I have had a chance to read through some of the forum posts that I have seen out there and I realize that I might just be out of luck, but I am hoping someone will be nice enough to listen for a me a bit and try to help me out.

I had a hard drive die on me recently. It is a Western Digital WD5000AAKS-65YGA0. It was acting like the board was overheating and causing a reset. After poking around I got another WD5000AAKS drive and tried replacing the board, that didn’t seem to work. So I got another drive that has the same full model number, my understanding was the second part of the model number is the firmware of the board. So I swapped the boards on those drives (the 65YGA0). The drive now doesn't sound like it is resetting, it spins up seeks a little, however the drive doesn't show up in the BIOS with any information, it is just a blank line. When I try to run the WD Diagnostics I get an error code 132, which sounds like the board might not be responding correctly.

For some background I went to school for Electrical Engineering, I realize that there are a billion things that can go wrong and sometime it is really hard to diagnose. I have access to some soldering equipment, oscilloscopes, multimeters, microcontroller programmers, etc. So I can and will try some crazier things. What I am hoping for is a way to figure out how to get the data off. None of the data is important, I spent about $20 in the drives and am willing to spend about $20 more to see if I can get any data off the drive, but if that fails, I am done.

I keep hearing differing information. Is the calibration data stored on the MCU or on the platters themselves? What about the serial number? Would any of the tools that are available on this site help me figure out what the drive is currently trying to do? Would MHDD give enough diagnostic information to allow me to figure out if the drive is just refusing to respond because the serial numbers don’t match or because of some other failure. I don’t know what my options are for getting diagnostic data back from the drive beyond the DLGDiag tool.

I have also heard of building serial adapters for accessing the MCU directly on the board. Is that possible for Western Digital drives? I can’t find and datasheets for the MCU they are using so I am assuming it is proprietary. Is a way to get the second board working with the old drive?

Better read more

search.php?keywords=western+digital+board

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

You can purchase a Salvation Data Western Digital Doctor to help read the ROM from the drive. It should cost between $500 and $1000 and will likely take a week or so to arrive. Of course, you'll need to spend lots of time learning the ins and outs of data recovery because the product is sub par and the support is worse.

Another option is to spend $10,000 on PC3000 from Ace Labs, but you are still left with time to learn, but with better support.

The best option is to pay a data recovery lab to do the job for you. If you just want the PCB reprogrammed, there are places out there that do just that. I have no idea how much they charge. But, if your diagnosis is wrong, you are just wasting your time and money.

I'd certainly entertain doing a quick diagnostic and reprogramming a supplied donor board, but you would have to supply me with the original drive and a suitable matching donor board. Of course, the price would certainly be greater than $20. You can PM me if you would like to explore this with me.

So, if $20 is all you are willing to spend, I'd say that you would just be better off sending your drive back under warranty before you void it, if you haven't already.

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Luke
Recovery Force Data Recovery

From what you said i have a feeling it is just a bad board, but you will need special equipment to copy the rom information to the new board to match the bad drive.

I have one of these drive in right now i am working on and it was just a bad board. But you cannot just swap them, unless you get REALLY lucky to get a matching board with the same rom, but there is nothing on the drive that will tell you that.

If it is just a bad board you can probably find a dr firm to do it for you for not that much.

Typical failures on this drive, in order of what we encounter, are bad PCB, bad heads or firmware.

About the only thing you could do without special DR gear is to transplant the MCU from patient to donor. But this requires surface mount repair gear and experience. It's a bit of a pain even for us who do this sort of thing routinely; reprogramming another PCB with the correct info (and with the right equipment) -- assuming that PCB failure is the correct diagnosis -- is the preferred protocol.

If it is bad heads there is nothing you can do yourself. There is no substitute for an accurate diagnosis.

Jono

PS - We are WDC authorized, but don't offer "partial" repairs or partial recoveries.

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http://www.datasaversllc.com

What do you mean by "causing a reset"? Does the drive spin up with its original board?

I'm not a DR guy, but I believe the data are stored in both places. The "adaptives" in the MCU enable the drive to access the platters. Those same adaptives are backed up on the platters themselves. AIUI, in those cases where the MCU is damaged, various combinations of adaptive data are loaded into the MCU until a combination is found that gives at least partial access. Then the copy is retrieved from the platters and loaded into the MCU.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

@Cleanroom, You are saying unless I get lucking on finding a board with the same ROM. Is there any way to tell if the ROM is correct? Is the only way to tell if the ROM is correct by putting the board onto the drive and if it starts up ok then it is the same ROM, but if it doesn't start up ok it could be the wrong ROM or some other issue?

