http://www.clasohlson.co.uk/Product/Product.aspx?id=168541881

Thats what I have used in the past to remove surface mount components.

Vulcan - whats your opinion on this one?

The transfer was a success and the drive spun up but the file system showed 32 GB in a raw file structure, PANIC I thought id damaged the drive or overwritten something . I powered it down to read up on the RAW file structure, after that the drive wouldn’t spin up when the jumpers were configured as slave and wasn’t recognised in disc management.

Success!

The U12 swap worked wonders, I was able to retrieve all my data from the WD1600JS.

During the desolder I was very careful, and basically used wick to remove solder, then heated the pad and lifted the leg with a pin. Not the best method, but these were all the tools I had to use. Soldering the chip onto the PCB I didn't find easy, but again I was careful and took my time so as not to heat up the chip too much.

After putting the modified PCB onto the WD1600JS, the first sign it was working was in the bios where it was recognised with the proper code, man what a relief it was seeing that bios screen. The drive seemed rock solid while copying files over.

I think I might try to put the original U12 chip back on the donor PCB, and use that HDD from now on. Or perhaps my newfound confidence is pushing the boundaries by doing this. I can't see any problem though, as long as my soldering job is good.

Can I say, a big thankyou to the gurus on this forum. By reading various threads outlining the procedures I was able to recover some important files from a HDD I would have otherwise thrown in the bin.