Follow along as reader [anonymous Gort] swaps the guts of two hard drives to bring one back from the land of the dead.
Someone at work had a laptop computer they never backed up. They traveled 1000 miles to give a presentation, using the laptop
235 thoughts on “Hard Drive Resurrection”
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i am going to attempt a pcb switch on my WD800BB hard drive. i need the data on it, but can’t afford professional prices, period. what i would really like to know is if the firmware is going to be a problem for this drive. anyone who has a success or failure story for pcb switching in WD 80gb drives, please post it!
Many great suggestions in this thread, would like to add something that hasn’t been mentioned. With the hard drive apart, if you can’t or will not be recovering data, the magnets in these drivers are awesome! We’ve pulled apart a number of dead drives just for those powerfull magnets!
Finally, anyone have thoughts on how long to keep the hard drive in the freezer?
What is PCB?
What is PCB?
Anybody reading this in the Atlanta area who can provide help swapping platters?
I’m going to attempt this surgery on my 75 gig ibm deskstar. What kind of snpa ring tool did you need? Internal or external? I imagine you used the snap ring tool to remove the plates. Thanks for the info.
Remember, disassembling is the last, last thing to attempt.I practiced on 2 old 160mb drives (cost 2 dollars each).Used the star/Torx drivers and snap ring tool to disassemble the drive.(size = T5 to T9 star/ Torx)
The Torx driver to unscrew the center screw as the snap ring tool held the assembly still. I practiced 4 times insuring I could get the disk platters in and out.Try a (pcb) logic board /printed circuit board swap first.
Practice on dead or low cost drives first.
practice with T5 to T9 star/Torx driver and snap ring tool to disassemble the drives.
Make the target drive FAT32 or EXT2/EXT3, not NTFS.
Have a computer with a CD, a CDR and a FAT32, EXT2/EXT3 hard drive as big or bigger than the drive you
S.O.S. HELP! HELP! HELP! Very afraid after reading posts that I did further, possibly unrecoverable damage… chronology of events:
Computer: Dell Latitude CPx Laptop, 20G HD.
OS: Win2k
1. Took out keyboard (tried to clean before replacing).
2. Replaced keyboard. Went to boot. Windows rebooted over and over several times. Worked as usual and turned down.
3. Powered up next day. Blue Screen of Death.
4. Error message: Windows could not find file…SYSTEM/SECURITY. and “system hive error”.
5. Ran Norton Emergency Boot… said virus found but unable to repair.
6. Ran downloaded boot repair and purchased recovery software. Both wouldn’t load.
7. Ran Windows Recovery Console… at first, recognized O.S…. but after several starts / stops with all of the above… no longer.
8. New message: 0x0000007B 0x81867910,0xC0000102, etc. & INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE
9. Took to Best Buy Geek squad… at first, agreed w/ my assumption that sounded like virus. (I was thinking it was a virus in the boot sector… oh, had also created new boot record)
10. Then told it was a bad platter after running diagnostics and nothing recoverable…
QUESTION IS: How reliable is Best Buy diagnostics??? Can I still send to place w/ clean room??? Have found 2 reasonably priced…
No whirring, whizzing, whining, or any noises of any sort before I removed the keyboard and used canned air… could this have done something??? Did my constant rebooting while trying to fix what I thought was a virus done too much damage??? ****My next step was going to be attach the drive as a slave to another machine… after reading posts, that should have been first step… but, again, never suspected drive nor did MS tech support area lead me to believe it was the drive??? IS ALL HOPE LOST??? Sorry for long post. Any suggestions, ideas, admonishments, public flogging appreciated.
Question 1 , did the laptop work ok before you took it apart ?.
Question 2 , did you
anon gort…
Thanks for reply.
Q.1: Everything worked just fine until removed keyboard and cleaned keyboard and other areas w/ canned air.
Q.2: Did not attempt reformat or reload of any software… (data too precious)
…. purchased new harddrive for laptop (just to get it up and running) that came w/ 2.5″ USB drive enclosure… was going to use that…
Sooo… will try the other steps and let you know…
I had a hard drive in a laptop crash, but it was still under warrantee. I had to save the information without taking the hard drive out (otherwise warrantee void…) I tried a plethora of methods, including Linux Live-CDs. Linux could recognize the drive, but couldn’t mount it, and I didn’t have any recovery tools that would work under linus. Eventually I found a way to create a Windows “live-CD”: http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/
I was able to recover my data, and sent the laptop in for a replacement.
(The next two replacements had various problems too and finally got a different brand with the third……what a mess. Don’t buy an Averatec laptop!!!)
If a multi-platter drive has only one read channel, then aligning platters to each other probably doesn’t matter a lot, because only one head is active at a time. A head selector connects the desired head to the read channel, apparently.