@jono-ats, I would be tempted to transplant the MCU, except for the fact that I believe it is the MCU that is going back on the original board. (That and at my current company I am doing software, so I don't have access to the full surface mount labs I used to.)

@fzabkar, So what the drive did originally was it would spin up, the heads would start to seek and then I could hear the drive start to spin down. It would then spin up start to seek and then spin down. There was one point where I had applied cold to the back of the board over the MCU that I was able to connect it to the system and transfer off ~500mb, before it spun down and stop responding again. Currently with the originally board the drive spins up, seeks for a second, doesn't do anything for a while (~30 seconds) and then spins down.

In regards to the ROM and adaptive data, could hooking up a board from a newer drive cause any adaptive data/serial number on the platters in the drive to get wiped out? Or is trying a different board general safe? I was assuming it was safe since I wasn't explicitly every trying to write, but it make sense that it might try to re-write the adaptive data if it thought that it was corrupted.

It's not the MCU that goes bad, so don't let me tempt you any further.

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http://www.datasaversllc.com

Yes, that would be safe for your drive.

In retrospect my previous statements were ambiguous. When I wrote that "the copy is retrieved from the platters and loaded into the MCU", I did not mean to imply that this would be done by the drive itself. Instead it is the repairer who would need to retrieve the data and flash it into the MCU using his preferred software tool.

One thing that you could do is to remove any oxidisation from the preamp contacts on the PCB. Just give them a gentle scrub with a soft white pencil eraser. An alternative that may be worth exploring is to shine up the contacts with metal polish and a cotton bud. I have had excellent results with Brasso, particularly on black-spotted battery contacts, but I haven't tried it on any post-RoHS hard drives. Clean off the residue with isopropyl alcohol and a toothbrush.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

That's very decent of you.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Thanks...but, it certainly wouldn't be for free. I helped out another forum member last week with a similar issue...which reminds me, I should follow up with them today.

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Luke
Recovery Force Data Recovery

to my reply... If it is just an board issues, and I am unsure if that is the fault just yet, then you will need a board of the correct rom/firmware. I can say that if i am 100% certain it is a board issue then yes finding an actually board with the right info will be pure luck since as i said before there is nothing on a drive that will tell you the firmware info on it. so it is just keep trying till you get lucky, but at this point you might just want to get a professional dr firm to do the job for you and Diagnose the drive to what the actual failures are with the drive.

It could be a bad head that is causing the issues and swapping boards will lead you not get you anywhere.

The equipment needed to work on those board for transferring the rom information is expensive, and is difficult to understand if you have no idea how to use it.

A lot of reputable Data recovery firms will do a free diagnosis of the drive, as long as you have not physically opened the drive yet. If it is just a board you may be able to get a goo cost for the recovery of your hard drive.

Where exactly are you located, maybe on of the pro's on here is close to you that can help you out.

Thank you everyone for all of your help!

I am located near Redmond, WA. I have tried finding a couple of local places, but it seems that no of the people I could find had the equipment to try to solve my problem. And some of the national places I talked to are out of my budget.

So one last question, if I had access to a clean room and hard drive that was the same model, would I be able to swap the platters between the two drives? Or would I still need to program the board with the adaptics from the bad drive?

Thanks!
Derek

No no no no no no no no no no no no NO.

This is not the solution. This is practically never the solution. Please stop thinking about moving platters (and encourage your friends and everyone else you know to do the same).

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

i am going to second the NO! swapping the platters will guarantee you never get the data back again. at this point as long as you have not opened the drive you are in a good situation, once you open it then any quotes you got expect them to be on the top end. If it is a board/rom issue a lot of places can do it on the cheap. But i do not know your budget.

Why does everyone think moving platters in a drive will fix it. Much easier to swap the heads and the board then the platters. I hear this from clients at least once a week. 95% of the time you never need to remove platters, or even touch them.

I also do not recommend you swap the heads in the drive either. you have been given a lot of info and recommendations. If i were you and the data is very valuable, put the drive aside and save up some money. i would stop tinkering with it.

I PM'd you on another lab to contact.

As I said in my original post, the cost for DIY on this is way more expensive than having a professional help. No matter how you look at it, the ROM on the PCB has to move with the platters...not that anyone in their right mind would ever want to move platers, if they could avoid it.

Anyway. You have three choices as I see it.

1. Pay a professional lab to recover your data
2. Pay a professional lab to reprogram a donor PCB that you supply & hope that the PCB is the only point of failure
3. Give up

Am I missing any options, anyone?

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Luke
Recovery Force Data Recovery

Yes. But the option u missed involves sacrificial goats full moon and drum like instrument. So as such - not worth mentioning.