Hello, my hard drive has unfortunately failed. The heads were stuck to the platter and the spindal motor was not spinning up. I guess I will need to do a platter swap with a matching donor. The model is HTS541680J9SA00, MLC:DA1928, HITACHI P/N:0A50518 and manufactured in JUN07.

Where can I find a compatible donor as google seems very limited. Are any other firmware codes compatible with this model?

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Zero Alpha: zeroalpha.com.au
Find Cheap Donor Drives App: https://www.zeroalpha.com.au/donor-drive-app Updated February 2026

Send it to a pro. i small wrong move will ruin everything.

where are you located ?

What wrong move? I need to swap the platter right?

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Zero Alpha: zeroalpha.com.au
Find Cheap Donor Drives App: https://www.zeroalpha.com.au/donor-drive-app Updated February 2026

Almost (99.9%) certainly not.

If you value your data AT ALL, then take it to a pro for this case.

If you don't care for your data and it's just for fun, then there are (risky) things you can try.

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PC Image Data Recovery
http://www.pcimage.co.uk

New!! HDD-PCB.COM for all your PCB and donor HDD requirements!

The head is damaged and the spindal motor sticks, so what risky things can i try?

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Zero Alpha: zeroalpha.com.au
Find Cheap Donor Drives App: https://www.zeroalpha.com.au/donor-drive-app Updated February 2026

Guys instead of arguing with him . Why not just answer his
original question?



Ebay

Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will.
-- Yoda

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Buy your friends Toshiba\Hitachi and your enemies Seagate.

also

buy-sell-parts-hard-drives-etc-f15.html

Dumb ass read my first post I need a donor drive for a failing hard drive, as this is the only chance I have of recovering my data. Take note that this is a HDD Guru forum and I have asked if anybody has access to the donor drive needed. So far all you have done is sent me this PM trying to sell me the same service as what I am about to do myself:



"Hitachi is very prone to alignment of head and platters." I have asked you to explain yourself and so far you have not which means you really have nothing positive to add here and you are not a HDD Guru. To give you the benefit of the doubt I am guessing you mean maintaining the alignment of the platters and the read/write head stack assembly. I'm going to give you a little advice buddy, ITS NOT THAT HARD, and when you one day do this for yourself you will see what I mean.

"DIY = Risky" - Exactly what do you think I will be doing that is going to be different to your singapore/perth friend you are trying to sell me? Do you think i'm going to remove the platter and then wipe it with my ass before I swap it with the donor?

So if you want DickHeadCrash I can even take some photos of how I will perform the very simple operation of removing the screws and swapping the platter. That way you and your singapore/perth friend with a well established data recovery firm will know how simple and easy DIY is. What you need to do is slow down and read carefully on what people are saying before you start insulting them. Now all you have achieved is to make yourself look like a retard. Publish your friends data recovery firm name and contact information and I will even test his solution to this problem and I will let you know if its going to be any different to what I will do. If you can't give any advice on HDDs or HDD data recovery then you need to stfu.

BTW thanks to the people who have responded with advice on how to find a donor.

Honestly, you should not be working on this drive. If the data holds any importance seek help of a pro. There is no need to swap the platters. The more you mess with it, the less chance of a pro getting the data, also the more expensive it will be.

If this drive had been sent to a pro initially, almost guaranteed no parts would be needed. Now though I am not so sure, and when he does fail to recover his own data, then consults a pro, the price would have tripled.

Dont know why everybody is being so harsh, its people like this that help pay towards our holidays

Why is that?

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Zero Alpha: zeroalpha.com.au
Find Cheap Donor Drives App: https://www.zeroalpha.com.au/donor-drive-app Updated February 2026

it would have been correctly diagnosed.

Guys, leave him alone, let him ruin it, we all got nothing to loose anyway. I noticed he keeps repeating questions which have been answered.



/PERIOD. sorry cant help it.

I'll make this simple for you so called data recovery experts who have replied with no solution to this problem except for "take it to an expert"

If you are one of the retards who believes I need to take it to an expert then it only shows you don't understand the problem with this drive and you don't know how to fix it.

So here is a simple test to for TerraNova, HDD Spaz, HDDGuy, Pcimage and HeadCrash to answer to see if they are actually qualified to give any advice about hard drives.

1. What Data Recovery shop do you work for?
2. What is the problem with this drive?
3. How do you fix the problem?

TerraNova, HDD Spaz, HDDGuy, Pcimage and HeadCrash if you fail any of the questions then you are not qualified to give advice to other people on hard drive problem solving and you are just wasting everybodys time by replying with shit that is not useful to anyone.

The final point I need to make is, if I was a dumb hard drive noob like TerraNova, HDD Spaz, HDDGuy, Pcimage and HeadCrash then I would definately take it to a data recovery shop to get my data back.

[quote="Zero Alpha"]

1. What Data Recovery shop do you work for? I work for the best data recovery lab in the world.
2. What is the problem with this drive? It's in your spastic hands.
3. How do you fix the problem? SEND IT TO A PRO!

quote]

Period. BlackST trademark or however it goes

Don't get one thing : why are you asking what is the problem about the drive as you wanted right from the start to do a platter swap ?
Just to close this thread, you need :

- Clean room with all the equipment, ESD free.
- First, try to free the heads from platters SAFELY. Need appropriate tool to do it. Do not contaminate the media.
- If the motor is seized, then you have to remove heads THEN check heads health (in this conditions, I would think heads are bad too). First level diagnose requires microscope. If you want to be sure, you have to check each head for electrical paramteters. No, a multimeter won't work and will destroy it.
- Motor seized ? Need to move the platters ALL TOGETHER to a new chassis. If the heads are good , use same heads.
- Check surface conditions. Need microscope and endoscope.
- Assuming you have done it perfectly with appropriate torque and with perfect vertical alignment and with no eccentricity (1 mm. lost alignment and everything is fucked for sure), see if the drive calibrates and IDs.
- If so, extract data.
- If doesn't work, you'll need probably a new head set from donor and/or have alignment problems. Restart and double check each step.

Maybe this is what you wanted to hear.

Why is it important to know where we work?

the problem initially is stiction, a situation where the heads fail to park correctly in the designated parking stand, and the contact on the surface between heads and media causes resistance when spindle motor tries to turn, causing a failure to rotate platters and initialise drive.

How do you solve? With knowledge of the fault, correct tools and skills, patience and experience, hence send to a professional.

If data is important send to a professional, if it is not then dont. Either way it doesnt matter to anybody except you.

By the way, what do you do for a living??

The drive is fallen or the motor died (seized) instantly, heads do not stick by themselves to media.