Hello All,

I believe some of you can help or give me some tips or tell me the reason why the following happens only with heads swap cases:
From time to time I get drives which the only way to recover the data is by swapping the heads.
So I look carefully on eBay or other drives stock websites and track and order the right donor drive (at least I believe that I track the right one).
The drive arrive and I do heads swap operation. After the heads swap the patient's drive start doing "beep beep beep beep beep beep…" not the usual dead heads sound.
I don't see any logical reason why the heads operation failed. I transfer the heads very carefully without bending the heads or causing them to stick to each other so there is no any logical reason for the drive not to work after the heads swapping.
When I try to use the donor pcb instead of the original patient's pcb the drive motor spin without the beeping sound or any other "bad" sound BUT the drive stays on BSY state.
If I transfer the patient's original rom chip to the donor's pcb then the beeping sound start again as before.
This thing happen to me mostly on 2.5 drives and the most with Seagate and WD drives.
It happens in about 50% of the total heads swap cases.
Please let me know what do think the problem is.

Best Regards,

If you are really smart you can do it in your kitchen (think about emergency case !) BUT the headstack MUST be working AND compatible 100%, physically and logically (map) otherwise you have to make it work !

It's a good idea to check the heads back in the donor

But if they don't work, it's not necessarily true that you did something wrong, often there is (hidden or invisible to eye) platter damage that kills the new heads.

If they do work back in the donor, then your new heads probably aren't compatible. WD and Seagate are pretty fussy (especially Seagate 2.5"). Either that or the problem lies elsewhere, such as platter imbalance or firmware/servo damage.

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As Sean said, that are several reasons for a non successful head swap.

It would help if you post the model of the drive, because that might lead to something.

That, or the heads are incompatible.

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I run throgh my statistics and found that the major problem is with 2.5 seagate drives.
With WD I have 80% success rate.
I work with clean area.

The 2.5 seagate drive patient model is:
ST9160412AS
Patient date code is: 10306 - > 28.1.2010
While the donor is: 11022 - > 11.7.2010

But the date code, everything is the same.
Can't think of a reason what went wrong.
There are 2 logic reasons that I can think of:
1) There is somthing I miss or don't know about heads swapping for seagate
2) The heads wasn't compatible affter all.

I must emphasize that the drive make beeping sounds and NOT clicking sounds.
So it didn't seems like dead heads but more like compatible heads but I am far from being sure about that.
What do you think?

"beep" sound can mean loss of servo but also something else. I would check compatibility of headstack itself, regardless of model and production date....

Bingo!

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Hi all,

I want to update you that I took back the heads to the donor drive and got recognization but with very weak heads..
So I believe that the beep sounds were a sign of not compatble heads..

Then you have media damage or some other problem that destroys the new parts.

Before assuming the heads were damaged, did you check them with microscope ? Maybe they are just dirty.

P.S. these are case where a DDA or a 2 GHz digital storage scope can really help.

No, I haven't cheacked the heads with microscope. I never used one before for that purpose if they are damaged what should I see under microscope?
How DDA or 2 GHz can help on this case or in general?

By the way, the son of a ##^## just been recovered with the use of new set of heads
Now I notice somthing I didn't notice before the color of the conduction coil is a little bit different's heads but with a very close color..

Then heads were effectively INCOMPATIBLE.

Or better : heads of same type are all the same (except if there is something electrically different) but at factory parameters are calibrated to match surface and geometry.

Likely, when you moved back to donor, heads were just dirty or not re-fitted properly - maybe they are fine.

DDA or hi-end scope can help analyzing the servo and what comes out fromt the headstack, + the communication (with a little play...).

The weired thing is the new heads which I used for seems to be not compatible too since the same beeping sounds were coming too also but in much low rate but still it gave me 99% of the data.

Do you have DDA or hi-end scope model which you can recommand on or direct me to?

Plenty of DDAs and oscilloscopes, LeCroy and Agilent are the better. You need also differential probes that unfortunately are very expensive. Try finding used equipment in good condition and test before you buy...
Note : we are talking about thousands $ equipment.
Note 2 : avoid at every cost chinese, low cost and 'as is' stuff !

might be a stupid question but have you checked to make sure you used the proper torque settings for the cover head screws? I believe they also help allign the head stack over the platters.

Thank you for devoting few minutes to respond my question but YES.
Any pro whos respect himself will pay attension to the right screws or their thighten on the drives lid.