I don't negate this, I am asking question, on which you didn't response:

BTW, if you put card board on spindle motor contacts you get identical message.

I would always rule out PCB, it is non-destructive, takes just 5 minutes, and despite my most obvious opinion on something, I ultimately have to be 110% sure.

But here I base any opinions on pure experience and knowledge. In this case, I am sure heads are faulty. Whether or not I would test PCB first is not in question, only my opinion on the cause of actual failure.



Trying to operate mechanically defective heads is not so different from trying to operate heads inaccessible because of isolated PCB. Both cases will return some similar error in that info cant be read from surface. I do not see your point here...

spindle motor is stopped if errors in heads are found during HDD power-on tests.

Just to be clear SAjunky, you did "negate" that head-related hypothesis previously, when you said:


So you've changed you mind and now agree that this can be a head-related problem - but we see that you argued the opposite position earlier. IMHO it's difficult to follow your comments when you change your position, but without actually mentioning that your position has changed.

Different experts different opinions. I am no expert at all. So I should be quiet, shouldn't I?
But in my opinion before considering a head or pcb transplant the standard procedure hddguy suggests should be done (considering static discharge protection) : to clean the contacts which helped in the following case:
http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/142565- ... 06008-fix/

The risk: On the other hand the spin down is probably a self-protection mechanism to prevent further damage. Maybe the heads are already scratching on the media. Then each turn on will make things worse. So if data is really important...

This is two part message for two different subcommands issued during spinning up operation. You refer frequently to your experience. In my few decades experience with embedded processing firmware, in such situation the first error is relevant and all subsequent can be ignored, as they are dependant on condition created by the first one. Therefore I am saying that this message does exclude head problem as a source of this message, but not a possibility of bad head in general. This can be only found after removing the first obstacle.

Now please answer the question I am asking third time, no answer.

hddguy wrote, it takes 5 minutes to check PCB, but also didn't answer this question. So, what do you do guys?

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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

Not clear enough, for my poor English! Do you do or you do not!

Hi, before going inside best to start with simple to more difficult. So eliminate PCB then continue. Quote form labtech indicates this.

No, if the PCB turns out to be the only problem.

Clear enough?

P.S. why are you so upset about everything?

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

Clear. Why I am upset? It should be also clear.
You start from simple job to more difficult. But to the OP in one single voice 'unisono' you advice to go straight away to the most difficult one. Without checking.This is unfair. Even more: Once you see that on your advice OP turned to watching head transplant videos, you are making fun from OP and entire thread is filled up with jokes. Who are you?

Oh dear, I really didn't understand you before. But replying to your clear sentence above, no, those messages really do not exclude a head problem according to Seagate-internal docs, because the messages are not a subsequent error message after an initial one, as you suggest.

[Edited to remove full explanation - I give up spending time on this. I don't expect you to believe my comments, so I'm adding this posting just for other readers.]

I will let the OP decide for h**self regarding my posts.

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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

this thread is now hilarious.

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http://www.northwind.gr
SandForce SSD Recovery
Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

Indeed...

Maybe it is a language issue, but several people have TRIED to be helpful, and you have rebuffed the majority. That's certainly a way to ensure that everyone is going to bend over backwards to help you . . .

We're not magicians. We can't remotely diagnose your drive with 100% certainty. But the responders see many bad hard drives every day and they are giving you the benefit of their experience. If you don't agree, why argue? Do you argue with your doctor? Just do what you want to, anyway.

The protocol is clear: eliminate the PCB as the culprit, because that's the easiest thing to try, with the least chance of making it unrecoverable. The next steps require a clean room and experience. Period.

Good luck!

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http://www.datasaversllc.com

This is just the guidance I was looking for... I will definitely post my results. First thing is I will rule out the PCB as being bad, since that is the easiest non destructive test I can do. Next... Which I believe will be the fix is the head replacement. However this will be an educated decision based upon the PCB testing.

In all respect... I gotta go big or go home. All joking aside I realize that this is a professional job and also a recovery effort only. I could care less about the drive in the end. Over the years I've learned lots of content online, since Google is your friend in the IT industry. However I am seasoned and understand that experience is:

Broke shit
Experience = ------------------------ minus Sanity
Time trying to fix it

Oh yea this thread has ROFL Copter status! I should have word on what steps I've taken by this weekend and the results.

Thanx for the advice, it has helped.

I had checked the PCB on the drive and after being 110% sure it was good I opened it up.

After inspection of the drive further... I found the top platter to have a chatter mark on the inner most track.

So it is a head, the question now is... If I proceed with a head replacement... what are the odds that it is still recoverable?

That inner most track "the parking spot" is where the tracking info is, right? However isn't it redundant on the other platters?

I know I have one shot at this... Your thoughts?

The possibilities of you getting data from this drive after opening, poking with it and if you proceed are exactly the same about having a date with Nicole Kidman or Pam Anderson tonight...

@Bohack,


No surprise there, as the professionals said at the beginning of the thread. Unfortunately, that's only the damage you can see so far. There may also be damage to other media surfaces. So the minimum damage you've found so far, is one head & one media surface, but the total damage is not yet known.

If the data on the drive is important, then stop here (even better, stop before this point ) and talk to a reputable DR company, as your chances of DIY success are practically zero IMHO, despite what impression some YouTube videos might give...

Well so the data is not as important as the challenge at hand. So I'm open to constructive advice to try my hand at repairing this. I do understand that I'm not a professional, but you gotta start somewhere.