why do all the people say they can fix it, but never tell how?
If all the equipment is really so expensive, people will get help instead of trying on their own.
I also want to learn how to troubleshoot an HDD, not to use but just for expanding my knowledge.

There must be a reason....

surgeon do tell what they do to fix you up
the police tells why they arrest you
NASA tells how they got on the moon
i know how a nuclear reactor works.

and you are trying to tell me that the only two secrets on the world are:

Osama's hideout
and HDD recovery?????????????????????

Delchrys, it seems that you have either too much time in your hands or the purpose of being here is something else.

There are no secrets in this world, everything has a price.

If you don't want to hear it, feel free either to go to other forums (maybe you'll miss this one very badly in a nanosecond depending on where you land, if the attitude is the same - or maybe you'll find a more comfortable place even if you won't get a byte out of your drive .... OK, a single LBA )
OR
Use PMs and ask... ask.... ask.... (BUT be ALSO prepared to have sometimes your PMs dropped...dropped....dropped....)
OR
Get another donor, and another one, and another two or three, *MAYBE* one will work .... MAYBE. MAYBE NOT.
OR
assume that you can't know and do everything.

Think... I don't care about how nuclear reactors work, I just pay the electricity bill and want that when I come back home.... CLICK ! And then there was light...

so if i PM you you will answer???

No.

As a certain DR individual is fond of saying, I can think of two or three possible answers to that question, but I can't tell you publicly.

In fact I have often thought that it would be possible to create a fictional data recovery professional by programming an AI bot to respond with vague, bandwidth-wasting answers such as the one above. Moreover, if this bot could convince visitors that he's the real deal, then he could generate a nice income as a broker by outsourcing his jobs to real pros.
:idea:

_________________
A backup a day keeps DR away.

This stuff kills me. *deep breath*, ok.. the surgeon doesn't tell you what he did for you to start performing surgery on family members. The policeman doesn't want you going around arresting other people. The rocket scientist from NASA is *pretty* sure you aren't going to build your own rocket to the moon, and last but certainly not least.. you may understand (somewhat) how a nuclear reactor works but does this qualify you to build your own? You watch TV? Movies? Why not become an actor to "expand your knowledge". You vote? Why not become a politician? Hell, you drive? Why not become a mechanic, maybe an engineer. After all, its all in the name of expanding your knowledge, right?

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Serial flash ROM swap did the trick, data is being backed up as we speak.
So you can put the HD502HJ on your list as PCB swappable.

Thanks for all the not-helping.

Special thanks to Fzabkar who really did help.

I have the same problem with my hard drive samsung hd502hj.

the 2 drives are in raid 0, both the same model 2x 500go. But one day, one of the 2 drive is not recognize anymore by the bios and don't spin anymore. totally silent and death !

so I tried to swap the pcb from a donnor to the defect drive. The drive spins normally like idle bu still not recognize by the bios !

I don't understand, the pcs's revision of the donnor is the same than mine (F3_1D rev.02) but SN, PN and production date are different.


that's strange because when i swap from my other working raid disk to the defect one, it works ! (spins + recognize by the bios)

the working drive and defect one are very similar because i bought them at the same time for mounting the raid.
same production date 2009.11, almost same SN and PN.

there are 2 cases:

1. donnor's pcb (same pcb rev but different production date) in the defect hard drive : not recognize by the bios but spin
2. pcb of my other working disk in the defect one : recognize by the bios and spins.

Do you think i also have to swap the chip rom u12 from defect pcb to good one in the first case ?

The other solution is to find the same production date model but it's a lottery.

Do I only have to match the pcb revision or I have to be carefull of the date too ?