surface degradation which can cause very bad things inside, so i don't recommend fiddling a lot with it if your data is important.
It might be worth checking the output of the serial terminal but that's also something that can be though if you have no experience with suchlike things, partly because the voltage level is 1.8V there and most of the adapters you can get are made for 3.3 or 5V.
If you get that right there's a good chance you make things worse if you start poking around with the terminal connection due to lack of knowledge, but it should be safe to watch, until you start sending commands.

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

thanks for the answer pepe, can you explain this, pleae...
It might be worth checking the output of the serial terminal???

Hi Pepe
We have less than 20% success rate with this Seagate 1TB model - ST1000DM003 / CC-46 /SN Z4YXXXX .Today yet another head transplant failed .
What is specific reason for so ,much failure in this particular model . Is this common phenomenon with everyone?

Hello,

i recovered quite a few with surface damages (with rings), but yeah, these are not a walk in the park.

@mingo: check out this thread:
https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php ... connection

.. and there are tons of similar ones on the forum i believe.

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

pepe, well, I see that it is a bit risky, and you have to know what is being done, I don't know.
What I can do?
If I test the output terminal, and it does not pass, will I lose the data?

You won't loose data by checking the terminal output. You may make it worse in 2 ways:
- messing with terminal commands
- running the drive unneccessarily if it has some surface degradation already.

You might consider contact a pro if your data is important to you.
i can recommend www.onretrieval.com in Spain.

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

Thanks Pepe, I'll see what I can do, if I decide to do the checking of the terminal output, or send it to recover the company you told me, it is known that this process of recovery with companies is very expensive, but perhaps it will make a sacrifice .
I saw videos and opinions about the terminal output, with good results, but there are many types of firmware fix kit, and they confuse me.
I want to first check the terminal output, if I see that it cannot, then the last resource will be to send it to the company.
Thank you very much Pepe, I hope to give you good news of the result of my decisions.

I would like to know Donor PCB criteria , Is PCB revision also crucial for ultimate donor compatibility or it can be ignored .
Often there are pcb's having same no but different revisions. Is it necssaey to keep all revisions ?

I Think its not necessary to match Revision except code , but for greater compatibility it might be necessary.
May be spildit and fzabkar knows better . I would like to have list of all PCB's starting from 80GB IDE - 4TB SATA from all manufacturers
Is there any source to get it ?