[SOLVED] PCB broken

[Peterspie]

Hello,

I have a broken PCB on my WD-hard drive.
By just replacing the PCB the hard drive spins up, but isn't recognized in windows. So, the Bios from the broken board should be placed on a donor board to get it working again.
I searched for a company (in the Netherlands) to replace the BIOS. They told me they could do it, but the other day they called me to tell that one of the legs of the bios was broken off of the chip.

Now, I just took the risk to connect the drive to my pc with the donor board without the original bios.
When I go to disk management I can see the drive, but it says: Not initialized.
I want to know: if I initialize the drive, will my data on it be lost?
or, can you get the data back after initializing with some kind of software tool?

Maybe there are people here in the the forum from the Netherlands that have experience with a company who might try to fix the broken bios?

Regards, Peter

 

[lvt]

Now, I just took the risk to connect the drive to my pc with the donor board without the original bios.
When I go to disk management I can see the drive, but it says: Not initialized.
I want to know: if I initialize the drive, will my data on it be lost?
or, can you get the data back after initializing with some kind of software tool?

Technically, your data are still there, but the computer can't read the HDD because the info provided by the donor Bios is incorrect. Your computer will need the data stored in the old Bios to work with the HDD.

 

[USAFRet]

I want to know: if I initialize the drive, will my data on it be lost?

Yes...all gone.

This situation is specifically what backups are for.

 

[fzabkar]

Which pin is broken? Can you show us a photo of the damaged chip?

What is the model of the HDD?

 

[Peterspie]

Which pin is broken? Can you show us a photo of the damaged chip?

What is the model of the HDD?

I will try to take a photo. But it is so small, I don't think i will get it sharp enough.

The model is a WD40EFRX.

 

[fzabkar]

There are two possible approaches.

1/ Fix the chip by adding a wire to the broken pin.

2/ Rebuild the ROM contents with special software tools. This is possible for all but a few WD models.

 

[USAFRet]

For future reference, a 3rd option:
Accept the loss of the physical drive, replace, and recover the data from your backup.

 

[Peterspie]

For future reference, a 3rd option:
Accept the loss of the physical drive, replace, and recover the data from your backup.

I know, let's hope the pcb can be fixed.
I have a part of the data in my backup, but not all of it.

 

[Peterspie]

There are two possible approaches.

1/ Fix the chip by adding a wire to the broken pin.

We will try this next wednesday. Then I am also to send a picture of the broken pin, made via the microscope.

2/ Rebuild the ROM contents with special software tools. This is possible for all but a few WD models.

Ah, this also sounds very interesting. The model is a WD40EFRX.
I will start to look for this software.

 

[fzabkar]

You may be able to rebuild the ROM with WDMarvel, but it's not a job for a raw beginner. That is, it's not a point-and-click tool.

Other tools cost many $$$$$, eg PC3000, MRT Lab.

 

[Peterspie]

You may be able to rebuild the ROM with WDMarvel, but it's not a job for a raw beginner. That is, it's not a point-and-click tool.

Other tools cost many $$$$$, eg PC3000, MRT Lab.

I found this software. Do you think it will work?

 

[fzabkar]

No, that only has a chance of working when the problem is a logical one, not physical.

In any case there are far better logical tools that cost a lot less money, eg DMDE, RAISE.

 

[Bazzy 505]

Hello,

I have a broken PCB on my WD-hard drive.
By just replacing the PCB the hard drive spins up, but isn't recognized in windows. So, the Bios from the broken board should be placed on a donor board to get it working again.
I searched for a company (in the Netherlands) to replace the BIOS. They told me they could do it, but the other day they called me to tell that one of the legs of the bios was broken off of the chip.

Now, I just took the risk to connect the drive to my pc with the donor board without the original bios.
When I go to disk management I can see the drive, but it says: Not initialized.
I want to know: if I initialize the drive, will my data on it be lost?
or, can you get the data back after initializing with some kind of software tool?

Maybe there are people here in the the forum from the Netherlands that have experience with a company who might try to fix the broken bios?

Regards, Peter

The reason why your disk appears as unitialized because even when swapping same revision pcb, with same firmware there is one vital component that still missing. Each modern HDD is to an extent physically unique, and each PCB contains a flash chip in which calibration data unique to each drive is stored. Unless you swap ( or clone, if you have flash programmer) the donor pcb will never work correctly in the old drive.

to give you an idea what's involved:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFpSWF7MWEc