WD10TMVV

Started acting like that (write protected) the day after the last normal use, without any shock nor mistreatment. I'll try recording the noise.
BTW, if it's encrypted, how much would it be to recover the data?

Anyway, assuming the HDTune report is reliable and the disk is OK, with no bad sectors and a healthy SA, then where might the problem be? The Initio chip?

I found several posts on the net regarding some registry problem with same symptoms. Drive suddenly becomes write protected. I have a feeling its not same as ur situation but worth for u to take a look imo

Here for example http://www.daniweb.com/hardware-and-sof ... 7013/page2 on page 1 i think there was smth relevant.

I will try that. In the meantime I tried (twice) to record what it sounds like when plugged in my laptop. Not a great recording, but I only have the onboard mic on this machine. The thing is the head noise is not very audible.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/61719593/Normal.wma
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/61719593/%2B10dB.wma

BTW that software /Thumbscrew) didn't work. I kinda suspected it, for several reasons. One of them is: those solutions are for setting/unsetting writeability on USB drives, but my problem is also with readability, so I doubted it could be something settings-related (also consider that this drive behaves the same on several PCs).

I have been basically stuck with this drive, until yesterday. I got a few recommendations from users on this forum and a few other places on the net, but none of them allowed me to be fairly sure to succeed, and I was not in a hurry, so I kept looking around before doing anything with this disk. I eventually decided to take the risk of permanent data loss, as those weren't as important for me as they might be for other people, and did the SATA workaround. That worked perfectly, it was then just a matter of copy and paste and allowed a complete recovery. No encryption whatsoever.
However I took a slightly different approach. I had done that before by desoldering the decoupling capacitors, and discarding them. This time I left the capacitors in place, cutting the PCB traces instead. Replacing the caps after removing them sounds like a difficult task, unless you have the right tools (I don't), but rejoining traces is much simpler and can be done with a simple soldering iron. So now I can restore the PCB to the previous state, if anyone wants me to do more tests on this drive, for the sake of knowledge. Meanwhile, thank you very much for the help offered.

BTW, I'm looking for a replacement PCB that is SATA only, without the USB stuff onboard. I'd like to use this as a secondary drive. At this point it doesn't matter if the data on it wouldn't be read, since I already managed to copy them elsewhere, as long as I can repartition the drive and use it internally on my desktop PC. What should I buy? Can you recommend any particular kind of replacement PCB? If so, reply here or by private message. Thanks.

ciccillover wrote:I have been basically stuck with this drive, until yesterday. I got a few recommendations from users on this forum and a few other places on the net, but none of them allowed me to be fairly sure to succeed, and I was not in a hurry, so I kept looking around before doing anything with this disk. I eventually decided to take the risk of permanent data loss, as those weren't as important for me as they might be for other people, and did the SATA workaround. That worked perfectly, it was then just a matter of copy and paste and allowed a complete recovery. No encryption whatsoever.

Thanks for the feedback. It certainly cleared up the confusion.

So, in summary, even though your board has an Initio INIC-1607E bridge IC, which incorporates AES hardware encryption, the fact that the model is an Elements rather than an Essentials means that encryption is not implemented. Very interesting ...

Anyone have any luck getting that micro usb connector of the PCB? i haven't tried to remove it yet and i'm not sure if its difficult to do or not. I just need to get that thing off and solder my usb cable to the PCB so i can my data off and then toss this thing into the can once and for all!

Anyone have any luck doing it that way? If so how did you remove it?

Thanks,

garymon wrote:Anyone have any luck getting that micro usb connector of the PCB? i haven't tried to remove it yet and i'm not sure if its difficult to do or not. I just need to get that thing off and solder my usb cable to the PCB so i can my data off and then toss this thing into the can once and for all!

Anyone have any luck doing it that way? If so how did you remove it?

Thanks,

Sure ,
Please Use a IRDA Rework station To Remove This With 100% Accuracy

garymon wrote:how did you remove it?

Forum member, AussieGirl, took it to her local TV/AV repair shop.

However, if you wait long enough, I hear that these connectors fall off by themselves. :P

ciccillover wrote:I'm looking for a replacement PCB that is SATA only, without the USB stuff onboard. I'd like to use this as a secondary drive. At this point it doesn't matter if the data on it wouldn't be read, since I already managed to copy them elsewhere, as long as I can repartition the drive and use it internally on my desktop PC. What should I buy? Can you recommend any particular kind of replacement PCB? If so, reply here or by private message. Thanks.

Anyone?

fzabkar wrote:
garymon wrote:how did you remove it?

Forum member, AussieGirl, took it to her local TV/AV repair shop.

However, if you wait long enough, I hear that these connectors fall off by themselves.

I wish that were true. If i just want to bypass this crap USB bridge without taking off there connecter is there anywhere on the back i can just solder the USB cables to the PCB? the VCC, D-, D+ and GND? anywhere to attach those directly to the PCB?

