@Dananjaya
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this is very funny.
and this is a myth. there are no platter reading machines and there is no way to get data reading direcly on platteres without HSA in the world. there is no way reading platteres like CD or DVD.
according to their magnetic nano tech. , no need ROM info and firmware. how they convert physical block address to LBA. how they build translator. how made head map and how to link plattere data. some files writing on all platteres.
Thanks for this thorough reply. But again, shouldn't they be sued for spreading such erroneous claims ?
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in this model WD 10JMVW has 3 times clicking it means heads can't find firmware for booting. this occurs
1. heads totally dead.
2. firmware area damaged on platter.
3. pre amp problem.
And thanks for this precise explanation, relevant to that particular model.
What are the most likely causes for each of these types of failures, if there was no shock / fall ? Could heat be the culprit ? (I re-read the message where the owner explained how it happened : it was in mid-august, she hadn't used it in quite a long time, and apparently there was this clicking pattern right away, so it's doubtful that it reached a critical temperature at that moment. Strange thing is that she mentioned that is was recognized in Windows device manager – but I just verified : indeed, it does appear as "WD Elements 10A8 USB Device", WinHex detects it as a physical device but can't access it, so it must be just the USB controler.)
I read that on some models the pre-amps were just glued to the actuator arms, and this frail assembly could get broken over time, or due to overheating.
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sometimes head has very very poor reading , cliking continuasly or clicking 9 _10 times.
So this does
not apply when the "3 clicks and spin down" pattern is observed, and trying again would be futile in this case, right ?
@Spildit
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TTL will help to diagnose problem with for example SAMSUNG and SEAGATE. It will NOT help with WD ... For WD it can be used to read ROM, MODULES, ETC either by ATA over TTL and it can be used to drop to boot code mode to read/write ROM when PCB ROM is damaged and PCB doesn't respond by ATA.
For WD you would need some software/firmware tool to do the operatons over TTL. It's not like Seagate that you can use free software like hyperterminal to get a "log" produced from the drive.
Alright then. Thanks for the detailed explanation.
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Think of paying the $600 fee as a "punishment" for not having backups and as a reminder that there are only 2 types of drives, the ones that did already died and the ones that will die soon !
It may be a bit excessive as many HDDs work for many years without failing and end up being replaced just because they've become obsolete, but yes, any drive
can fail any day. Loss and theft can happen too, and then no amount of money can bring the data back. (Sometimes in classified ads I see
someone whose HDD or whole computer was lost or stolen with years of critical professional data for which there's no backup, desperately trying to get it back, even
going as far as proposing a hefty payment to the thief in exchange...)
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They might be doing data recovery and they might even have tools like PC-3000 or at least a cheaper MRT ... It's just that they might not be competent ! You can open a business let's say like a restaurant and be all legal and have license and place and all working fine at legal level .... but that doesn't mean that you can cook and that you will make good food and that your clients will be happy ...
They can for example outsurce the drives that they can't handle and do just the simple cases, or they can for example say it's un-recoverable ... and they can claim that they have this and that and that they are the best to attract clients ...
In this case it would be akin to opening a restaurant and making outlandish pseudo-scientific claims like “we use an exclusive proprietary technology to process your meal at a molecular level so that it doesn't provoke any fart, we are endorsed by
Iggy Pop and Keith Richards”. Even if the meals were good, it would still reek, so to speak, of dishonesty and lack of professionalism.
And data recovery is kind of a niche business, there are just a few companies per region / large geographic area, I don't think there is a lot of competition as there can be in other high-tech related actitivies (I may be wrong on this), so I don't understand the purpose of making fake claims to attract clients, when the level of (genuine) expertise and the cost of (existing) equipments necessary to run such a company is already way beyond what even generalist computer technicians can fully fathom and understand.
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If there was a method to read platters with a "machine" do you think that even the best experts on this forum would be claiming for example that a Toshiba drive with lost ROM/PCB is un-recoverable ? If the best experts can't do that why would that guy that was asking basic questions be able to do it ?
Doesn't mean that he can't do data recovery ... I would bet that they have just something like MRT and they extract the data when they can and they claim that they have magic stuff ...
I get that, but that kind of false claims must hurt the credibility of the data recovery business in general. Are these so common that
bona fide specialists won't bat an eyelid when they see them ? And wouldn't the large corporations they claim they've had as customers know better ? Besides, such corporations, unlike most private individuals faced with a data loss issue, have the financiary means to pay a premium price for a premium service – and they would have the ability to sue big time if their names were used falsely for publicity, so this would be a huge risk to take, even if this is an otherwise legitimate company doing actual advanced data recovery with expensive “clean room” equipments and expensive specialized software tools. I'm trying to understand what the point is. If someone wants to be a crook, there are much easier ways !
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I WOULDN'T USE
http://www.dafotec.fr IF I WERE YOU ....
I did a search on this forum for dafotec (first time i did ear about it). Results were this :
memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=32127
Apart from 4 posts there are only one member that have the dafotec URL on his website.
Check his posts :
viewtopic.php?f=23&t=32931&p=237197#p237197
Dafotec guy doesn't apear to have a huge amount of knowledge ...
If he can't do a simple thing like that on the posts i wouldn't trust him with ANY client HDD ...
I hadn't seen that post yesterday. To be fair those two posts are about 3 years old, and are not enough to prove a lack of competence – although I'll admit that a pseudonym like “rookie59” is kinda suspicious !
But even the most seasoned experts were “rookies” at some point... And even the most seasoned experts still learn new tricks on a regular basis – that's one of the purposes of this very forum actually. I'll humbly admit that I'm currently not knowledgeable enough myself to assess how advanced or basic the issue with that 200GB Seagate drive was in the grand scheme of things. But if I were to undertake a (huge) level of learning and training, and start a DR business 3 years from now, it would be quite disingenuous to point to this thread as a “proof” of a lack of knowledge !