My Book Essential Repair

[cattac]

Hi,

I'm having some problems that I'm hoping you guys can help me with. My Western Digital My Book Essential is no longer recognized by any computer when it's plugged into a USB port. However, when I take it out of the enclosure and plug the hard drive up to the motherboard, it shows up as disk 0 and asks me to initialize it. I'm fairly sure that there's nothing wrong with the HD itself. Unfortunately, from what I've read, the USB adapter automatically encrypts everything on the drive, and there's no way to access my data without going through the card.

So, basically, is it possible to repair or replace this card? I tried to buy it straight from WD, but they informed that they don't sell component parts. Would it work if I bought another My Book of the same model and switched out the cards?

My Book P/N: WDBACW0030HBK-00 4211D

USB Card: Symwave SW6316-3VB14

Thanks!

[cattac]

Sorry, the card's actually 4061-705089-001 Rev. AG

[poehere]

You can try and get the exact same enclosure on ebay and try this one. Has worked in more cases.

[craig6928]

you could try and get another board but it has to be the correct one for your drive as it be unique to each drive
as the encryption would be different


ebay has them

WD My Book Essential External Hard Drive Control Board

Part No: PCB 4061-705059-001 REV. AG (Printed on white sticker)

http://www.ebay.com/itm/WD-My-Book-Esse ... 2c6cdb0554

[cattac]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm going to try switching out the control board. I think I found an identical one at http://parts.com.hk/1/index.php?main_pa ... Tl38xzrxok .

[gwtesttest]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm going to try switching out the control board. I think I found an identical one at http://parts.com.hk/1/index.php?main_pa ... Tl38xzrxok .

I am experiencing exactly the same problems (USB enclosure not recognized and all data encrypted) with the same controller board *4061-705089-001 Rev AB*. Although it doesn't contain any critical data, I would still want to have access to it. I am therefore wondering if you managed to solve your problem? Are you still using this USB enclosure or have you switched to an un-encrypting enclosure? In case it still works and you don't need it anymore, I would appreciate if you could send or even sell it to me.

[msm]

Hi all,
Fortunately,in some situations there are tricky way to gain access to data!
everyone that facing similar problem, please check your hdd for these:
after connecting all cables (usb + power):
-dose hdd spin up?
-dose LED start to blinking or not?

[gwtesttest]

Hi all,
Fortunately,in some situations there are tricky way to gain access to data!
everyone that facing similar problem, please check your hdd for these:
after connecting all cables (usb + power):
-dose hdd spin up?
-dose LED start to blinking or not?

Thank you for the response. My situation is like this:

- Yes, the HDD spins up as it does normally.
- Yes, the LED blinks a couple of times and than remains turned on.

Also:

- USB device is not recognized not under Linux (tried a few kernels 3.8-3.12, dmesg reports nothing at all) and not even under Windows 7.
- One theory what could have happened in my case: the USB hub may have sent a too-high voltage to all USB devices for a second.
- If connected directly to SATA, the HDD works fine (except that all data is encrypted), SMART reports no errors, no clicking sounds...

[fzabkar]

If you disconnect the HDD from the bridge board and power up the bridge on its own, does the bridge then show up in Linux?

[gwtesttest]

yes, I've tried that once again now. Absolutely nothing shows up, not even in dmesg. Doesn't matter if I first plug in power, than USB, press the button, or the other way around. Tested on USB3 and USB2 ports.

So it seems that the TX and RX signals don't come to the controller chip or the chip itself is broken.

[fzabkar]

The USB-SATA bridge IC (U2) controls power to the drive by switching a dual MOSFET chip (U6) on or off. It also drives the LED. Therefore this proves that the bridge IC is at least partially functional.

It could be that the USB Data+ and Data- pins are open, as you say. The problem is that some bridge firmware will enumerate the device even if the drive is not detected whereas other firmware will not. One way to positively confirm whether the USB data pins are functional is to invalidate the serial flash memory (U4) while the board is powering up. If the bridge IC cannot see its external firmware, then it reverts to its internal factory code and identifes itself with the chip's generic PID and VID. To this end you would short the EEPROM's Hold pin (pin #7) to ground just before you power up the board, then remove the short a few seconds later. However, before you do this, measure the resistance between pins 7 and 8 to confirm that the Hold pin is not tied directly to Vcc.

[gwtesttest]

Thank you for the idea. But unfortunately it didn't work. I tried it a few times in different combinations and times (even shorted it for a minute) with and without the HDD attached.

Between /HOLD and VSS are not tied together and around 0.69mA flowed as soon as the power supply was connected. For the combination "connect power, short, press button" the lights (and HDD spinning up) went on as usual. For the combination "short, connect power, press button) the light didn't come up (neither did the drive).

I also tried to short EEPROM's Cable select (pin #1) to VCC (pin #4) to disable the EEPROM altogether, without any efect on dmesg output.

This probably means that external firmware is either not present or not an issue (I don't recall ever updating it). Any other ideas I could try out?

[fzabkar]

The external firmware must be OK, otherwise the drive wouldn't spin up, nor would the LED flash. The fact that disabling the external EEPROM prevented the drive from spinning up and the LED from flashing confirms that the external firmware contains the code that controls these functions.

ISTM that there may be a discontinuity in the wiring between the USB connector and the Data +/- pins at the bridge IC (L3, L4, L5). Did you test for this possibility?

Does the drive/PCB behave any differently if you restrict it to USB 2.0?

