About MQ04xxxyyy drives

[RecuperoDati299]

Hello

about the drives in subject, we see an amount

what is your experience with those where the drive income declared dropped by the customer but observing the heads sliders they appear glossy and no bendings are visible

so for safety you swap heads and they last few seconds and or couple of minutes then "good bye", click of death.

Are you too always "crossing fingers" with nasty stats?

Thank you for telling me about your MQ04 (and also 03, 02 and 01 looks quite the same. Maybe 01 slightly better) swapping results

regards

R.

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[Philip Shaw]

It's interesting you mentioned this model. I am working on a MQ04UBF100 with AZA as the first three characters in the Drive Rev and a date of August 2017. The drive was clicking so I changed it to a SATA board and did a head exchange with a drive with AAH and a date of about two years later. It came right up and started imaging but then got some errors and crapped out. After that the drive would initialize slowly but come ready. It couldn't read any sectors, though. I did two head exchanges with drives with AZA but they were about four years newer. I have had the exact same problem. It is very frustrating because I have done a lot of these drives and I don't remember any issues like this. I'm not sure if I need to get a date closer to the original (not easy to find). Sorry if I am rambling but I need to get this resolved.

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[data recovery databrb_com]

I think Head is ok. Usual I just get same head map be fine for MQ04. 

Thanks & Best Regard!
Sunny.
^_^

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[Desert Data Recovery]

Without blocking SA writing, head swaps should not be done on these drives.

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[RecuperoDati299]

hello

the topic of blocking SA writes is a key point

have you found the corresponding ROM modification?

A specific command in the terminal?

Or have you prepared a modified electronic board?

would you kindly like to share this TIP?

Thank you anyway

R.

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[RecuperoDati299]

and also

have you figured out why SA writes should lead the donor heads to die?

thank you

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Il giorno 12 mar 2026, alle ore 02:50, 'Desert Data Recovery' via DataRecoveryCertification <datarecovery...@googlegroups.com> ha scritto:

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[Paulo Braga]

Hello, 

After hearing directly from ACELab support that head swaps on Toshiba SMR drives required very closely compatible donor units, I have to say that I accidentally developed a method that has been working very well for me. I would like to share it here.

When performing head swaps on Toshiba SMR drives, I have successfully used donor heads from drives manufactured several years apart, and in many cases even from brand-new units of the same model. As long as the model matches, the method has worked surprisingly well in my tests. Here is the key point:

After replacing the damaged heads with good ones, in my experience the drive typically identifies correctly in the Utility and reports the proper ID, but it does not read sectors.

What I do at this stage is the following: I enable reading but switch from UDMA to Utility reading mode. Naturally, because the Utility cannot decode the translator on Toshiba SMR drives (which is still not supported), the software reports errors. However, the drive still starts reading and returns invalid data. Important note: Not clone Toshiba SMR drives in Utility mode, all data is invalid.

After this step, when I switch back to normal UDMA reading mode (UDMA100), the drive often starts reading sectors normally and behaves much better. This method has worked consistently in my tests, even when the donor heads came from drives with several years of manufacturing difference.

I hope this information can help others working with Toshiba SMR cases.

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[pbzcbf...@gmail.com]

After donor heads die, do people retest them in the donor drive? Is there any visible damage to the heads?

I expect that SA writes should be disabled because the donor's microjogs may be significantly different, to the point that adjacent SA tracks would be overwritten rather than the target track.

Is there a particular CP that stores the microjogs? If so, would it make sense to import the donor's microjog CP into the patient ROM?

The preamp typically requires two supply voltages, at least in 3.5" drives. The negative voltage (-5V or -3V) is used by the write circuitry. Would disconnecting this supply from the preamp prevent writing, and would the drive continue to operate if this were done?

[Alandata Recovery]

how do you block writing to the sa in toshiba ?

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[RecuperoDati299]

that was my same question :-)

It could be that Tim is busy with tasks and only reads the mailing list occasionally.

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[RecuperoDati299]

hello

Certainly, every time. The donor heads are remounted on the donor and checked under microscope before the reinstallation in the donor body.

The nasty and depressing part of the matter is that the PATIENT heads were straight and shiny (this justifies the attempt), and the DONOR ones turn out the same afterwards.

this is the long story of MQs

hard to sort out what is wrong

At the begin we checked many times the platters for any kind of either invisible ring: nothing.

When we close these cases with KO, we use the term "nano damages" , seen also ( much more rarely ) on Seagate's Grenada family STx000DMxxx

So on one side stopping SA writes is good for preventing issues with the translator

but this issue with the heads is a mystery

and I mean obviously that this happen as well in MQs with the body perfectly flat (we receive some with the body bend)

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[RecuperoDati299]

P.S.

at least on STx000DMxxx

you were observing

- matte heads sliders despite (apparently) perfect platter surfaces

and as well you finally had matte sliders surfaces on the donor.

A type of feedback that immediately taught that the corresponding head must be kept away from the platter.

So you keep the head away from the platter and read the rest.

You can do the same with MQs, too bad it's not possible to visually understand which head has problems.

Which would involve a costly trial and error process

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[Justin Skinner]

I always strip and clean the platters. I agree heads look fine, but as a precaution I clean the platters to be sure and seem to have more success this way.

[pbzcbf...@gmail.com]

Some preamps have a Write Gate signal pin. If you can switch this off, then writes should be disabled.

[Alandata Recovery]

What is your procedure for cleaning platters?

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