How to recover from PCB damage on WD1600AAJS

[SaminPA]

Greetings all, thanks for the site...

I'm writing in because I successfully let the smoke smoke escape from an HDD PCB while replacing the PC RAM (How, you say? Removed random cables to access MB, then plugged wrong power cable in wrong place while paying absolutely zero attention since the whole job was such a no-brainer). Drive did not spin up and removing the PCB revealed burn damage on the foam and the microcontroller.

Anyhow, procured another 1600AAJS and transferred pcb just to verify that the drive spins up and sounds healthy; it does, but naturally the new PCB firmware does not let the drive get recognized. This would be a WD1600AAJS with the new controller [88i6745] which I am told has the integrated ROM (no U12) so I am unsure whether to send it in for repairs or to try to find a compatible PCB? Apparently there is a copy of the ROM on the "service area of the drive but I have no idea how you would access that or use it to reprogram the PCB ROM??

If anyone has a matching PCB or suggestions, or recommendations for a place (in the Philadelphia area?) that would charge a reasonable price to just get the data off the disk (what is 'reasonable' for something like this???) could you pls post back? I would really appreciate any help, thanks.

Drive specs

Western Digital WD1600AAJS Caviar SE (SATA)

MODEL: WD1600AAJS – 00WAA0
DATE: 24 DEC 2007
DCM: HARCHTJCA
PCB 2061-701552-600 01P (White Sticker)
PCB 2060-701552-002-REV A (Printed On Circuit Board)
Product of Malaysia

[drc]

These PCBs have adaptive info that is nearly unique... getting a board that matched without changing the ROM to match your patient drive is EXTREMELY unlikely.

That said, anyone with the proper equipment can rebuild the ROM out of the drive's firmware area.

[Russwinters]

Hello,

I am very certain that you will not be able to get this drive up and running on your own; You will need special tools for this. I am guessing that this drive has the L shaped PCB, and that there is no U12 chip present. If there is a U12 chip (should be 8 legged chip) then you are in luck, and what you need to do is transfer the U12 to the new PCB (Take careful note of it's orientation, often there is a key to help you)

and that should do it, unless of course the preamplifier (a chip located inside the drive on the headstack) has been damaged as well. At that point you will need expert level experience, and equipment/facilities.


If there is no U12 you will need the special tools; you will likely need to rebuild a new ROM because the ROM will be inside the CPU which is what you are describing as damaged.

Post pictures for confirmation


regards,

[SaminPA]

Thanks so much for the confirmation ("anyone with the proper equipment can rebuild the ROM out of the drive's firmware area"). I was hoping that was the case.

That said, how do I find that 'anyone' and know that I'm paying a fair price??? There is so much on the internet that seems like total scams and rip-offs

Also, I'm fairly confident that everything but the PCB is fine (since the replacement PCB I tried sounded just fine) but should I be trying to locate a similar board BEFORE going to a repair expert or just let them pull off the data and throw away the drive... did I mention that it's my wife's stuff and there's not much of it but she is not a happy camper?

Pictures attached.

Attachments

[harddrivespecialist]

I have sent you PM, check it.

[rafaela]

Your PCB only need a (washing machine) , nothing else.









XRONIS

[quasimodo]

Your PCB only need a (washing machine) , nothing else.

XRONIS

Yes, contacts look a bit overused, but most likely that is not the problem. You can try to clean the contacts and try again. Maybe you get lucky. But since this happened after the power cable issue, more so realistic is the theory that you have some damaged components due to over voltage. If you know electronics and have a multimeter you can test out the board. Assuming of course you have a good multimeter and assuming you are good with a soldering iron. This of course would also require you to replace any damaged components and some components can not be properly tested with just a multimeter. Which would bring you back to square one. Yes, this board has the rom inside of the MCU ( IC chip). Yes, more or less a copy of the rom content is also available via SA. But it's not quite that simple and again you would need some professional equipment and some experience to perform this.

Therefore In my opinion your best choice is to send your drive to a pro.

Good luck!

[networkpc3000]

i can handle it. and check PM sent please.

[SaminPA]

For the record, I'd like to leave some feedback here - harddrivespecialist took care of my problem and even though everything that could possibly go wrong did [even a 6-day USPS priority mail delivery for a 6-hour delivery radius] he hung in there and made sure everything worked out in the end and even ate shipping to make up for the inconvenience.

Since I had my doubts and worried that I'd get taken for a ride when I started out looking for help, I'd like to recommend him without reservation in case anyone else is checking out this board - it's good to find someone who takes pride in doing a good job, specially when you're half expecting to be scammed

[pcimage]

Nice result.

[Alexii]

Way to go Hddspec =) Good man.