Best options for Seagate undetected drive that spins up

[scootley]

Hi,
I have this drive that I can't get an OS to detect as of today. Doesn't show up in Windows Disk Management, and doesn't show up in Linux fdisk.
It spins up just fine and makes what sounds like a few healthy batches of head movements when powered on. Was working fine yesterday.

I don't happen to have any PC with a SATA connector, so I have been trying to diagnose it with a few of those SATA-to-USB things (which work fine with other drives). The first few times I tried it, it did actually show up in Disk Management, but now it never shows up. I am pretty certain it is an issue with the drive itself after trying it with multiple PC's and connectors.

Any thoughts on whether it is more likely to be a controller PCB-level issue vs something internal to the drive's case?
Is this drive worth trying to do a professional PCB swap such as with donordrives.com or hdd-parts.com?

Drive size and type: 3.5" SATA
Branded model: Seagate Barracuda 2TB
Model #: ST2000DM001
PN: 1CH164-302
FW: CC26
PCB: 100687658 Rev C

Thanks much

[pcimage]

Won't be PCB, probably a firmware issue.

[data-medics]

DM drive, yuck. Will definitely need a pro with proper tools to even attempt working on it. And it may not be cheap either.

If the data isn't that important, just scrap it and move on. If you really need it, immediately stop messing around and get it to a pro. The more times it's powered on the less likely you'll ever get the data back.

[scootley]

Thanks for the input.

I am a bit confused about PCB vs Firmware. I mean I know that the PCB is the physical board screwed onto the back of the drive, and "Firmware" refers to drive-specific software that resides and runs on the drive so that it can operate. But for this particular drive, does the firmware reside on the PCB (some ROM chip) or on the drive platters, or perhaps both?

I am not planning on trying to fix it myself given the state it is in, but I am mostly curious as to whether a professional would likely need to open the drive case or not in order to fix it. Any guesses?

[pcimage]

A very small amount of firmware resides on the PCB, while the vast majority is in the platter(s).

Assuming that the drive doesn't make any untoward noises or spin down, then there should be no need to open the drive.

[scootley]

Thanks. So what would a data recovery professional do? Would they hook up the drive via TTL (or something) and re-write the firmware?
If the portion of the platters that contain the firmware has gone bad, would they be able to write the firmware to some other location?

[digisupport]

A Pro would before touching the drive say a little prayer.
Then carefully inspect the drive with PC3000, evaluate the results to decide what way to go.
Every case can be special - If you care about data, get a quote first, you can always go DIY afterwards.

These Seagate families are like "Eggs" - hard to "rebuild" when they break.
Not if the break, its when they break.