If you broke the ROM (with adaptive) while desoldering .....

[igen]

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Hello all,

Recently I had an interesting case ..

The customer brought a 2.5 "nativ USB Toshiba external HDD.
He also brought pcb sata which he had bought online.

Unfortunately - this man wanted to save add $50 and didn't take advantage service (the extra) transplant ROM chip.

He did it himself ...

As a result (of his joyful creativity) he broke pin no. 8 (line Vcc 2.5V - power supply of ROM).
This guy didn't even notice it.

The broken pin (with a piece of chip) remained on the nativ USB PCB - see below photo nr 1.

He just soldered the ROM chip to the sata board and ..... the disk is dead.

Then it ended up in my DR company.

I put the ROM chip under the microscope.
Unfortunately - I didn't see any path, no thread, no microjoints - just a rough and crumbled chip fragment.

This is difficult situation, because this is ROM of Toshiba.

This is the end... ? Game over ?

Absolutely not !!!

I had an idea.

Here's what I did.
See photo's below (nr 2,3).

I decided to do similar to the cards or microSD (spider).
I connected the ROM chip to the outside of the SATA PCB so as to have open access to the ROM pins (during HDD works).
There are no very high frequencies or high amperage here - so it can be done with short wires.
Seven wires were soldered to undamaged pins.
And the eighth (on a longer cable) was soldered to the smal sharp needle.

I put everything under the microscope and connected to the PC3K.
Then, I very gently insert the point of needle (looking under the microscope) and more to press in various places of the damaged pin hole (crater) and turn on the power on the PC3K whenever.
After a few attempts - pounded needle point she had to touched the ROM power line and the HDD started !

I quickly launched Toshiba Utils (on PC3K) and downloaded the ROM.
Then .... it's just that a piece of cake.
100% data recovered - happily, in this case only native PCB USB were damaged.

So - summing up:
Physical damage pins of chips ROM with adaptive data (toshiba, seagate or hitachi) does not always have to end up with irretrievable data loss.

I hope that this way will help someone.

I greet everyone.


P.S.

Curiosity - you don't have to hold the needle point (in the ROM) all the time.
You can also recover data directly after boot - as long as the HDD has no problems with the surface, heads and SA.

When booting the disk, the instructions are downloaded from the ROM to the DSP memory - so it only takes a few seconds for the needle to contact the damaged line in the ROM chip.
After this time, you can remove the needle - the HDD drive will works normally without ROM power.

I do not know how soft reset or hard reset reacts - maybe they need to be turned off in DE.
Of course it is also not possible to perform power on/off.

Therefore (it is safe) - if this method will work and if the drive boots correctly - at the first you need to download the ROM image !!!

Attachments

[Lardman]

Nice dead bug work

[jono-ats]

Nice work!!

[digisupport]

Good work.
I did some similar cases, ROM and NAND, but used Loctite circuit+ to connect to bonding wire under the missing pin.

[sourcerer]

One suggestion I have: Be careful that your needle isn't too sharp. I had poked a pin with a too sharp needle, and at the end it was smashed so much that it shorted the pins next to it.

[fzabkar]

Good work.
I did some similar cases, ROM and NAND, but used Loctite circuit+ to connect to bonding wire under the missing pin.

That's an interesting approach. 8) :idea:

[suricate.ch]

Nice one

[igen]

Good work.
I did some similar cases, ROM and NAND, but used Loctite circuit+ to connect to bonding wire under the missing pin.

Interesting idea...

But it is only possible if you have any contact (even micro) in the torn-out place - otherwise only the needle remains ...

P.S. Another problem (with electrically conductive glue) and a question:
What to do, when the glue has set and there is no contact?

[digisupport]

On the cases i have seen and done, I could clean up where the missing pin was, using a Glass brush and Scalpel.
Then bonding wire (tiny silver spot) was visible under microscope. Using a needle to place a very tine spot of circuit+ on the silver spot.
Place and thin wire and connect that with a curcuit+, again supplied with a needle. Chip was mounted on test board connected to Revelprog reader or NAND reader.

If it didn´t work first time, it takes one minut to remove curcuit+ with Glass brush and try it again.
For NAND, Glass brush needs to tweaked, bend and cut to fit between pins. Not a job for a shaky day

Good work.
I did some similar cases, ROM and NAND, but used Loctite circuit+ to connect to bonding wire under the missing pin.

Interesting idea...

But it is only possible if you have any contact (even micro) in the torn-out place - otherwise only the needle remains ...

P.S. Another problem (with electrically conductive glue) and a question:
What to do, when the glue has set and there is no contact?