The ROM chip on some of these seems to be much harder to remove than other WD models. It requires so much heat that it invariably damages the PCB and/or other components close to the ROM chip. Any particular techniques people have found to be better than others?

It's not difficult with proper tools - less than 45 seconds, no damage to pcb and chip, trust me. Hot air controlled temp rework station, less than 1500 Eur, complete. What's the problem?

I believe there is an increased risk of damage to tracks on newer PCBs when exposed to certain temperatures than older boards, but BlaskST is right, with the proper tools its pretty straightforward assuming you know exactly what it is you are doing.

P.S. I have tried MANUAL removal, with controlled temp. solder... even if it is lead free, NO damage at all, 2 minutes. It depends on your skills.
Professionality means admitting something is beyond someone's tools or possibilities, why not outsource ?

ACE Lab has developed new method of making donor WD Marvell drive PCB compartible with patient drive. It is ROM restoration:

- screw donor PCB on patient HDA
- to switch in Kernel mode without any jumpers
- rower up HDD and run the utility in Kernel mode
- perform "ROM restoration mode

Best regards,
ACE Team

What is the number on the pcb ?

Good going ACE !

I was very interested in making original from SA but curious exactly how. Today I transplanted head in Marvell (ROYL) with donor PCB but i had original. Without, I wondered about this. Actually I found some success with other things on these models...seems somewhat different to SD approach which I tried yesterday and seems to work as well. I enjoyed the research of it.

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pcrecovery - what was SD approach?

ACE team, you forgot to mention that it works only on ROYL drives

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They always hide the real part .

Dear rameez,

We do not hide the real part. It is obvious fact because only ROYL's ROM have adaptives

Best regards,
ACE Team

Dear AceTeam
That is obviously fact that you don't know how WD drives work
Module 47 which contains boot adaptives located in ROM on all WD Marvell drives not only WD Marvell ROYL drives

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Maybe they meant ROYL hdds do not contain external ROM (u12 position) and have 1xx modules..

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Yes, I agree with MoneyFan and ACEteam. Only ROYL drives has adaptives in the main controller chip (internal ROM) and copy of these files in SA called 1xx modules. You can't use ROM RESTORATION in non-ROYL hdds because non-ROYL SA does not contain ROM copy.

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Well you can agree but that doesn't make it truth
all Marvell WD drives has adaptives in ROM. On some drives they just not critical

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I guess it's newly for you, but all Marvel drives before ROYL have adaptives in the external ROM. And don't have that modules in SA.

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Yeah, right
All WD drives have ROM it doesn't matter where the ROM located inside MCU or in external chip.
All WD Marvell drives have CODE inside MCU which named kernel-code and that doesn't make ROYL WD drives unique comparing to the other WD drives
On All WD with Marvell CPU (including ROYL drives) module 47 which contains boot adaptives located in the ROM
Only on Marvell ROYL WD drives copy of ROM overlays and ROM tables duplicated on platters
And BTW ROYL drives CAN have external ROM they just don't use it - I guess this one is new for you

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Hi,
Only Marvell ROYL WD with ROM bigger than 128KB have ROM copy in SA...
Aquarius family have ROM 128KB, and not have ROM copy in SA...

Mikippp

Zeus drive has 256K ROM but doesn't have copy of ROM in SA and it's not ROYL

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