Intermittent hum on WD 1TB drive

[Crash11]

Hey guys,

New to this forum, and I need some help. I have a friend's external harddrive that was dropped about 3-4 feet onto a concrete slab. The drive was NOT on when this happened. The original enclosure is an HP Personal Media blah blah blah. I took the drive out and it's a WD drive (1TB capacity). Well, ever since the drop it will not be recognized by windows or the BIOS. I tried using the SATA - USB interface that came with the enclosure, and I tried hooking it up directly to a SATA port on my media center to no success. It makes a weird hum/buzz for about 0.5 seconds then stops for about 2 seconds. It does this hum/buzz cycle about 5 times then just stops altogether. I'm pretty sure it's powering up just fine. I don't think this is a PCB issue. I'm sure it's mechanical inside.

I've been doing all kinds of searching and reading online, and I can't make sense of this. I think the evidence points to a crashed head, but could that really happen with the drive powered down? Could the spindle be ruined? Is this a candidate for trying to cool the drive down in the freezer? I'm assuming any kind of software like Spinrite is out of the question here. What are my options? I have a donor drive that I can experiment with to see just what I can get away with before totally ruining the drive. I was thinking of filling my donor drive with data, taking the cover off, sticking the head down, then unsticking it and seeing if I can access any of that data.

What do you guys think? I'm desperate here. My friend can't afford the $$$$ for a data recovery service, and this is the only location for all of his pictures,music, and documents.

[ShaneWard]

It will be interesting to see what others think, but I think the spindle stack could be out of alignment and the heads are unable to go onto the platters or start up, possible motor damage too. I think the heads should be parked safely, but the weight of the platters might do something on that drop... Like I said, it will be interesting to see what others think of this.

Also I think the platters might be made out of glass, just have to hope it did not shatter.

[DR-Kiev]

What do you guys think? I'm desperate here. My friend can't afford the $$$$ for a data recovery service, and this is the only location for all of his pictures,music, and documents.

Suggest to your friend to put the drive on th shelf and try to earn enough money in nearest time to use professional data recovery service later.
Or , if you reaLY wish to help your friend, donate him for this job.

[BlackST]

Broken spindle and / or stiction and maybe other damage , heads and/or media (to be confirmed with further analysis in clean room environment and adequate tools.

Could the spindle be ruined?

Yes.

Is this a candidate for trying to cool the drive down in the freezer?

Yes but you won't get a single byte out of it. It will only cool the disk.

What are my options?

1) Wait for better times
2) TITAP (Take It To A Pro)
3) Live without data.
I don't see anything else.

I have a donor drive that I can experiment with to see just what I can get away with before totally ruining the drive. I was thinking of filling my donor drive with data, taking the cover off, sticking the head down, then unsticking it and seeing if I can access any of that data.

You'll destroy that drive too. A pity, but if you want to do some tinkering and have a look at drive internals, the "damage" is limited to the cost of the donor drive (about 60/70$, I think)

I'm desperate here. My friend can't afford the $$$$ for a data recovery service, and this is the only location for all of his pictures,music, and documents.

You have done what you could do but simply you can't do nothing by yourself with what you have.

Good luck.

P.S. if the damage is limited (but only a professional analysis can tell) it should not be the end of the world in terms of quote.

Last edited by BlackST on July 8th, 2013, 16:15, edited 1 time in total.

[DR-Kiev]

You have done what you could do but simply you can't do nothing. Unless the scenario is different.

Good luck.

You are wrong. You forgot about donation, this real help for the real friend.

[BlackST]

You have done what you could do but simply you can't do nothing. Unless the scenario is different.

Good luck.

You are wrong. You forgot about donation, this real help for the real friend.

I have a different idea but this would OT the thread and these thoughts fall into the "very personal" category....

[Crash11]

What do you guys recommend for professional service? I see pcimage recommended a lot on this forum, but I'm in the US. Also, does anyone have an idea of how much $$$ we're talking if the platter is ok, just out of alignment? My friend always goes to Staples for PC related stuff, and they quoted $1500 to send it to a lab for data recovery.

[Crash11]

Update:

I used the scrap drive I had to experiment with whether or not I could take the cover off, snap a photo, replace the cover, and keep using the drive. That worked, so I did the same with hdd in question. I've attached a photo.

[labtech]

The cost is likely to be that much or more at most reputable data recovery companies, especially it the cover has already been tampered with.

An in-lab pro evaluation is the only way for a fair shot at being successful.

