I have been doing a good deal of research into the MARVELL IC's that have part numbers starting with 88i. I believe they have a JTAG interface on the IC. It would be an interesting idea to hack a PCB and set it up to do head by head calibration and bring the drive ready for sector copying. Anyone out there agree?

_________________
HWHacker
Smiles

Yes they have a JTAG interface, but getting access to the BSDL files is another story. Some drives with different MCU should be easier to work with. You might need to twist some arms at Marvell.

Yes I would like to twist some arms at Marvell. They keep thing very close to the chest. Just hope there is an exploit to reveal code. lots of fun hacking

_________________
HWHacker
Smiles

Yes they certainly do. You will have to sign some NDA's with Marvell if you want anything from them. That's the reason that anyone who has access will not share (legal bindings). As for an exploit, that sounds like fun

You HAVE to sign strict NDAs with them and it's not a joke.
As for an exploit, as usual people complicate their own lives....