40Gb ATMR NVRAM problems etc...

[pcimage]

Hi all,

I'm running out of ideas with this one....

40Gb ATMR
P/N 08K0852
MLC: H69421
Dell P/N 0C2180

Initially it did not spin up, went straight to "safe mode"

On investigation I saw that the first two bytes of the NVRAM had been set to "00 00", which is clearly wrong. I change back to the usual "44 41", now it spins but clicks.

So I swap PCB with one of same f/w version, it spins and comes "DRDY DSC" but cannot ID the model, or read anything from SA.

I ordered in an exact duplicate donor (same model, date, p/n, MLC - Everything, even serial is very close), still same.

Is there a way to hot swap these, I don't think there is?

Any ideas guys???

Cheers

Sean

[jono-ats]

Sean,

I've had this problem before, too.

You can't hotswap them. If you try, sometimes the heads will stop over the platters and you'll have to disassemble the drive and reposition them to restart.

I think the ATMR is adaptive-sensitive. IMHO, the clue is the corrupted firmware. I would try programming the EEPROM with as many examples as possible.

Also, it would be interesting for you to test the heads that you have replaced and make sure they are still good. Sometimes when I do a head swap on these drives the heads die for no APPARENT reason.

The last one I struggled with came ready like yours, but I couldn't access the firmware.

Let us know how it goes. Sorry I couldn't be helpful.

Jon

[pcimage]

Not so important now, client has decided he wasn't going to pay even our regular recovery charge, never mind anything out of the ordinairy.

So not wasting any more time on this one.

It would have been interesting to see what was wrong with it, but the client wants the drive back.

Cheers anyway

Sean