Hi all,

I have two old MFM hard drives that I'm trying to recover the contents of, but can't access.

The first is a Miniscribe 6053, connected to an old 386. It spins up, but I get a simple "hard disk failure" error message at boot. Not much else. LED is not on, though it flashes on briefly at one point. No grinding or knocking sounds on this one.

The other is a Magnetic Peripherals model 94205-051. That one also spins up, but then emits a loud knocking sound (just one), then the spinning briefly gets more high pitched, and then it winds down, and the LED goes into a slow flashing state. I get the same error, just "hard disk failure".

Is there anything a layman can try with these drives to get the data off? Like simple lubrication or cleaning steps I can take with common tools? Or does one need a clean room to even open up these old drives, like with more modern drives?

Thanks in advance for any ideas!

Miniscribe tech docs:
https://mirrorservice.org/sites/www.bitsavers.org/pdf/miniscribe/

Circuit Diagrams:
https://mirrorservice.org/sites/www.bitsavers.org/pdf/miniscribe/Miniscribe_6032_6053_6085_Schematic_1987.pdf

LED flash codes:
https://mirrorservice.org/sites/www.bitsavers.org/pdf/miniscribe/Miniscribe_5.25_Inch_Half_Height_Tech_Support_Manual_Sep88.pdf

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Thanks! This is definitely confirmation that I am out of my depth!