To all I am a Computer Forensic Ivestigator and I am interested in HDD recovery. I would like to know if there is a tool out there to tell me if and what is bad on a HDD like if it is a PCB or a head and so on.

Hello,

AFAIK there is no such tool. One cannot exclude the human knowledge and experience on the field of DR. After some diagnostics were done there are tools to deal with FW, to clone the disk contents to a good drive, restore filesystems, etc.
But it is always You who makes the decision regarding what to do in the first place: Replace PCB, repair PCB, check/repair FW, Replace Head stack/preamp, transfer the platter(s) to another HDA...
the success of the recovery often depends uppon this decision.

regards,
pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

Thanks for the insight. is there a good tool to start with I know I need to study the ATA specs and so forth and thuoght that maybe MHDD or Victoria might be a good start to I know you can't write to the PCB but maybe I can diagnose with such tools?

take multimeter and 2 hard disk one in good condition & another same model bad. start comparing.

DF

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DF
www.datatracksystem.net

Hi,

to diagnose the PCB u most often need good and open eyes , then tools like multimeter, oscilloscope, dual power supply, soldering equipment, but the most important is of course the ability to think wisely and have some knowledge about electronics, preferably to have some years of experience in the field of repairing electronic equipment.
So I think it is pretty hard to start it from behind a keyboard without any training.
U may build up a stock of drives for PCB replacement, but this is only a very small part of the cases that can be recovered by replacing the PCB.
Many of the tools used in this field is mentioned on this forum, I recommend reading it a bit.

regards,
pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

If you don't have any diagnostics tools here's what works in most cases:
1) drive clicks --> bad heads
2) drive shows up with wrong ID/capacity in BIOS or it IDs OK but you can't get any single sector from it --> bad firmware.
3) drive doesn't spin up and if you listen to it carefully it makes slight ticking sound as if tries to spin up --> spindle seizure or heads are stuck to the platters.
4) drive doesn't spin up and there is no even slight ticking when you cycle the power --> PCB is dead
5) drive IDs fine but some sectors are readable while others are not or very slow --> heads or media degrade and the drive needs good imaging.

Thanks, sound like a good start. I was sort of thinking the same as to start 2 hdd with MHDD side by side 1 good 1 bad and compare.

Starling thanks for the list I have a felling on the one drive I have been playing with it is either degrading or a bad firmware.

Try on first to read and understand ATA command´s, registers ATA protocol comunication via HDD to HOST u can find information on internet about!


Best Regards