WDC WD20EARS apparently dead

[OldMan58]

I have two WDC WD20EARS (2 TB Green series) drives installed on my computer that I use mostly for backups.
Two days ago one of them stopped functioning properly.
My OS is a Windows 7 64-bit Ultimate installed few weeks ago without any problems.
My hardware (fully functional for the last four years mostly under Win XP) is:

Mainboard: Gigabyte P35-DS3R
Chipset: Intel P31/P35
Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 @ 2400 MHz
Physical Memory: 6144 MBDDR2-SDRAM
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT

On Intel ICH10R (AHCI mode):
Hard Disk: M4-CT256M4SSD2 (256GB)
Hard Disk: Western Digital WD1001FALS-00J7B1 (1000GB)
Hard Disk: Western Digital WD1001FALS-00J7B1 (1000GB)

On JMicron JMB363 (AHCI mode):
Hard Disk: Western Digital WD20EARS-00MVWB0 (2000GB)
Hard Disk: Western Digital WD20EARS-00MVWB0 (2000GB)

The symptoms:
1. The drive content was not available anymore; just a message box indicating that the drive must be initialized first before using it.
2. Any attempt to access the drive froze Explorer for minutes (probably timeout errors).
3. Could not access the SMART data (the same behavior as above - timing out after a very long interval without any information).
4. Restarting the system didn't help. The same symptoms as above.
5. BIOS eventually detects the drive (but slowly - again I think some timeouts are the reason for the delay).
6. Moved the hard drive on a different computer (much newer with i7 960 and X58A chipset running the same OS) - the same behavior.
7. No clicking noises (or any abnormal noises) from the HDD. At start-up the HDD makes the same kind of noise pattern like the good HDD.

My preliminary conclusion is that the hard drive is at fault here. Moreover, I think the defect is not of mechanical nature (the noise pattern appears to indicate healthy mechanics). Because the drive is eventually recognized by the BIOS, the SATA signal integrity is probably fine (a faulty SATA line on the HDD would make the drive undetectable by BIOS). I suspect the SA on the HDD is the culprit (a bad sector in that area, firmware fault maybe?) but I'm not 100% sure.

The Windows Event Log shows the timeouts. The JRAID (JMB363) service indicates: "The driver for device \Device\Scsi\JRAID1 detected a port timeout due to prolonged inactivity."
This confirms in part my suspicions.

My question: is it possible to recover/revive the drive without spending a fortune for a data recovery service? The backups I had on the HDD that failed are useful but not that important to justify the high cost many DR providers are actually charging for the fix.

Is it reasonably to assume that this HDD can be revived by SA validation/restoration with software tools and not by a long and complicated work done in the clean room?
A software solution seems to be offered by A-FF Repair Station: is it suitable for this kind of problems? Or it is only good for unlocking a HDD? How safe and reliable is their service?

While not a HDD expert, I have a good understanding of HDD and computers and I spent most of my life as an embedded system designer/developer and the last years writing system software (Windows drivers, system utilities, etc.) As consequence, I`m able to use any professional advice in this matter that requires reasonable knowledge of the technology. But I cannot perform clean room hardware work (mostly because of logistics and the lack of parts). In the past I managed to revive successfully a WDC HDD by changing the PCB and the EEPROM with the calibration data but this is the most I can do...

I would appreciate any help in this matter.

Thank you,

OldMan58

[OldMan58]

Update: I rebooted the computer using my old Windows XP 32-bit. Interestingly, the "defective" hard drive returned to life. I'm copying the files on another HDD right now. At least I saved my data. But... I'm puzzled: the drive didn't work for more than 24 hours on two different computers running the same Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit.

I'm not sure if the HDD is ok. Maybe I was lucky enough to have the drive booting properly once and let me save my stuff

Any ideas what might have happened?

I'll return with more updates after saving everything.

OldMan58

[OldMan58]

It is a fact now: the "defective" WDC WD20EARS is recognized by BIOS but it does not respond to SMART. Windows XP is able to access the content of the drive but Windows 7 does not. WD Diagnostic Tool does not display the SMART info in either OS.

Why is XP able to access the drive is beyond my understanding, but this helped me to save the data on the drive.

In conclusion, I continue to believe that the SA on the drive is screwed up and requires a fix.

My question is: can this drive be repaired or just RMA it? I assume that, in the end, the later is safer and cheaper.

Any comments or advice?

Thanks again.

[Vulcan]

WD Diagnostic Tool does not display the SMART info in either OS.

Now you have recovered your data and can therefore take risks running diagnostics on the drive, if you can get WD DLG to give you an error code when testing that drive, then that error code should qualify it for RMA, assuming it is within warranty and not limited (e.g. is not an OEM drive).

In conclusion, I continue to believe that the SA on the drive is screwed up and requires a fix.

My guess is slightly different (not what I would call "screwed up", since the problem is intermittent) but similar, although I'm not an expert.

My question is: can this drive be repaired or just RMA it? I assume that, in the end, the later is safer and cheaper.

Agreed, if it was my drive and I had the option, I would RMA a drive with those symptoms.

Good luck and perhaps consider buying some more drives to use as backups of your data? Although you said the 2TB drives contained "backups", the fact that you had to recover data from the drive suggests that they contain your only copy of data, and not actually backups...

[OldMan58]

My mistake: most of the content was backup data requiring just time to rebuild. But I also used the drive to save two virtual machine snapshots that I wanted to preserve. Not a great loss but good to know it is back.

I agree: I'm already considering a NAS with 2 drives in RAID 1 configuration for future backups.

The drive is OEM but still in limited warranty. According to WDC warranty check:

Serial Number_ Model Number_______ Warranty Status_____ Warranty Exp Date
WCAZAxxxxxxx WD20EARS-00MVWB0 IN LIMITED WARRANTY 10/30/2013

with the explanation "The product is under warranty and available for replacement."

I assume I can RMA the drive. BTW, the drive does not pass WD DLG - in Windows 7 I cannot even run the tool (only in Windows XP I can).

Thanks for the advice.

[drc]

I've RMAed drives to WD for as little as a couple of bad sectors. Never had any trouble.