WD 6401AALS PCB ICs swap service required

[bs160305]

Hi there,

I have two fried PCBs of 2x wd 6401AALS black edition that were working on a Raid1 config.

Board Number: 2060-701567-000
Main Controller IC: 88i8845E-BHY2
HDD Motor Combo IC: L7251 2.2
Western Digital PCB 2060-701567-000

I have got the replacement donor PCBs available ail but have no idea how to replace the main controller (BGA) from the original to donor PCB or swap the Motor controller which is damaged from the donor to the origianal PCB.

Any company that could provide the service to swap the ICs with a price quote?

Thanks.

Steven

[northwind]

It doesnt work this way. This is quite a challenging task even for a seasoned technician and very rare to have to do this. There are other ways, contact member lcoughey and he will do this for you.

Good luck.

[northwind]

ah, new member, no ability to PM... here is lcoughey's link: http://www.recoveryforce.com/

[lcoughey]

Steven,

I probably can help at a fairly low price (not $50, that is for sure), assuming that the only issue with each drive is limited to the damaged PCB and the process to reprogram the donor is straight forward.

Luke

[bs160305]

Steven,

I probably can help at a fairly low price (not $50, that is for sure), assuming that the only issue with each drive is limited to the damaged PCB and the process to reprogram the donor is straight forward.

Luke

The damage on the PCBs is obvious. Can you be specific on the price. Any email to contact you?

[bs160305]

It doesnt work this way. This is quite a challenging task even for a seasoned technician and very rare to have to do this. There are other ways, contact member lcoughey and he will do this for you.

Good luck.

So i guess you have a way to retrieve or find the BIOS settings from a dead PCB. Can you please be more specific?

cheers and thanks

Steven

[bs160305]

ah, new member, no ability to PM... here is lcoughey's link: http://www.recoveryforce.com/

Actually i think i know you. Pretty funny i am from Greece also originally

[lcoughey]

If the PCB is dead, it could be a very daunting task to read the necessary modules from the SA in order to reconstruct the ROM modules.

[loki]

Deleted post as Luke has already replied

Loki

[bs160305]

Hi there,

I have two fried PCBs of 2x wd 6401AALS black edition that were working on a Raid1 config.

Board Number: 2060-701567-000
Main Controller IC: 88i8845E-BHY2
HDD Motor Combo IC: L7251 2.2
Western Digital PCB 2060-701567-000

I have got the replacement donor PCBs available ail but have no idea how to replace the main controller (BGA) from the original to donor PCB or swap the Motor controller which is damaged from the donor to the origianal PCB.

Any company that could provide the service to swap the ICs with a price quote?

Thanks.

Steven

Let me rephrase my question because i received a lot of ... you need a professional type of advice and no actual advice ....

The SMOOTH chip is damaged on the side that drives the spindle motor. The side that controls the board's switchmode power supplies, including the Vcore and Vio supplies for the MCU, is not damaged, so I would expect that the MCU has probably survived.

The "ROM' on my board can be reconstructed using commercial data recovery software. Software that can accesses the hidden System Area on the platters and retrieves various firmware modules which are then reassembled into a ROM image which can then be written to the MCU's flash memory. This is a simple, single-click procedure which requires no soldering.

That said, some firmware versions do not have the required ROM backup on the platters, so the procedure in those cases may require an MCU transplant, or some other software method which I don't know about...

So.. does anyone know a reliable and reasonable cost vendor for a ROM reconstruction or if that fails MCU transplant ....

[lcoughey]

No, it isn't a one step software fix. If you are looking for someone who seems to be willing to do the work for nothing contact fzabkar on this forum. He seems to believe that this type of job should be no more than $10.

Another option is you can purchase a few thousand $$$ in tools and equipment and spend the time learning to do it yourself.

Or, you can pay someone who has already made the investment in the tools, staff, facilities and training.

If you believe that moving the MCU will work, hire your local TV repair guy to move it for you, if you don't have the soldering skills yourself.

Good luck

[dick]

The SMOOTH chip is damaged on the side that drives the spindle motor. The side that controls the board's switchmode power supplies, including the Vcore and Vio supplies for the MCU, is not damaged, so I would expect that the MCU has probably survived.

Well the MCU might be ok but there is another problem on many models which is when the Smooth chip gets fried it will often damage the preamp so that means the drive requires replacement heads. If thats the case then the task becomes even more complicated and of course expensive.

[fzabkar]

The following PCB supplier offers a free "PCB adaptation" service:
http://www.donordrives.com/services

He explains his services in detail here:
all-those-folks-with-burned-pcbs-look-here-t24519.html

[northwind]

OP has emailed me and has received the correct answer (again).