I once revived a stuck Hardcard drive by whacking the drive housing so the platter’s inertia made it lag behind, as the housing rotated around the platter. Once unstuck, the drive ran fine. Didn’t have to hit it hard.
I’m amazed that HDs can work after being opened in ordinary (but clean) rooms. Perhaps any ordinary dust is so big that it can’t possibly fit between head and platter!
salvage:
Head actuator bearings are just peachy, for building precision mechanisms. Platter spin motor also has lovely bearings, but they are hard to get at. Yes, the magnets for the head actuator ar wonderful. Wear gloves, so you won’t get pinched (as badly :) ), if you take them apart.
Good luck, folks!
I was using a 30GB Toshiba 2.5″ HD in an external enclosure to store photos when It bounced off a bunk bed and wouldn’t work anymore. I’ve 9GB of pictures that I hope to recover by swapping the disks to another Toshiba HD, almost the identical model. Then I’ll copy the files to an internal HD with plenty of free space. I’ve been practicing on a couple of IBM 2.5′ 60GB HDs. A couple of questions
Should I format the good drive where I plan to place my platters?
DOes one use some sort of a tool to handle the platters?
Removing the top platter is easy. Should I try it alone first?
This is all very fascinating. Possibly educational? Thanks to everyone for posting here.
I’m about to throw my Toshiba 40G (MK4026GAX) laptop hd into the freezer w/ fingers crossed, of course. The drive crashed today (scratching and clicking noises; faliure to read error upon attempt to boot, etc.), after only 5 months of use. Has any one tried gutting one of these? If so, any success? I have a relatively small amount of very important info that I would really like to recover (~1 month of law school notes). Does anybody have any other suggestions regarding this type of drive that do not involve spending several hundred dollars?
Thanks again folks
Hi,i’m the 75 gig IBM deskstar guy. Thanks for setting up an AIM alias to help. I actually just got my replacement drive, same model, serial numbers etc on the new identical drive. I’ve practiced thus far on a 20 gig drive. Have a couple of question. How did you remove and then handle the platers once the screws holding them in were removed from the rotor?
Can you touch the edges of the platers if using gloves? What kind of gloves do you recomend i use? thanks for your help.
The photo # 1 and # 3 shows a bent tweezes , I took a clean pair of tweezes and bent the edges as shown..
First platter was easy, came right out second platter required a tilt as it came out. To install the platter I just reversed
I recovered a Maxtor ARES C64K drive that was 20gigs. It had a single platter with a single read head. Initially, I thought the circuit board was bad, so I bought 2 identical drives to swap with. Didn’t work.
So, I removed the platter from one of my new drives and placed the platter from my broken drive inside. It took a couple of tries to get the platter lined up correctly (there was a lot of vibration) and the disk would POST. Remarkably, I recovered 100% of the data I was looking for and the rest of the directory structure was about 80% recoverable.
$21 on ebay for 2 broken drives with the identical firmware.
Not bad for no clean room and no gloves. Did it in my basement :)
The freezing method doesn’t work on my 200 GB maxtor diamond plus 9 hard drive. The cold temperature only delayed the clicking/clunk (it looks like that the voice coil actuator starts to work only when the platrers spin up to a certain velocity). Carefully listen the clicking/clunks and they are likely from the position of voice coil actuator (enlightened by the detailed inlustration of http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/printpage/177). But still don’t know what’s wrong inside the hdd. Why the arm keeps swinging back and forth without settle in its ready position? The read-write head is dead? How poor am I! Looking for an identical drive for future swapping parts like what is said above.
Dan…
Thank you for the feedback on the
Maxtor 20gig ARES C64K drive.
Am happy you got your data back.
hi, great resources here. I have a maxtor Diamondmax 80Gb plus 9. power surge killed the motor (or the motor control chip?) it does not spin. After buying a replacement drive, and swapping the pcb..no dice. Now it spins, and the bios sees it, but the heads crash. I was told that the firmware needs to be reloaded, and that the mfr’s always keep a redundant copy of the firmware stored in an aternate location on the drive firmware chip.
My question: is this possible, and if so, is there a way to reloade this firmware, or reinitialize it?
I’m at my wits end, and about ready to open the drive and start swapping the platters.
How do you remove the platters, without damaging the surface and the platter heads?
Do the platter heads automatically adjust the proper tolerance between the plater surface, or do we not have to worry about the space, as most platter heads seem to be mounted on flexible metal.
thx!
#120: your donor drive must be IDENTICAL to your crashed drive — model and firmware #s must match.
Firmware is loaded at the factory and cannot be changed, but i could be mistaken.
Your best bet is platter transplant, which is what I’m currently facing (fried motor or seized bearing).
But once again, donor must be identical.
——–
Now, my own questions are :
Has anyone had any experiences with Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 120GB disk (IDE). It has 2 platters and I wonder if they must be aligned dead on.
