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gabriel2007 · Active contributor Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 6

I am trying to swap a damaged board of an affected drive by the Seagate's flaw I just described in the other topic, with the a new working board...

when I swap the boards you can hear a cracking sound within the drive but when I return the original board to the affected drive you can hear a normal spinup.

firmware are the same , and lot is the same , as a matter of fact both of them came inside a 20 hard drive sealed box...

Is seagate preventing from people to fix the drives by this method of the board-replacement ? (they have a service for recovering data)

or am I doing something wrong or this can't be done at all ? author of this site did it and worked with a barracuda...

my two boards look exactly, except for some numbers on two chips like a serial number...

HELP! Sad

harddrivespecialist · Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2009 9:57 pm Post subject:

Seagate has its own data recovery company and they charge a hefty service charges to recover your data, even though it could be their own flaw, like it was with a firmware bug.
Before they got confronted by a lot of customers, they charged a minimum of $700.00 (to my best knowledge) to recover data from those drives.

If your drive is effected by one of those firmware bugs, pcb swap won't help.
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RussWinters · Posted: Tue Mar 24, 2009 10:02 pm Post subject:

Specialist is correct; PCB swap will not work for this problem.

If you purchased your drive retail; individually then you may be eligible for seagate to recover your data. I have not heard of anyones experience with their quality of recovery so I cannot say anything about that.

I know that most data recovery companies can fix these drives very easily. Thats not to say the fix is easy; it involves issuing manufacturer level commands through a serial interface to the HDD. If you mess up even one letter your data could be gone for ever.

gabriel2007 · Active contributor Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 6

But what is the technical reason for which the board swapping doesn't work? if both boards are identical like two water drops ? shouldn't my drive boot up? is there some serial inside the drive itself that matches with one on the board?

thanks for the replies

RussWinters · Posted: Thu Mar 26, 2009 6:42 pm Post subject:

The board isn't the problem. The only time board swapping works is when it is the board that is the problem.

In this case it is the firmware. Firmware is not stored on the board as most people seem to think; it is stored on the platters. The MEANS to find and ACCESS the firmware is stored on the pcb (Adaptive information that is different for every single drive no matter how much you match it is different, there are rare cases when you can find a pcb with adaptive data close enough to gain firmware access, but it is rare)

The only way to FIX the issue with these seagate HDD if your drive has already become afflicted is to connect via serial port and issue the correct manufacturer level commands to the hdd, but that is not all.

gabriel2007 · Active contributor Joined: 24 Mar 2009 Posts: 6

ohhhhhhhhhhhh kay , we shoulda started by that point, thanks for the technical reply and case closed !

sunnydreamspace · Deadharddrive regular +5 Joined: 04 Jan 2009 Posts: 540

hi,
it some of my opinion:
1,you swap PCB no sure it the same PCB fix for you need and your operation seem wrong, when you swap the new PCB is coming clicking noice....
2, firmware base on platter. PCB ROM have had to match the firmware, like your case swap won't help, like: RussWinters & harddrivespecialist said is right.
please let me know if something wrong with my opinion.
please note: don't do more with your drive if unsure, as data will go for forever
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provide Hard drive PCB,entire drive/ Data Recovery service.... big HDD resource. talk to me immediately! sunnydreamspace@hotmail.com
skype: sunnydreamspace

Woodzy · Officially active! Joined: 05 May 2009 Posts: 3

Please check this post
http://www.deadharddrive.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1368
Thanks!