Question Data Recovery Question

[troemich]

A friend of mine got an external HDD. I took it out of it's casing and plugged it in directly via Sata. The data shows up, copying data is not possible because it freezes up. After a couple of minutes, the HDD stops spinning and disappears from the OS. I noticed that there's one spot at the PCB that was very hot. The hot spot is near the Power Sata Connector. After letting it cool down, I plugged it in and it spun up again.
I tried Windows and also Ubuntu. Windows Explorer froze and crashed, Ubuntu did not freeze, but couldn't copy any data.

Could it be that there's some Chip or IC that's blown that causes this overheating? Would it be wise to spend money on a donor PCB? I know the drill, swapping the BIOS Chip with a heat gun.

It's a 2TB WD Green 3.5 inch.

 

[seagate_surfer]

Hi,

can you create a clon of the drive? It is safer to recover the data from the clon than from the original drive.

 

[troemich]

Hi,

can you create a clon of the drive? It is safer to recover the data from the clon than from the original drive.

The HDD disappears after a couple of mintues and the PCB gets very hot. I don't think cloning it will work.

 

[seagate_surfer]

Ok, have you tried to use some kind of data recovery software? Like TestDisk or Recuva?

 

[troemich]

No. I didn't see no reason to try that. I unscrewed the PCB. At the spot where it gets hot, there's a chip that has visible burn marks.
I'll try ordering a PCB. The BIOS Chip is located very close to the plastic of the Sata connector. Any idea how I should avoid the melting of plastic? Kapton Tape?

 

[cryoburner]

I have not actually attempted transplanting a surface mount chip this way myself, but yeah, I think it would be a good idea to mask off everything around the chip with a heat-resistant material to reduce the chance of melting or dislodging other components. You would probably want to used a narrow nozzle on the heatgun too. And be careful not to overheat and burn out the chip itself.

 

[fzabkar]

Could we see the PCB? WD's drives have very poor overvoltage protection, so be very careful.

WD's drives also have a "slow responding" problem which can be circumvented with a DIY firmware modification. Tools such as WDMarvel have a single-click solution for this. Otherwise there is HDDSuperTool (a freeware Linux based tool).