Thanks!

The USB bridge is completely removed from the PCB and the connectors are a bit damaged. See the pictures attached.

Is there anywhere else on the PCB that i can connect the 4 USB wires? There has to be somewhere else. If i look close i can see traces going to L11, that should be the Tx/Rx i believe. What about the VCC and GND? Anyone got a clue. I'm desperate here, i've got 10 years of photos that i need to get off that i didn't backup in time!!!!

Thanks,

Attachments

These testpoints should be good for USB connection. However, don't take it for granted. This is just what I found out by poking around with my cheap tester on my already malfunctioning WD10TMVV (bad Initio IC, but good USB connector). So these findings might be wrong. But, if you want to try at your own risk, here you are:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/61719593/HD%20W ... points.jpg
I take no responsibility, though. Be warned.

ciccillover wrote:
ciccillover wrote:I'm looking for a replacement PCB that is SATA only, without the USB stuff onboard. I'd like to use this as a secondary drive. At this point it doesn't matter if the data on it wouldn't be read, since I already managed to copy them elsewhere, as long as I can repartition the drive and use it internally on my desktop PC. What should I buy? Can you recommend any particular kind of replacement PCB? If so, reply here or by private message. Thanks.

Anyone?

ISTR that there was some mention of a suitable PCB, but that may have been for a different USB product.

However, my suggestion would be to search for a Scorpio SATA PCB that uses the same Marvell MCU, ie 88ixxxx-xxxx.

When you find one, confirm that the preamp connections, particularly the power pins, are the same on both boards. Be aware that you will still need to transfer your board's adaptive data to your replacement PCB.

garymon wrote:Is there anywhere else on the PCB that i can connect the 4 USB wires? There has to be somewhere else. If i look close i can see traces going to L11, that should be the Tx/Rx i believe. What about the VCC and GND?

L11 looks good for the Data+ and Data- pins. You could easily confirm ciccillover's work by measuring the resistance between the test points on the rear of the PCB against the corresponding pins of L11.

You could also consult the USB pinouts here:
http://pinoutsguide.com/Slots/USB_pinout.shtml

The ground pin is easily determined by testing for continuity with a screwhole.

FWIW, the following document has a pinout diagram for the INIC-1608:

INIC-1608 USB to SATA Bridge Specification:
http://www.innortech.com/pdf/Initio%252 ... 092007.pdf

Perhaps ciccillover could confirm whether the pinout is similar?

I didn't have the time to remove the PCB again, nor will I in the next few days, so I'm afraid I won't be able to confirm that. Btw what I did was to just plug in its original USB cable, insert a female USB connector on the other end and start looking for suitable testpoints or vias. While doing so, I was measuring exactly the same (very low) resistance between each USB pin and its supposedly corresponding testpoint. The spots I pointed for GND and +5VDC are right indeed (at least for my HD), as I have already tried powering the drive from there. My doubt was about D+ and D-.
Garymon's pictures are too blurry to see this myself, but at this point I would simply check if the vias near the D+ and D- testpoints I circled are connected to the PCB traces from L11 on the other side of the board. If so, then of course my guess is right; otherwise, keep investigating.

Thanks for the help and responses fzabkar and ciccillover!. The GND and VCC were definitely the same on the PCB as i'm able to power the drive, however the D+ and D- are different, my PCB is a bit different from yours. I believe i found the proper pins but my computer does not recognize or mount the USB device. Maybe i don't have the correct pins, but i'm afraid the culprit is the logic board itself

At this point i'm out of ideas.

A couple of questions for you guys.

1 . If i opt for a logic board replacement, what exactly would i need to remove from my old board to put on the new one to get it to work? This one does have the INIC-1607E chip, so i do realize the data is encrypted.

2. I suppose its not possible to bypass USB and go to ESATA? Due to the problem with the encrypted stream of data?

Thanks so much! i'm not giving up...i have to recover this data.

garymon wrote:Thanks for the help and responses fzabkar and ciccillover!. The GND and VCC were definitely the same on the PCB as i'm able to power the drive, however the D+ and D- are different, my PCB is a bit different from yours. I believe i found the proper pins but my computer does not recognize or mount the USB device. Maybe i don't have the correct pins, but i'm afraid the culprit is the logic board itself At this point i'm out of ideas.

Also just to note i've got it to the point where Windows recognizes the device but as an unknown USB device. Any ideas what could be the problem?

Thanks

This might be because of inverted D+ and D-. A long time ago I was building a desktop PC, and I accidentally exchanged the two lines on the motherboard pin header for the front USB ports of an ATX chassis. No matter what I plugged in those ports, it would be detected as unknown device. So make sure that your wiring is correct.

WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV

Re: WD10TMVV