Best wishes

[Crash11]

More specifically, what order should I try this? If the head is stuck to the platter and I try to spin the platter, won't that scratch the platter? If I try to move the head to the ramps first, do I try to pull up slightly first or just slide it? I do work in a laboratory (not computer hardware related) that has a clean room. We use it for weighing very fine filters down to thousandths of a gram so there's no air flow and particulate filtration. I can take the drive in there with tweezers, screwdrivers, pliers, etc. Can you guys recommend anything more specific? I'm a mechanical engineer by the way. I'm sure you computer engineers will laugh, but I'm hoping it gives me more credibility than an accountant or car mechanic. I also work with computer engineers that build and modify circuit boards. I can enlist one of them to help me to the sensitive operations.

Something I was curious about.... if the drive was powered down when it was dropped, doesn't that mean the head was engaged in the yellow ramp area at the time? How did the head end up stuck to the platter like it did? I've heard that some drives park the head over the platter in an area that isn't used for data storage. Is that the case here? Or is it simply that the drop screwed up the spindle, and when the drive was first turned on after the drop, the head swung out and stuck to the platter that wasn't rotating properly anymore? Sorry for all of the questions. This is just the engineer in me that's curious about how something works.

[northwind]

Is it my imagination, my monitor is dusty or the top platter is actually FULL of dust?
If so, even if you manage to perform the operation with success and move heads back to the ramp, they will die upon powerup.
If you care about your data, don't do anything else.

Contact http://www.datasaversllc.com/ ask for Jon. They will help you out. They're in Atlanta.

Good luck.

[fzabkar]

I would suggest that the OP place a business card between the PCB and the HDA contacts (after parking the heads on the ramp). Then let the drive will spin up. This will give the air turbulence more time to blow any dust off the platter. If the motor remains spinning, then let it spin as long as possible. If it spins down, then keep spinning it up until you feel confident that the HDA has been purged of contaminants.

If the drive doesn't spin, then it may be that it needs to see the preamp. In this case you could mask off the two voice coil contacts on the HDA connector with insulation tape. You could even use the donor PCB for this. If you upload a photo of the PCB, I could locate these point for you.

Years ago I used to routinely follow such a practice when mopping up the debris after a head crash. It gave me peace of mind just in case I missed something.

Best of luck.

[Keatah]

All this messing around is just running up the cost of eventual pro service. In observing the discussion I can't imagine a good DIY outcome. But if you prove me wrong, then you get 1up!

[hddguy]

Try to rotate the platter counter-clockwise and gently place the head stack back on the ramp. There are risks on the process and if he heads break apart you will have a biger problem to deal with. It's a risky operation.

Maybe parking the heads is required, but do you forget that WD have nothing to keep head stack secure while top cover is gone? Try to park them while not secured will only cause more damage.

If you want to offer advice, make it good advice...

[ShaneWard]

If you can move the platters slightly, then the heads are not stuck onto the drive. If they don't move all all, don't use much force too, then its stuck and you need to send it in for data recovery. If they move, then the heads just fell onto the platter and the heads can be moved back to the head stack, but I am not sure how you would do this, moving the heads when the platter is stationary could damage them and the disk. In any case, I think the spindle motor assembly was jolted slightly out of alignment from the fall onto the concrete floor. One possible outcome would be to move the platters to a completely new drive.

The only solution is to take it to a DR company or tell your friend to use their backup, this drive is completely buggered especially since the cover was removed and there is dust on it. at best, if it does work, it will only last about 5 mins before its dead completely.

[BlackST]

80-90% FUBAR , maybe someone can try but a high price and uncertain outcome. Don't really know if personally I would accept even to take a look at it.

P.S. I wonder if this was really the unique repository of your friend's data pictures and documents and what does he think about all this...

[Crash11]

No backup for this data. This was the only location. I absolutely hate the idea of a external harddrive with moving parts in it anyway, but this just reaffirms my choice to backup anything I really care about into the cloud.

Anyway, we've decided to use Data Savers LLC. Their fee seems reasonable. I'm not going to mess with the drive anymore. Out of curiosity BlackST, why do you think it's 80-90% FUBAR?

[BlackST]

Let's first cross fingers and see what is the outcome. In any case you are in very good hands.

MY worries are about contamination and media damage caused by heads touching the platters while being "on the loose". Sometimes visible or even invisible media damage like that is sufficient to kill a new headstack right after reaching that area.
Also we don't know anything about what's happening at inner surfaces. Just this.

Let Jon work !

[Crash11]

Let's first cross fingers and see what is the outcome. In any case you are in very good hands.

MY worries are about contamination and media damage caused by heads touching the platters while being "on the loose". Sometimes visible or even invisible media damage like that is sufficient to kill a new headstack right after reaching that area.
Also we don't know anything about what's happening at inner surfaces. Just this.

Let Jon work !

"on the loose"????

[BlackST]

Yes when you removed the top lid there was nothing to hold the headstack in place...
They used a precise head parking strategy for a reason !

NOTE : this may or may not be a problem at all, everything depends on media condition. First heads have to be safely moved out from platter area then surface decontaminated and visually inspected. Let's think positive....