Had one of these in, only drawing 90ma on the 5v rail. Prob should have checked it further but went for a board replacement, did the same thing. Motor windings resistance upon testing was infinite, thought that was a little odd so lifted the sticker below the motor and tested points there, came back fine. Upon looking closer someone appears to have taken a scalpel to the cable (see picture). Bit weird? Guy denies any knowledge!

Had to be a deliberate act?

One of the local computer shops damaged several Fujitsu drives by slicing through their flex cables with a scalpel. They did this accidentally while cutting through the cardboard box that they were shipped in. Yours looks deliberate, though.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Was it assessed by another less reputable lab prior to your getting it?

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Luke
Recovery Force Donor Inventory: 5,000+ Fully Cataloged HDDs & Growing

He says not, but i suspect probably yes. Why people do this i dont know.

Next question i suppose, whats the best route for repair. Already established on a test drive that swapping the cable for another isnt really a good idea and im not sure my soldering skills are quite up to scraping the lacquer off the traces and repairing them if i could even do that without cable melting.

i think the only two options is to try and get the damaged pieces off that drive and put a new one on from a like drive. Or a Platter swap...

I guess you could also attempt to repair that wire

Scratch away some of the insulation and solder some small wires over it.
On a 3,5" drive it was kinda easy and nothing melted.

My solution..... Hey it works so thats the main thing

Oh and now it gets even better. Drive spins up, run a fix for slow WD response and get access to his data. Of course, its now not his data, its for someone called Susan. Confront him with this and now he admits it been looked at by someone else in the city who could not recover his data. So looks like they have taken his drive in, and given him SOMEONE elses drive back with a cut cable!!!

What a waste of my time! Might be some rather bad news for one of my local competitors though when i phone whoevers data ive recovered up!

Nice work on the repair Ken

Shame about the cowboys who gave the poor guy the wrong (sabotaged) drive back.

We've seen this sort of things a few times, where local "PC experts" fails to recover and/or lose the clients drive and just give them back any old drive, in this case what looks look like a deliberately butchered one

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PC Image Data Recovery
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I don't see why you say you wasted your time and there is no reason why you cannot get paid your full rate.

Charge the client your full amount and have them go back to the computer shop with the bill, demanding their "REAL" original drive as well as payment for your services for both recoveries. If the shop refuses to pay the bill, it goes to the local media. If they don't produce the drive, it goes to the local media and to the courts. As the client wasn't forthcoming himself, be sure to not let him off the hook for paying for your services...either he pays or he gets the other guy to pay.

One thing you cannot do is ignore this...or it will continue to happen over and over and over again.

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Luke
Recovery Force Donor Inventory: 5,000+ Fully Cataloged HDDs & Growing

Don't be too sure that it's not their data. You can never know unless you ask.

I had two Spanish woman bring in a drive for recovery a couple weeks ago. When I recovered the data, it was mostly all pictures of black kids, so I assumed the PC tech and put the wrong drive back in the computer. But after I asked her about it she told me it was actually her mother's laptop, who had married a black guy, and it was pictures of his grand kids.

Sure had me confused and panicked for a few minutes.

Just play dumb, give the data to them for verification, and if it isn't theirs do what Luke said above.

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Data Medics - Hard Drive, SSD, and RAID Data Recovery Service Company

As to the original repair, I've found a small bit of solderwick works well as a jumper. It soaks the solder up nicely and is less prone to snapping as wire is, since it maintains flexibility.

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Data Medics - Hard Drive, SSD, and RAID Data Recovery Service Company

Oh someone will be paying me for my time for sure, but it will no doubt be a massive hassle. Data isnt his, we went through directories over the phone and none matched. Looking forward to the face to face conversation tomorrow!

Always slightly suspicious when we get things in that look deliberately sabotaged. Always have the feeling we are being tested at the back of my mind and that if we dont pick up these "obvious" faults we will end up at the front of some national publication branded as incompetent!

Be sure to add extra for the hassle.

Let us know how it goes

Yup...know exactly how you feel.

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Luke
Recovery Force Donor Inventory: 5,000+ Fully Cataloged HDDs & Growing

Tell him that he has to pay; but you will make him some discount for leaving the HDD there for spare. If he does agree, he is telling the truth; and it will be fair to do some discount as he is a victim too.