Are you saying that non-original 0x8003 makes all data scrambled?
This sounds impossible. AFAIK is not read by the drive and it's written only externally.
I can check it when I'm back at work but very likely you made a mistake somewhere during the test

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SAN, NAS, RAID, Server, and HDD Data Recovery.

I can certainly recheck. I'll use Spyglass and the same Charger for comparison.

Can you also modify the foreign 0x8003 module by changing the reported SATA capacity to the IDEMA standard? For example, for a 2TB model, change 3906963632 to 3907029168. Then see if the reported capacity does indeed change. If it does, then this will be additional confirmation that the drive makes use of this module.

See https://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?p=320999#p320999

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

Could this have something to do with it?

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A backup a day keeps DR away.

I'll have my re-test tomorrow when I head into the office.

This makes the most sense to me:
MCU-held secret / state + SA-held drive-specific value / state -> correct decryption context

In module 0x8003,
For Charger it is 3906963632,

while for CaramelR 7200 it is 3907029168,

Charger is self encrypting while CaramelR 7200 is not.
Hope it helps.

MSM DATA RECOVERY

The reduced capacity is typical of 2.5" Passport and Elements models. I believe the intent is to prevent the host from accessing the SmartWare encryption key at the end of the user area.

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A backup a day keeps DR away.