I didn't want to hijack kissmyoops's thread even though it's very similar to that issue. Mods, please merge if it's too similar.

My ST2000DM001 stopped working earlier this year without any clicking or any other noise. Windows kept asking me to initialize the drive at every start-up. Took the drive out and started researching how to get the data off it. Found out most likely it's a PCB issue, that i'll need the same exact PCB (100717520 Rev B), and I'll need to move the ROM chip to the new PCB. I didn't know about hdd-parts.com and their free ROM transfer service, so ordered the same PCB from ebay and got it in a couple weeks from China.

Once the donor board came in, I did a simple PCB swap hoping for a miraculous easy fix. HDD booted up with donor board and ROM chip but windows again asked me to initialize drive. Realized I have to swap ROM chips.

I've desoldered simply stuff like capacitors from the back of circuit boards to fix stuff like monitors and tvs, but didn't realize how hard it would be to desolder the ROM chip without things like a hot air tool or chipQuik. Luckily I ordered two 100717520 Rev B PCBs and was able to practice on one before doing the real ones. Even though I successfully took the ROM chip off the donor board and moved the one from my PCB to donor board, I'm afraid I had to apply heat for too long and might have damaged the ROM chip somehow. More on this later.

Hooked up the drive with PCB2 and ROM1...and nothing. BIOS doesn't see the drive and neither does windows disk management tool.

Did I damage the ROM or PCB chip with too much heat while desoldering? I didn't break any of the pins in the ROM chip. Maybe my solder job wasn't as good or maybe I applied too much solder creating a short between the pins? I hope not, don't see that with a magnifying glass.

So that's where I am right now. In the other thread, fzabkar mentioned testing the continuity between pin #8 and inductor and check the resistance.. Not sure which is pin #8 and which on the PCB is the inductor...

Could really use some guidance.



Original on left with ROM removed. Donor on right with swapped ROM



closeups of the swapped ROM solder job

Your problem never was with the PCB, this model has firmware malfunctions related to the media cache and bad sector reallocation functions that account for about 70% of failures and the other 30% are head failures. I've seen exactly two of this model with failed PCB and that's from about ~1000 cases I've personally handled.

You've just made the situation much worse by your misguided efforts. In the future, ask for advice first before you try something. If you did in fact ruin the ROM chip, then it's trash bin time for the drive as the data is now unrecoverable.

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Your soldering is terrible

Assuming the ROM chip is still alive, it needs to be handled with care now.

If the ROM chip is dead, there is still hope, but it is not going to be cheap.

My suggestion, hand the drive to someone who knows what he's doing. First, it needs to be determined if the chip is alive or not. I would lean against giving you further instructions how to do this on yourself because chances are you'll just put the nail in its coffin.
No offense mate, one needs to know when to stop.

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+1 for what's already been said. BTW, you forgot mentioning wether the patient was spinning up initially, only said that windows wanted to init it.

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

i think you have bsy problem on your disk. You need pc3000 or mrt to solve this problem.

So where do I go from here? How do I test the ROM chip? I've ordered a hot air tool from amazon and will use that to take off the ROM chip from the donor PCB if needed.
Yea I wish I'd asked first, but unfortunately I found this helpful community too late

Yea, I'm not proud of it at all. Wish I'd stopped, but here we are
I'd appreciate any guidance you can provide on how to proceed from here.
I'm in New Jersey, US. Found some local places that do data recovery, but have no idea if they're reputable or not.

I'm not 100% sure. I think it was. But I could be wrong. It stopped late last year and that's when I took it out and put it away.

any data recovery professionals in NJ, USA here?

You say NJ like it was the size of vatican city

In my humble opinion, I would say that it is not easy to damage a ROM of this type with a classic soldering iron (much easier to damage it with an air gun), although, evidently, it is possible...

If the drive spins and asks you to initialize, maybe the problem is as simple as belonging to a "seagate expansion" with a SATA/USB bridge with sector size conversion. Although it would not be necessary for 2TB disks, if I have seen them.

If so, commercial programs like DMDE/R-studio...etc can access the partition.

in fact, at this stage, it is extremely crucial to do proper diags with proper tools with properly qualified person, as long as the data has any importance.
messing around and guessing what the problem(s) could be will just multiply them quickly.

any high level tool like DMDE and Rstudio is not considered as proper tool and anybody with less than 2000 successful recoveries behind is not considered the properly qualified person (even such number does not qualify some people enough) .


pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

I can agree, in part .....

For the symptoms described by the OP (disc spins without strange sounds), that the disc comes from an enclosure with sector size conversion.... fits.

I don't think that doing a simple check with a commercial program that can skip the sector conversion (since I understand that it doesn't have DR tools) will make things much worse, at this point...

Another thing would be if the disk made strange sounds, or if it was recognized but with slow access, it would indicate other problems

If it takes more than 2000 recoveries to give qualified advice, I understand that I can fall into that range, I have a few more actual recoveries to date ........, yet my reasoning may be wrong.

This, too, is not an absolute truth; it depends on what for.

We have licenses for several commercial programs (UFS, R-studio, DMDE, among others) and are commonly used.

As an example, we don't use a PC3K/MRT port to recover data from a disk with an exclusively logical problem and also, for certain file systems some commercial software works better than DE at least in my perception.

Hello,

i meant the OP has messed so much with this disk you can't even be sure it is thursday or not.
He wasn't sure if it was spinning when he stopped checking it last year, now etc.
Of course one can make random tests and has mathematical probability to succeed but if data is needed this might be too low to take the risk.
So proper tests in proper order can give good results with a lot better chance than the above.

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

i have exactly the same model, pn and fw
disk spins but is not recognised
noticed the problem when computer failed to boot and have a ssd as primary and this was the secondary and only x drive finally came up with windows.
removed and system booted ok with ssd,
if i plug in this drive and try to view with disk manager the program seems to freeze
under these conditions would a pcb swap be advised
thanks in advance

No.
This:

means your PCB is ok. The problem relies somewhere else, drive needs to be evaluated.

Again, if data important --> consult a pro.
If data not so important --> read how to connect drive to terminal and post terminal output during drive powerup.

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Ransomware Reverse Engineering - NoMoreRansom! partners

got the same response when i sent to review, heads need to be replaced
prices range from 900-1100, may have save some more pocket money
thanks for the help

Ok, we hope it turns out recoverable...

pepe

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Adatmentés - Data recovery

went to one recovery place who installed new heads
they said it recognized for a few second then went into busy state
so they could not get any further
i am not sure of their level of expertise

can anyone recommend someone in sydney australia who can look a

i went to payam and they said 2k ..ouch
thanks