WD GREEN 1TB DRIVE
MDL-WD10EACS-00ZJB0
DCM-HARCHT2AAB
Chip plate number -2061-701474-300 AA


I REQUIRE SOME INFO BEFORE I WASTE MONEY ON THIS THING!
I have been reading it is possible to exchange the PCB and try to recover data myself,i have also read that without the correct parts you will not get anywhere..
first question is has anyone actually managed to change a pcb board on this model with success?
Secondly, is there a guide to doing it and is it just as simple as getting the correct part and fitting?
any suggestions on where to obtain the part woudl also be usefull at this stage i suppose. i scoured google and ebay to try and find a supplier but had no joy!

i'm quite technical so dont hold back i will ask for clarification if i dont understand..most of all i suppose i want to know if its a big hassle or if its just as simple as finding the correct PCB!?

Tahnks in advance.

1. You CANNOT simply change the PCB on this model, it has adaptive data inside the processor on the PCB which needs to be transferred or recreating, both of which require specialist tools.
2. What makes you think the PCB is at fault? What are the symptoms of the failure?

Cheers

Sean

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http://www.pcimage.co.uk

New!! HDD-PCB.COM for all your PCB and donor HDD requirements!

Ok,thankyou for the reply.

the reason i believe it to be the board is no detection in bios, when i power the drive i hear it initialise and spin! it was working fine until i turned it off to change its location in the building. i have no real knowledge in this field (data recovery or HDD repair) but have worked to component level in the computer trade for some 15 years! this means nothing i know,i was just using an experienced guess as to the fault! any other suggestions or info appreciated! no ticking noises,not hot (although the reason for relocation was i thought the location it was in maybe excessive over time)

i am not mean or tight i was just hoping to resolve the issue myself as this drive contains everything i would hate to lose! if not i will ship it to someone who can and pay what ever it takes...would prefer no to have to! but by the sounds of your previous maybe more expensive to set myself up with the required knowledge and hardware/software! and i'm not realy keen to destroy what maybe salvaged!

let me know what you think,and i will try to answer anything else i can! suggestions welcomed!

This does not sound like a PCB problem, most likely an internal problem of the drive.

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i'm open to any suggestions. including economical recovery options.

It's not "economical" like 10 £ and neither 100 but it doesn't cost the world...
Everything depends on what happened exactly.
I confirm that straight changing of the PCB is useless and you have a slight chance to make things worse, eventually. Pcimage from this forum can help you.

If it's spinning up normally with no untoward noises, then chances are it's a firmware issue.

This requires specialist knowledge and expensive equipment.

Please feel free to send it over for a free initial analysis.

Cheers

Sean

_________________
PC Image Data Recovery
http://www.pcimage.co.uk

New!! HDD-PCB.COM for all your PCB and donor HDD requirements!

i feel this thread resulted quickly to this is a specialist field and spend some money thread rather than an info/help thread, but i appeciate the reply and info on not just as simple as changing a PCB!

now just to question expense, were not just talking a piece of software and a chip reader are we becuase if we are i think i'd prefer to learn a little more, i see you can have boards made for little money and i also noticed they will ship with required firmware now if that just leaves the adaptive data to deal with then that sounds to me like i need to learn a little more...my soldering skills are excelllent and my air station use is quite capapable too..it would be nice to hear what it would take to diagnose the drive effectively rather with some hint to a location for further info..

@ Sean, thanks for the offer. PM'd

Merit, you didn't understand : the "board" you are talking about is maybe an adaptor for Seagate, what you need is not a board and your soldering skills and equipment are useless: a comprehensive tool for diagnose and deal with firmware is a HW+SW complex tool that cost 10'000 $ + update fee. It doesn't cover mechanical problems. Not to say that it doesn't come with step by step tutorials, you should know what to do at least at intermediate level. Detailed Info about drive firmware and deeper details are not available , all of us had to study and is a neverending process as manufacturers do change things without notice.

When you say "I'd prefer to learn a little more" if you mean "I want info" , then this is the wrong place. You can have some generic info by using search, but nothing more, and everything ends when you'll need dedicated EXPENSIVE gear and know how even to diagnose a problem. This is what's behind an inexpensive device like an HDD - sad but true.

thanks for the info-

i carried on reading as i hate banging my head off walls not understanding and came across a link in another thread that lead to this diy-what-the-big-deal-t12671.html i think this pretty much summed it all up for me!

thanks for putting up with me without the need to become frustrated..i can appreciate the situation i put you in...

if there is nothing i can do with it myself then it brings this thread to a close.

thankyou.

There's one last thing you can do it yourself before sending your drive to a pro:
Unscrew the PCB and clean the heads contacts then put the pcb back again.

Maybe you get lucky enough and your drive working again.

Good luck

...at least it won't hurt and it's free.

Actually that is potentially incorrect..............

It might do very serious damage.

1. anti-static procedure , not followed
2. Cleaning with what? , a wire brush and incorrect solvents.


I know you take a lot of stick from other forum members, but this sort of thing does not help your case.

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Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Article 19

True. If you plug the cables in incorrectly you can damage the drive, so we should not ever tell anyone to plug a drive in at all. For that matter, you can kill your whole computer if you turn it on while it is underwater, so anyone here who tells someone to use a computer is being reckless and dangerous!

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.

I disagree.

I have a bunch of HDDs were like that one and I cleaned the heads contacts in the PCB and they worked well already.

Cleaning the heads contacts in the PCB with a bruch not wire bruch.

I have a several cases almost like that and I know that will NOT harm anyone. Trust me

i work in a static safe enviroment all day repairing boards to component level most of the non invasive options have been tried including the suggestion above before i came to the site..thankyou..

something changed today after leaving it alone for the weekend..i ran linux up just to see if it would spark...it didnt realy but it did detect the drive..
this drive is from a NAS box by WD so shoed diferrent partitions that were never present on the drive...Raid partitions x 4 very small and the main partition 986 gig but nothing was mountable...i left it and just looked and unplugged...

Question- does that shed anylight on what might be more the fault with the drive to anyone? just for info purposes really not that i intend to try anything myself from this point on....

That partition layout is normal for a NAS.

If it works sometimes and not others, its probably either a problem with bad sectors in FW that can be read occasionally or bad head(s) that occasionally work well enough to read the FW on startup. You might turn it on 50 times and have it work once or twice, or never again.

Honestly it was a bad idea to turn it off again instead of cloning it while you could (though if it was a head issue then you still would not have been able to clone, but at least you would know what was going on).

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You don't have to backup all of your files, just the ones you want to keep.