Worst comes to worst, I’ll buy a brand new one ($80), populate it with data, skew platter alignment and then see if data is still readable. I figure a worthwhile experiment vs $3,000 bill by data recovery Co.
I just want to ask a question.
I tried desperately to recover my data on my HDD. Intially, it was just a problem of me dropping the harddisk. Without any knowledge prior to trying to fix it, I opened my HDD and let dust went inside, and I also took out the “platters”. I touched the platters several times with my bare hands. On top of the above, I even moved the position of the “heads”. At the end, I put everything back together, I even tried to clean the dust myself using primitive tools, i.e. soft fine cloth. (It was very late at night and I was very desperate to get my HDD fixed, I couldn’t call noone for help so I decided to take a look at it myself.)
I just want to know, after I’ve done all those stupid things, is it still POSSIBLE to have ANY of the data recover from that drive?? This drive is a multi-platters drive (250Gb Maxtor). PLEASE HELP ME, I really want to get the data back from that HDD!! I am willing to pay anything to just recover SOME of the data on it!
hi if anyone can help me with this i would really appreciate an email! – bpm105@hotmail.com.
i have a laptop with a 30gig toshiba drive. I came to turn it on yesterday and, despite the drive spinning up and making healthy noises, the system hung at the XP startup screen and windows would not load. i removed the drive and transferred it to a 2.5″ backup case and attempted to read it by plugging it into another machine via usb. this works…although unfortunately not on the main partition – just on the remaining two, which work fine and can be accessed and written to without a problem. the main partition however, is apparently ‘corrupt and unreadable’ according to the box displayed every time i attempt to access it in my computer. the hdd spins as well as ever and is not making any strange noises etc. does anyone have any thoughts as to what this might be or any suggestions as to anything i can try? i’d really appreciate an email if you could help!
#122
even if you scratched the platters, data should still be recoverable but it won’t be cheap. Especially in the case of such big drive, you’re looking at thousands.
Look up Action Front or Ontrack in google.
This is a great article. Also, the comments, #75 especially were very good.
A few answers to some of the questions. I picked up a entire set of 33 piece security bits kit, including torx security bits for $13 at the local ACE Hardware store.
To sum this article up. If your HD is already gone, what have you got to lose by trying? Most of us cannot afford the $1000+ fee for professional recovery, and from what’s been posted above, they will do the same things as this article has suggested. So back up your data, and then give this a shot.
-Binx
After replacing the platters and hard drive spinning, the bios and OS will not recognize the hard drive. Any ideas what I’m doing wrong?
Thanks,
Could someone please:
1) illustrate what a “snap ring tool” is by providing a link to a web site that sells one
2) describe *exactly* how the “snap ring tool” is used in this process (hard drive platter swap)
#1
snap ring tool , look for
anonymous Gort, have you tried this procedure on newer high density drives? ( 100GB+ )
I think the tolerance and measurements are much smaller.
On the other hand, embedded servo is nice – I was playing with old drives and found platters can be put on completely out of alignment, and still, everything will work.
to # 129 , sphinx
did the 20gb laptop drive.
working on a 20gb Pc IDE now.
Hey, I droped a disk lastnight and thought I was sunk, but after reading through some of this, I took it, thumped each side hard (not real hard) on a book. It’s working, backed up, and running like nothing ever happend.
Thanks for your help!
Anonymous Gort, let me know how itgoes… from whatever little tinkering i did, I see heads are extremely fragile – those little “pads” keep breaking off when i insert the platters.
1) Do you have a tool or technique for carefully sliding the disk between the heads?
2) how do you remove the metal plate over coil assy, without the arm dancing all over and scratching the platter? the freaking magnet is a pain!
Thanks
I have an 80gb IBM Deathstar that died (stopped spinning, no clunk noises). So I just got another hard drive on ebay, same model number and everything, BUT there was a different Part Number. I swapped teh boards, and now the drive spins up but cannot be detected at all by the computer, either by the BIOS or Windows. Is there anything I can do with these drives, or are they totally incompatible. Like I said, visually, they are exactly the same, except for the part number. Augh, so frustrating.
ho guys I burnt a chip an pcb(the green piece) of my hard drive. is it replaceable with one of the same model?
I have a hdd what has been fallen off from the table. Database’s hdd is very important for me. I want to recovery this data but i’m living in the country poor – VietNam.
Anyone could help me? Please get the advice to mail: Hoangcamapas@gmail.com
Should i send the hdd to another country to recovery it?
I have a failed hard drive with 20,000 plus mp3s on, i ama dj, the control logic board has blown, cooked threw a microchip, anyone tell me where i might obtain a replacment control board for a maxtor maxline 2 250 gig ata drive.
im sure the data is fine just the logic boards cooked, im on uk.
fault was caused by overheating after external drive case fan stopped.
Tim.
