Hi all!

I need a help for recovering Toshiba DT01ACA200 after burning PCB.
Here is the background. The other, very similar hdd was burned due to PS voltage issue, and I tried to compare voltage levels on certain test points to the DT01ACA200, when I accidentally shortened two lines with different voltage level. As the consequence, the motor driver/ctrl and probably some other components were burned, so I decided to replace the PCB from the donor (found the same hdd). However, I did it without success, sine the bios rom from donor (I suppose) doesn't fit to patient. It spins and I can hear that head moves for several times and then the head movement disappears. I hope this is expected behavior. So, I have to use the one from patient, but unfortunately it is burned like most the ICs on it, so when I solder that one and try to run the hdd, nothing happens (I think it even doesn't spin-up).

I finally come to question. Is there any solution for the case the BIOS Rom is lost?

What also happened in the meantime is that the patient hdd fallen from ~1m to the ground at the time it was turned off, and heads park. Does anybody know how harmful this can be? When I tried to run it, it sounds like before, like nothing has changed.

Thanks a lot in advance

It sounds like you may have overvolted the +5V supply. Toshiba HDDs have very poor protection (or none at all), in which case the preamp on the headstack may have been damaged.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Hello,

yes, we can recover from the lost rom solution on this drive. Dropping it surely won't help a lot, hopefully the MHA did not get deformed, but it needs to be checked before any attempts to recover the rom. So do not power it up at all.
Another possible issue is the preamp, as Frank said, which can damage the data in case it runs current through the write heads, so that's one more reason for not powering it up.

pepe

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I just realised that the OP's drive is a native Hitachi. In any case it seems that the protection components didn't do their job.

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.

PCB was not connected to the hdd at the time I shortened the lines, then I think the preamp is still fine. So it was just PCB, connected to PSU, and I accidently shortened 5v and 2v5 I think, with OSC probe.
Based on measured values on BIOS ROM, I think it is dead. So the question is whether it is possible to readout useful info and burn new ROM and replace the one on donor board with it?

That flash chip contains unique information required to start the drive. So you cannot just replace it with another one. The unique info needs to be recovered. There are quite few people able to do it as to my knowledge, since there are no commercial tools able to do it out of the box.
PM me if interested.

pepe

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hi pepe. i appriciate your knowlage about this toshiba ROM.

Hi, this one is Hitachi, as Frank said.

pepe

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