[gwtesttest]

USB Data +/- pins on L3 are actually the first thing I tested and they should be enough for USB2 connectivity (for newer tests I am trying all on an USB2 port). (L4 and L5 are harder to get to.) I tested L3 again (together with the USB cable) and resistance from pin in USB cable to other side of L3 for each one of them 2.7 Ohm (they are not shorted together).

Unfortunately not, USB2 and USB3 behave the same. I even tried it with other USB2 and USB3 cables, even tried a few power adapters from other WD MyBook Essential models. And it is always the same: light turns on, HDD spins up and makes a few usual sounds as if something is read, after a few seconds, light blinks 3 times, and it stays on (HDD is spinning as in standby mode) - looks the same as I remember that it should, but the USB device is not detected.

[fzabkar]

You might like to watch this current thread:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=27911&p=192562#p192562

Perhaps streetskater will tell us how a working bridge board behaves on its own.

[gwtesttest]

@fzebkar, Thank you for your support.

I managed to borrow a WDBACW0010HBK-00 and it contains exactly the same board, even same revision, and everything works!!! I am creating a duplicate right now and finally the nightmare will be over.

[fzabkar]

I managed to borrow a WDBACW0010HBK-00 and it contains exactly the same board, even same revision, and everything works!!! I am creating a duplicate right now and finally the nightmare will be over.

Congratulations.

After you have backed up your data, could you tell us if the bridge PCB identifies itself in the absence of a HDD? Perhaps you could provide a report from USBDeview or UVCView or a suitable Linux tool?

[raven4d]

I managed to borrow a WDBACW0010HBK-00 and it contains exactly the same board, even same revision, and everything works!!! I am creating a duplicate right now and finally the nightmare will be over.

Congratulations.

After you have backed up your data, could you tell us if the bridge PCB identifies itself in the absence of a HDD? Perhaps you could provide a report from USBDeview or UVCView or a suitable Linux tool?

connecting the bridge board with a HDD attached , will give the following reaction


[ 104.933051] usb 1-2: new high-speed USB device number 4 using ehci_hcd

[ 105.636029] usb 1-2: New USB device found, idVendor=1058, idProduct=1130

[ 105.636032] usb 1-2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3

[ 105.636034] usb 1-2: Product: My Book 1130

[ 105.636036] usb 1-2: Manufacturer: Western Digital

[ 105.636037] usb 1-2: SerialNumber: 57434156354C303931343437

[ 105.636382] scsi5 : usb-storage 1-2:1.0

[ 108.794814] scsi 5:0:0:0: Direct-Access WD My Book 1130 1012 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6

[ 108.795564] scsi 5:0:0:1: Enclosure WD SES Device 1012 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6

[ 108.796165] sd 5:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0

[ 108.798513] scsi 5:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg3 type 13

[ 108.799807] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Test WP failed, assume Write Enabled

[ 108.802045] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Asking for cache data failed

[ 108.802049] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through

[ 108.806808] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Test WP failed, assume Write Enabled

[ 108.807932] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Asking for cache data failed

[ 108.807935] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through

[ 108.807938] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdc] Attached SCSI disk

[ 108.813480] sd 0:0:0:0: Embedded Enclosure Device

[ 108.816555] sd 0:0:0:0: Failed to get diagnostic page 0x8000002

[ 108.816558] sd 0:0:0:0: Failed to bind enclosure -19

[ 108.817557] scsi 5:0:0:1: Failed to get diagnostic page 0x8000002

[ 108.817560] scsi 5:0:0:1: Failed to bind enclosure -19

[ 108.817577] ses 5:0:0:1: Attached Enclosure device

[unhappy_wd_user]

Hi all,

I'm having the exact same issue as gwtesttest.

I've tested to connect the bridge board without the HDD as suggested by fzabkar and it does get detected in the Device Manager.

However, when I re-attached the bridge board back to the HDD, then nothing gets detected anymore.

You can refer for the full details of my problem in my thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=29173

Hopefully someone can lend me a helping hand as I'm getting desperate.

gwtesttest, as for your mentioned solution, so did you replace the bridge board or the PCB ?

[waynehom]

Hi everyone,

This was very helpful. I managed to recover a WD Essentials with the PCB from Parts.com.hk

WD My Book 3TB Desktop USB 3.0 External Hard Drive Storage
Model: WDBACW0030HBK-NESN
Hard Drive Serial #: WCA...
3TB WD drive is marked as Manufacture Date: Aug 4 2012

My friend somehow disassembled the drive and lost the PCB, so I had to do some research as to which Revision board I needed. In addition to the hardware encryption, he also enable the WD software password. Attaching the drive directly to computer results in no files found, so needed to get the board first. So, narrowed it down to two versions.


4061-705094-001 Rev.AH.
http://parts.com.hk/1/index.php?main_pa ... taGQfl96_4

4061-705089-001 Rev.AG
http://parts.com.hk/1/index.php?main_pa ... taG1fl96_4

They were very helpful, offering to refund the first part for the second if it didn't work. I ended up paying for both boards, as I felt that was the better thing to do. And it would've saved a few weeks of waiting for delivery.

So, managed to use both of the boards, and it turns out 4061-705094-001 Rev.AH was the correct one for my drive.

So, drive recognized, then unlocked with WD software, and luckily drive was readable and all files were recoverable to a new hard drive. Made a second backup copy and my friend is now happy to have his stuff back.


Thanks
Wayne