Motor controller chip failure

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Tim Farren

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Oct 19, 2012, 2:05:06 AM10/19/12
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Hello everyone. I have a drive that won't spin up. When powered on, you can hear nothing from the motor. Instead you hear noise as the heads attempt to travel over the non moving platters.

I know the motor isn't seized. It's a western digital 800BB drive. I tried a board from a similar drive and the motor works and the drive comes up but all blocks just timeout on the DDI. Upon inspection of the original drive's pcb, I see a chip that connects to the motor contacts which has developed a nice little bubble. I believe this chip is the problem.

Question: has anyone found a way to externally spin up the motor while leaving the original pcb attached to the drives internal head stack? I tried attaching the pins from the good pcb to the drive while bending up the 4 pins on the original pcb. The drive seems like it tried to start, but then decided to stop trying, I suppose because the rest of that pcb is getting no feedback or additional signals from the IDE interface.

Can this be done? I just need the drive to spin up, is there a way apart from desoldering and transplanting that motor controller chip? I'm terrible at doing that. I've never been successful as I always botch the soldering job.

Thanks.

PCLAB

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Oct 19, 2012, 3:44:48 AM10/19/12
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I believe you need a PCB swap.

IT LAND

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Oct 19, 2012, 6:25:22 AM10/19/12
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Does this HDD has a U12 ROM or embedded MCU one?
If it has U12, just get an exact PCB and move the U12 to the donor, that usually do the jobs if heads and FW are OK.

Jono

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Nov 10, 2012, 3:14:06 PM11/10/12
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Put the PCBs in kernel mode and copy the ROM.  Simple.  No soldering.

Tim Farren

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Nov 10, 2012, 3:40:02 PM11/10/12
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Sounds great. What special equipment do I need?

Sent from my iPhone
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sup...@rambuscomputers.co.uk

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Nov 10, 2012, 4:07:52 PM11/10/12
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PC3000 UDMA, Atola or Salvation Data

Sent from my iPhone 4S

Tim Farren

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Nov 10, 2012, 6:14:58 PM11/10/12
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Which is the most cost effective?  Which Atola?

IT LAND

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Nov 10, 2012, 6:21:05 PM11/10/12
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Hi Tim, 
the most cost effective one is a device called DFL-WDII.
It will do teh job very well and is the cheapest for WD.

Cheers,
Oded


On Sunday, November 11, 2012 10:15:02 AM UTC+11, Tim Farren wrote:

Which is the most cost effective?  Which Atola?

 

From: datarecovery...@googlegroups.com [mailto:datarecoverycertificati...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Sup...@rambuscomputers.co.uk
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2012 4:08 PM
To: datarecovery...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: Motor controller chip failure

 

PC3000 UDMA, Atola or Salvation Data

Sent from my iPhone 4S


On 10 Nov 2012, at 20:40, Tim Farren <t...@farrentech.com> wrote:

Sounds great. What special equipment do I need?

Sent from my iPhone


On Nov 10, 2012, at 3:19 PM, "Jono" <jonatha...@gmail.com> wrote:

Put the PCBs in kernel mode and copy the ROM.  Simple.  No soldering.

 

 

 

 

 

 



On Friday, October 19, 2012 2:05:04 AM UTC-4, Tim Farren wrote:

Hello everyone. I have a drive that won't spin up. When powered on, you can hear nothing from the motor. Instead you hear noise as the heads attempt to travel over the non moving platters.

I know the motor isn't seized. It's a western digital 800BB drive. I tried a board from a similar drive and the motor works and the drive comes up but all blocks just timeout on the DDI. Upon inspection of the original drive's pcb, I see a chip that connects to the motor contacts which has developed a nice little bubble. I believe this chip is the problem.

Question: has anyone found a way to externally spin up the motor while leaving the original pcb attached to the drives internal head stack?  I tried attaching the pins from the good pcb to the drive while bending up the 4 pins on the original pcb. The drive seems like it tried to start, but then decided to stop trying, I suppose because the rest of that pcb is getting no feedback or additional signals from the IDE interface.

Can this be done?  I just need the drive to spin up, is there a way apart from desoldering and transplanting that motor controller chip?  I'm terrible at doing that. I've never been successful as I always botch the soldering job.

Thanks.  

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