head replacement tool

[yair25m]

Hi,

I need an advice where can I buy a tool for replacing the heads stack of WD20EARS (caviar green 2tb) drive (model 00MVWB0).
I would also like to know - what in general are the parameters that should be the same in order for a drive to serve as a donor?

[CK]

You appear to be asking some fundamental questions about this drive, so would I be correct in assuming that this is your first time swapping heads in a drive?

Perhaps you can clarify so that you can be offered appropriate advice for your situation.

[northwind]

what he said ^^^

And, is this your drive or a client's drive?

[yair25m]

It's not a client drive, it's my own one.

The price the data restoring companies is too high for me and I'm willing to take the chace. This is actually the third time I'm replacing heads but in the previous times I had an appropriate tool for the Seagate drives. What I'm asking is a company that sells the head comb for the WD20EARS drive.

[CK]

Thanks for clarifying your situation. A headswap on this drive is more complex than on a Seagate drive. It would be unwise for you to try a DIY attempt if I'm totally honest. The costs of headtools + donor drive + risk should greatly outweigh the cost of sending this to a pro. A headswap on this drive can be done for less than $1000.

However, it's not for me to tell you not to do it, so if you really want to risk it, you can buy the tool here: http://www.hddsurgery.com/tool/hdds-wdc-3-5-ramp-p4

As I said above, a headswap on WD is tricky and requires more than a "simple" head swap.

[pcimage]

Agree with CK

The physical head swap is only the "tip of the iceberg" on these WD's

[BlackST]

@yair25m,

assuming that it won't be "so" easy and you also have to consider a lot of other things BUT you want to do it anyway, the only thing I would suggest you is to contact user "helpdisc" on this forum.

[yair25m]

@CK and pcimage: can you elaborate more about the difficulties that can arise in replacing heads in such drives?
Also, I already opend a defect hard drive and it's not so clear to me how to dissasemble the head stack as I can't see an appropriate screw.

[CK]

I can't elaborate too much as the learning curve is steep with these and most of the information would be over your head (I don't mean this in a condescending manner). There are unique characteristics with WD drives which complicate the headswap process. You need specialised tools, such as PC-3000 to complete a headswap successfully on such drives. This is a bad drive for you to experiment on. It's a very high density with a 6 or 8 heads.

I don't mean to be unhelpful but I honestly recommend that you look at alternative options rather than DIY.

[yair25m]

Please try to be more informative - I didn't learnt anything from this discussion except the fact that it's a complicated process and you are encourging me not to take the risk. *In my case the information on the disk is not so important and I can take the risk*.
I already used PC3000 and I can't see why it is crucial for replacing heads. In some sense it looks easier that the Seagate as the heads are located in the parking area and not on the plates.

Any valuable information regarding this case? Has anyone done it before in here and can point some difficulties in the process?