My fiancee said her external HD was clicking and now it won't power up. The PCB was fried, so I swapped the U12 to a donor PCB and plugged it in using a SATA to USB connector. Now the disc spins up fine (without any clicking) when it is powered up. However, when the USB is plugged in & recognized (when Windows plays the sound effect), the disc clicks once and spins down (at which point, Windows plays the "USB disconnected" sound effect).

I was guessing the pre-amp / head is what's causing the problem. Is there anything else I should try before diving in? I know that I'll have to swap a new PCB in since the current donor PCB is also probably fried at this point.

Thanks!

Head failure isn't unusual in the 3200JS.

Your donor PCB may be fine unless the heads are shorted. Most likely just one has gone bad.

What do you mean by "diving in?" If you are thinking of doing a head swap without a clean room, proper gear, and plenty of knowledge, let me save you some trouble right now. Don't attempt it if you value the data.

Jono

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I'm just poking around with very few expectations for getting it working again. Right now, I'm looking to approach things in a logical order. I'm curious if there is any more fun I can have with it before opening it up since that will be that last thing I do before dropping it in the trash.

Outside of swapping the ROM to an identical PCB, there really isn't anything more you can do without proper gear.

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If the chances of success for someone with zero experience is 0.0001% for these kinds of failures,
the the chance of success for THIS particular drive is... negative?

Sorry.

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