Hi,
My WD5000AAKS (oct 2009) stopped working after a power surge (which killed another drive and a couple of DVD burners on the same computer).
The chip that seems to be affected is the smooth one.
How can I recover the disk? If I get a hold of another WD5000AAKS, is there a swap procedure I can do?

any help would be greatly appreciated.

Ariel.

Well you can try this one. But also consider this can effect or damage your preamp too. If you want to try to get another pcb and move the adaptive from your Marvel chip over to the new one. The adaptive for your HDD are stored in the chip with Big M on it Marvel chip.

If what you say all the damage happened and all things you indicated were damaged them maybe I might suggest that you do not attempt this one alone. That you should seek a DR company to help you out in this one. There are more times than one when a smooth chip is burned or damage it effects the preamps in the HSA.

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Iorana Haraharaini

Replacing Smooth Chip could be the easiest solution for you, if you have soldering expertise. As it will be easily available. Also your PCB might attain ready state after chip replacement to enable you to copy the adaptive from patient to donor as suggested by poehere.

I agree with poehere, often if the SMOOTH chip is fried, the preamp has also been damaged. The last 2 WD drives I got with fried SMOOTH chips had damaged preamps, so not even a new PCB and adaptive swap helped.

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

poehere, how do I transfer the adaptive (Marvel chip) from the old pcb to the new one?
from what I see, it's not a regularly soldered chip like the "smooth" chip.

If I do replace the marvel chip (by getting a new one from another pcb or buying one), what exactly would be the next steps for the pcb to function properly?

I had another WD2500 along side the WD5000 in the computer when the surge happened and I managed to recover it by simply replacing the PCB from another similar WD2500.
I didn't copy any adaptive data. Does this make sense?

Ariel.

You were lucky on your other WD drive. Normally the adaptive for that drive are stored in the ROM and the ROM has to be moved over to the new PCB board.

In your case you need tools to do this one with. IE ACE, Atola, or SD that can read the contents of the Marvel chip and move the adaptives over to the new PCB board. That is if your premap is not friend. I have seen more cases than not that when the smooth chip is friend such as yours the preamp needs changing too which means a complete new HSA on this one. Then what happens the head alignment issues come into play on this model and you have to understand how to realign the new heads in this drive in order to read the data on it again.

I am sorry but I think this job is way beyond any DIY and you should try and get some professional help on this one. You got lucky with your other HDD and was able to read it again without moving over adaptive for your drive. But on this one you will not be as lucky as the other one. If you want try and find a PCB that matches this one and test it and see if your HDD will spin up again. It should start clicking on this one when you do it. That will at least indicate if the preamp is burned or not. Then you will know how to go on this one. If it can spin up with your new PCB board this one should not cost you a lot from a DR pro to use your donor pcb board and move the adaptives over and get your data back for you. If your drive does not spin and click then you know for sure you have more problems and they are interenal and your premap is fried.

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Iorana Haraharaini

thanks poehere for the explanation.
what exactly is stored in the marvel chip? in other words what is the "adaptive"?
assuming the preamp is working, would it be enough to replace the smooth chip on the original pcb?

galiel, please use the search function on top of page.

About the question :

assuming the preamp is working, would it be enough to replace the smooth chip on the original pcb?

the answer is yes if it's the only blown part, but usually there are other chained failures when the combo ic blows. Also : do you have the necessary SMD rework gear and fresh spare parts as that IC is not available commonly and the capability to check everything else before attempting a PCB repair?
Good will is not enough, sometimes.