I have a toshiba laptop hd which is 30 gigs. model MK3018GAS it was making a grinding noise / spinning down then spinning back on. I got a few blue screens. Thought it was the laptop fans and it wasnt… After listening and hearing the HD spin and then not spin.. So…. The hd spins up makes a grindy like noise like something is given out… Then it stops spinning after a few seconds it comes back on and then no more…. Not sure what I should do. It came up to win xp then it stopped spinning, is it a dead motor or something?. any suggestions?. email me master_of_a_million_styles at yahoo dot com
I have a similar issue. I have had success with 3 of 5 attempts at freezing hdd’s. I have a different hdd now and freezing wouldn’t allow it to spin up. I am also looking at purchasing an identical hdd and attempting to replace parts trying to get data off. I am wondering as with one question earlier, is there a good way to get the arm off of the platter and back on. I am seeing that when attempting to manually spin my platter using a torx driver there is a scratching noise telling me that the arms are touching the platter to much. I am thinking if I purchase an identical drive and replace the arm onto the platter maybe this will take care of the issue thus allowing me to get the data off. I am just not sure of the best way to remove and replace the arm as the ends of the arm always move together when not having the platter seperate them. Any help would be appreciated.
I have a Seagate 160gb hard drive with a fried chip on the circuit board. Does anyone know where to get replacement circuit boards? The drive is still under warranty but I am reluctant to send it to them for fear of losing the data.
Your help and thoughts are appreciated. Email me with any sources for logic boards.
Robert
I had a large Maxtor drive with a very important document on it (worth 25,000 usd) fail. I read the initial posts about platter replacement. I seriously considered going this route so I continued reading for fail/success/advice posts. Came across many different ways to get the drive back up. The freezer deal scares me the most. It’s a hit or miss (or should I say total destruction) with this method. How cold? How long to leave it in? Is your freezer colder than mine? Too many unknown variables in this equation for me. I can see how this will work for ‘frozen’ parts such as arms and other moving metal parts. When the metal freezes, it contracts and thus may free up a stuck part. However, if you leave it in too long, you can end up with condensation (which we all know is water) in your hard drive.
Luckily for me, Microcenter had a sale on these drives and I purchased two at that time. I took the board off the good one and placed it on the failed unit and voila. ALL data retrieved. No need to ruin the platters with contamination or water.
I understand that different situations call for different remedies but, ALL remedies should begin with the same simple element – a coherent thought process.
Happy recovering.
# 139 – See if you can do an advance swap for the drive at Seagate. That would allow you a few days to get it done on your own time. The only drawback to this method is the FW versions btwn the two drives. Hopefully they will match.
Hey does anyone know how to take the head, in the new hdd, off the patter and then put the head back on the old platter? When i am practicing with a new working hdd i am taking the head off the platter then just putting it back on the same platter. When i power the hdd up the head starts clicking. What am i doing wrong?
Thanks everyone.
I have a Wester Digital WD400 portable hardrive.There’s lot of data inside.Unluckyly, one day the hardrive was fall, and a few days later all the data and partition inside was gone.
Could you give me a few tips how to retrive my data back?Tq
i didn’t see anyone mention a trick that worked for me once. i took a laptop drive out, with an adapter, attached it to an open pc. at boot up, while it was trying to start, i spun it, (while keeping it level – more like a flick of the wrist) a few times and it started and mounted, which it wouldn’t do before. i recovered the important stuff just by copying files! might be worth a try, instead of hitting a drive, when it won’t spin up. i think it was a bearing issue.
Attempted to fix a 40 Gig Maxtor Diamondmax plus.
Tried 10 different PCBs and a few different cables.
Took 2 nonworking 40 Gig Maxtor s apart for practice.
Then moved the platter to a good drive.
Made the same seek sound the rest (6) made.
The drive has 1 head and 1 platter, when I looked under it the surface was bad.
I think the
Will this void my warranty?
yes it will void your warranty you er.. uneducated person.
good article, interesting ideas, i needed to recover data from laptop drives, although i dont know where to get the damned screwdrivers, cant buy them locally, maybe online..
yeh
The freezer method worked very well for me.
This might be an obvious one but I have been told by a data recovery place that my drive’s firmware is messed up. Is it risky to change the board that has the firmware? I suspect not since the only board I know of on HD’s is external. Just wondering thanks. Its a Seagate 200GB 7200RPM ATA133.
Since this seems to still have been an active topic relatively recently, I’ll give this a shot. Would like to pull the data from my old Amiga SCSI drives (yes, I’ve got an Adaptec SCSI controller on a PC here), but the boot drive seems to have died in storage. It makes no sound upon startup, but the LED comes on so I think it’s just the motor. Any suggestions? How do I properly mount the drives so they can be read (I’m open to either Winbloz- or Linux-based solutions)? And how do I make a disk image from them that’ll work in UAE?