Seagate - Disk replacement and now fails to load.

[racoonlab]

Hi guys,

First post for me.

I dropped my portable Seagate 2.5'' from just 20 cm. Yes it was on, running? No sure, but at this point, is it important?
A nice and lovely bip came out from the hard-disk from that moment.
With nothing I could do I open it...yes I open it. The heads were bent and two heads out of the metal plate...mmm that was very bad luck.

So the _fantastic_ idea to buy another hard drive, yes Seagate, yes portable, but same serie? Hard to find it because the hard-drive was 1 year old.

Then I bought the same model and decided to change the heads.

I open the new HD and omg the heads and internal structure were a slightly different; and here is when I changed my plans to substitute the disks.

I had to remove the heads as well so that I could put some paper between them to be able later to insert the heads back in place and have a disk between two heads.

Once everything was ready to start, with the HD open, (so that I could see what was going on, I started my disk.

And yes the plate/arms are able to move from the start position to the center of the disk, but nothing else happens. It does that a couple of times back to the end of the disk to the edge and nothing happens.

Then the HD stops.

Ok, ok what a surprise I cannot expect that everything works, but am I completely screwed? Or maybe for some planet alignment or Mayas I have a possibility to make it work?

Cheers.

r

[Cleanroom]

not 100% screwed since it seems it is only one platter, but you are way out of your league to continue trying. Find a pro that will take on the case, but expect to spend a lot of money if it can be recovered.

[pcimage]

Agreed. Time for DIY is over I'm afraid.

How to turn a $600-800 case into a $2000-3000 case

[racoonlab]

Thank you for your post guys.

If I try to remove a disk would be to silly? Well I guess so who knows where the data were written.

I was soooo proud of my DIY

r

[fzabkar]

Then I bought the same model and decided to change the heads.

I open the new HD and omg the heads and internal structure were a slightly different; and here is when I changed my plans to substitute the disks.

Just out of curiosity, what are the first three characters of the serial numbers of each drive?

[racoonlab]

Hi fzabkar,

I keep you posted later this evening. I don't have it right now with me.

A doubt if I may.

I noticed that every single disk has a small area near the center that is brighter than the rest of the disk. I believe it is the signal that tells the head _and of the disk_ but I am not sure.

What I am sure is that all the disks have that area not aligned with the area of the other disks. Does it matter? I know I said a kind of _blasphemy_ for a lot of people.

Thanks in advance.

r

[hddguy]

In theory, it is as simple as replacing failed component with a working one. In reality it is totally different. There are so many things to consider like safe removal of heads while ensuring media is not damaged, heads compatibility, alignment, maintaining a clean environment....

Even if you were successful (somehow) how would you deal with the subsequent read errors and bad blocks that you are sure to come across? How do you plan on rescuing the files? Do you have an idea that you can change the heads and continue using it?

With nothing I could do I open it...yes I open it. The heads were bent and two heads out of the metal plate...mmm that was very bad luck.

Can you account for all the sliders from the head stack? Often they become detached and 'lost' which can cause some additional problems.

If you need your data then you need professional assistance.

[racoonlab]

Thank you hddguy,

I thought that spinrite would have done the miracle. It was nice to see the hd running once it was open and gosh that magnet is so damn hard!

The plan was to make it work at least once, get the data and forget. I will try to play with it a bit more, but I guess there isn't so much to do.

I guess lesson learnt, next time NAS and/or online backup.

r

[labtech]

Thank you for your post guys.

If I try to remove a disk would be to silly?
r

Removing the disk is not a solution in your case. No need to.

[racoonlab]

Just out of curiosity, what are the first three characters of the serial numbers of each drive?

Hi fzabkar,

SGH for both, then 5 for one and Y for the other one.

r

[fzabkar]

SGH for both, then 5 for one and Y for the other one.

Thanks. I have seen older posts which suggest that the first three characters need to be a match when choosing a compatible drive (third character = number of heads). However, I have been told that more recent models use slightly different criteria.

The following is just a guess based on an examination of numerous models and serial numbers:

char #1 = manufacturing site
char #2 = platter type/density
char #3 = number and type of heads/preamp