I think it's time I invested in a professional tool to safely perform headswaps. At the moment I can manage 1 and 2 platter jobs, but I really would like to have something in my toolset that I know would give me great confidence when swapping multi-platter head stacks and save me a bit of time and worry.

I've had a look around on this forum, and else where, and the hddsurgery tools seem to get reviews. They definitely aren't cheap, especially if you are buying more than one, but it looks like they are really well designed and manufactured and will last a lifetime.

The majority of the repairs I get are definitely Seagates, with possibly Samsungs next in line. I'm thinking about getting the Seagate hddsurgery tool and I'm sure I can make back that investment fairly quickly.
http://hddsurgery.com/art.php?id=2

If anyone has any input in this regard, that would be great. I'm pretty certain I'm going to order it this week, but comment is always nice to have.

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

The tool is a work of art. Extremely well made, precision instrument. Especially useful when motor is stuck and/or stiction is present.

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http://pcrecoveryllc.com

definitely recommended, very well engineered.

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Data Recovery Ireland

Well worth it.

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Hard Disk Drive (HDD), Solid State Drive (SSD, SATA, NVMe, etc), USB Flash Drive and RAID Data Recovery Specialist in Massachusetts

Well I've placed my order for a Seagate unit as well as a Samsung one. Hopefully the payment clears soon and I get the tools fairly soon. I've got one job ready and waiting for the Seagate one, so I'll update here once I've used it and, hopefully, say that it worked like a charm

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

@Nick_CT....

If you like your tools.....then get ready for a treat.... These are precision tools made to the highest standard and quality.

They still make me smile like a kid in a sweet shop every time I use them..


steve..

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East Anglian Data Recovery Services
http://www.eadr.co.uk

"If it's your only copy - then it's not a backup!"

After endless pain and red tape with the bank and foreign exchange, the tools are finally on their way to me. I've got two 3 platter 3.5" drives lined up for head swaps so I'll be giving the tools a go as soon as they arrive. Will post back my results.

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

Nick, can I suggest that you try the tools on a couple of spare HDD's before you use them on a 'live' recovery job.

The tools are great but you need to be confident in using them on test jobs first. If you are doing it right, you should be able to take the heads in and out of a drive time after time without damaging them.

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Data Recovery Ireland

There's no doubt I'll definitely be doing a few 'practice runs' before using them for an actual recovery. Using a new tool for the first time on a customer's drive would be DR suicide

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

Fedex arrived this morning to deliver the HDDSurgery tools. It looks like customs or someone had opened the package as it wasn't properly sealed, probably checking if it wasn't a bomb or something ridiculous. Customs can't get their head around what a 'hard drive repair tool' is for some reason. So much red tape importing things from the eastern block.

Either way I've got my hands on them now and will do some trial runs this week and see how it goes. I must say I like the little wooden boxes they come packaged in, nice touch.

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

I've given it a trial run on a ST350823A I had in stock and it's a very impressive tool. On my first trial it worked 100%, got the heads out and then back in again without any fuss. After putting the drive back together I copied a 4GB ISO file off it to confirm all was well and it transferred perfectly, haven't got time to image the whole drive but I don't think it's necessary.

That was the Seagate tool I tried, I'll be giving the Samsung one a go on the weekend. Murphy's law says that the next drive I get in for a head swap will either be a 2.5" or a drive that isn't supported by the set of HDDSurgery tools I just got

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Death is nothing, but to live defeated and inglorious is to die daily.
Data Recovery Cape Town

I must say, I like the Samsung tool very much.

For some reason CPR tools don't seem to have a T133/166 head comb in the set, the HDRC tools "fit where they touch" and my home made tools are OK but a little rudimentry.

The Samsung head tool from HDD Surgery makes T133/166 head changes a breeze, nice work Nikola

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

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

their tehnological proces of making tools does not alow them to have it.
Strong grip is needed for samsung witch can not be done with plastick.
But who know maybe they will copy samsung as well

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HddSurgery - Professional Data Recovery Tools

I'm confused...

I am not sure what grip has to do with it. Grip shouldn't be a factor if the heads are resting on a flat surface.

I think you meant the material, not the process. Why would the process of making tools, in general, have something to do with a specific tools material?

What do you mean by copy Samsung? Does Samsung make head combs?

You are confused because Your are not into this problem.
If You have time look at our materials You will see how we solved problem of taking off heads when they are out of the platter...
I said they is a reason why they can not copy our samsung head change tool.
Material from witch they make their tools can not solve this problem, since botom screw is one part with ball bearing and it does not have a gorge like Seagate drives have...
If You ever trayed to change heads on samsung You remeber that u need special key for it...

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HddSurgery - Professional Data Recovery Tools

No, I mean CPR tools "head combs" are better than the cheap HDRC combs, not the HDRC "head exchange tool" which looks suspiciously like your tools (which I don't have) but plastic.

CPR head combs are very good IMHO and work for most drives but do involve guiding the heads off the platters manually.

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

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

A 10LB hammer would be a better and more engineered head remover than HDRC glued together plastic head combs.

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Buy your friends Toshiba\Hitachi and your enemies Seagate.

sorry did not read good.

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HddSurgery - Professional Data Recovery Tools

A little harsh, but not entirely unfair

The head combs aren't TOO bad (I use mine to unlift suspect heads and keep them apart while I use real tools to remove and transplant the donor ones).

They are a work of fine precision engineering compared to their "platter exchange tool". Never even used mine, just gathering dust since I bought them several years ago. I wouldn't trust them on clients drives after seeing how they perfomed on test drives. What a pile of steaming doggy doo's they are!!

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

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

Where can I buy to?