I have a heated topic for discussion that many have already discussed, But I wanted to see if people have got more information since the last time it was posted.

It seems the pc3000 is best for firmware updates to the PCB and the most advanced so far with this regard.

However, the Data Compass is suppose to be a cheaper version of the pc3000 and I get mixed comments...some very good, some bad....

Then the atola, I was told has a way to go to catch up to writing, saving and editing firmware to the PCB as compared to the pc-3000. So what I was hoping for was to get objective comparisons and information that can shed some light on this topic.

Which do most people prefer, use and why?

If you are planning to buy , I would recommend that you save for the best .
Instead buying shit from SD .

Hi
I have PC3000 UDMA i am using this past 2 years i don't have any Problem with it,i am planning to Try DC from SD how is DC Work please i suggest me Thanks.

My opinion at the moment i dont buy anything from SD, but yoy can ask other users to tell about their experience.

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ZeBong
" что случилось в России - останется в России "
" Россия еще раз"

If you have time, you can make some tools for some brands/families at NO cost. But you need time.

@itconcept,
You can contact thatdellguy from this forum he can guide you about SD products .

Rameez ,
This Is Nonsense He Is Spreading .In My Case i Cannot Comment Cos I Have The SD doctor Series Only and Nothing Else .But People Who Use Data Compass Are Happy and It does a Good Job In Drives that Are Failing ,Ann On This forum Has ample Experience With The Tools She Has UDMa Also .

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Regards
Amarbir S Dhillon , Chandigarh Data Recovery Labs [India]
Logical,Semi Physical And Physical Data Recovery
Website-> http://www.chandigarhdatarecovery.com

OK I will not post my experiences with UDMA. Sorry to say not such a happy story on this one. I got the UDMA over a year ago and from the first installation stated to experience problems in the card. I kept having problems with the program and untranslated errors inside of it. The more I requested the more they told me to change out the PCB board and do a hot swap to fix my drive. I had one screen shot after another asking them what this funciton was becasue I could not read it and understand it. All I saw was complete garbage on my screen and menus. I would ask for help and they would say to go here and select this function. I would spend days and hours searching for what they asked me for. Then came to find out that one of my areas of garbage was actually what they wanted me to do and what they asked me to go into.

This was only the beginning of the night mere with ACE and the wonderful TS that they have. Second problem was the lock up in the UDMA card. Each time I would get so far on a recovery job the card would freeze up and give me fatial PCI error. I would have to shut down my computer system, reset the card in the pci slot and bring it back up. Well it might work for an hour or maybe two but right again when I was about to finish my work it would freeze and give again PCI error. I took screen shots of this one. Again TS response to me do a hot swap on the pcb board this should fix your problem.

I asked on more than one time what is the PCI specification of your card so that I can find here on the island or order one from outside a mother board that will work with you card. They told me PCI error is not the problem in the configurations of the mother board it works with all motherboards. That is BS the PCI error is becasue of the mother board and the card was not compatiable with my mother board. I had to get like 6 different mother board. Finally after finding out the specification of each PCI slot on the mother board and testing them all I got a working mother board to mount this card in. But lol this was not all that maters. Each time on ATA1 when I got from the ide cable to the pata/sata cable I have again PCI errors. I also get now that the program can not read the card serial number and to contact ACE if this problem continues.

Now after no help what so ever from TS i got to playing around with all this mess. I am not good at understanding this card and the crap errors it has on it. I know that if I change a cable out I have to reset the card before ever turning it on. I know now that this card is very sensitive to the PCI port configuration inside the mother board. I also found out the garbage on my screen was due to untranslated areas of Russian in my progam. They delivered with my card a very old version of this program. I had to beg them to give me updates in my update box, The ldr files or should I say pci files are so old they are worthless in repairing drives. Most of mine are back from 2006 date. I was never supplied with the pdf manual.

Not only this but the terminal usb adaptor came broken. They knew of this problem and seem to ignore the fact this adaptor did not work at all and the TX was not working on my card. AFter months of fighting with them guess what they said they would do something for me. They asked me to give them 360 euro for a new one that mine was not out of guarantee. Well wow they said 1 year but guess what no fine print that is only on the card udma and not on parts that come with it.

Now I receive email asking me to pay again to them 900 euro for TS. I know that if I do not pay I do not get updates. But considering the condition of my download box and the lack of response on the forum what am I paying them for. Maybe I can have a new update program twice if lucky three time in one year.

So as you see all companies have faults and problems no company is perfect. I like the UDMA do not get me wrong in this one but after 1 year of nothing but problems and figuring out how to avoid them and get around them I am now able to keep it up and alive to do a recovery with it. So to me I have wasted a lot of time and frustration on this card and did not even do a recovery on it the first year. I could only keep it working long enough to clone drives with it. If I knew I would have to pay that much money to only be able to clone drives I could of bought a deepspar and saved me a lot of money and frustration on this one.

So now how to do recovery work that is a good question. The only way left for me was to get use to use the tools from SD and learn them. In doing so I wrote the book that everyone has now for the maxtor manual. I did this out of desparation here to be able to do recovery work. I know that all tools have problems and not all programs work well. People complain that SD can not translate from Chinese to English but then on the other hand ACE can not translate Russian to English either. I have the perfect example of this one and the program they gave me to use that is full of garbage and untranslated errors from Russian to English.

As for the DC this to me is a good tool. I know for a fact that I had some drives that were killing my system and when attached to the DC it would make recovery possible on it.

I do not want to continue to go on into this one but just to be fair to all in this ACE is a good tool once you get past all the problems and SD has a good tool also. I find that the two of them together can work and if one does not fix the drive the other one can. I have good luck with maxtor doctor on all my maxtor drives and can repair them easy with this tool. I have not yet been able to find a good way with udma to do the same. I have done all and for some reason the HD Doctor in repairing the SA is my first choice on this one.

Now you know the experiece I had with both of these companies and their tools.

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Iorana Haraharaini

what a pity you facing this problem before. but it's over now. forget it don't angry any more. keep happy everyday. and every tools must have strong-point stand on market. tools just tools. success or no depend on your skill ,experience, & knowledge. like Ann be smart can be use tools what she have and done job soon. i don't talk about others tools. just vote PC3000 UDMA.

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data recovery service[/b]

Amarbir,
I only use Ace products and I am quite happy with it , never felt the need of another tool after buying it , So i have never used SD but I have seen most people complain about it even in the forum and also the people outside that own the product .