| Author |
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stickyfox@gmail.com
Guest
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 Posted:
Mon Dec 05, 2005 1:35 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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I have never replaced a head assembly, but I've recovered data from
opened hard drives in very filthy environments and had remarkable
success (for example, when one head crashed). Your platters are
certainly not damaged at this point just because you opened the drive.
You can't consider your rebuilt drive to be as reliable as a new one,
but it will most certainly last long enough to get the data off.
I am not sure alignment is an issue either; the sectoring on the
platter should handle this.
To keep the heads apart, just wedge something in betwen the arms;
don't put anything in contact with the heads.
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CJT
Guest
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| Posted:
Mon Dec 05, 2005 1:35 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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Ted Bundy wrote:
| Quote: | Another Maxtor harddrive to fail, way to common- rule #1 AVOID MAXTOR
Harddrives.
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I disagree. I haven't had problems with them, and I have quite a few.
I think they're fine when not abused.
| Quote: | western digital much better, plus a better warranty.
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I prefer Maxtor to WD, but not on the basis of reliability.
| Quote: | "Dave D" <dave_d@dave_d.com> wrote in message
news:xa6dnTTqGNclYg_eRVnytw@pipex.net...
"Ryan Underwood" <nemesis@icequake.net> wrote in message
news:-YqdndsC1K7HCw_enZ2dnUVZ_tmdnZ2d@fidnet.com...
Hello.
I have a click-of-death 4-platter Maxtor drive. It failed clicky while
running. So I believe that this is not a firmware issue or an issue with
the
hidden data on the drive, nor simply due to bad sectors. By process of
elimination, it seems to be either the electronics, the heads or the head
amplifier. I obtained an identical drive and swapped the board, which
did not
change things. So now I am thinking about trying to replace the head
assembly.
snip
As others have pointed out, this is not possible to do at home, period.
For starters, a hard drive must never be opened in anything other than a
special clean room because a speck of dust landing on the platters will
cause a head crash which will destroy the surface integrity of both heads
and platters.
Secondly, dismantling the mechanism will severely damage the heads and
platters, special tools and jigs will be required to accomplish this-
there is no room for error.
Thirdly, even assuming one managed to physically transplant a new
mechanism, the drive will never read or write data again because of the
contamination of the previously sealed drive and the alignment of the
mechanism.
The drive is now junk, you'll have to forget about the data on it I'm
afraid.
Dave
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--
The e-mail address in our reply-to line is reversed in an attempt to
minimize spam. Our true address is of the form che...@prodigy.net. |
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Clint Sharp
Guest
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| Posted:
Mon Dec 05, 2005 6:08 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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In message <-YqdndsC1K7HCw_enZ2dnUVZ_tmdnZ2d@fidnet.com>, Ryan Underwood
<nemesis@icequake.net> writes
| Quote: | Hello.
I have a click-of-death 4-platter Maxtor drive. It failed clicky while
running. So I believe that this is not a firmware issue or an issue with the
hidden data on the drive, nor simply due to bad sectors. By process of
elimination, it seems to be either the electronics, the heads or the head
amplifier. I obtained an identical drive and swapped the board, which did not
change things. So now I am thinking about trying to replace the head assembly.
I have attempted this before, on a Toshiba 2.5" drive with 5 platters, and met
with no success.
I most certainly wouldn't like to try and replace the whole head |
assembly, but it might be possible to replace the head amplifier
chip.... You'd need some way of making sure the fumes from whatever
soldering process you use don't hit the platters but it should be
possible to do provided you can get the chip. I *have* replaced heads
and head assemblies before but a long time ago when drives didn't have
an embedded servo. You might have some success if you had a drive with
only one platter but I believe the tolerances on a multi-platter drive
would make this nigh on impossible without having to re-write the servo
tracks, destroying any chance of recovering the data.
| Quote: | The other problem was that when I slid the heads off the platters, they slapped
together. I believe this may have instantly destroyed them, but I'm not
certain. It seems like I need some kind of "comb" type thing to keep the heads
separated while off the platters. Anyone have any bright ideas?
Ummm, a comb? We used to call it a spragging tool but I'm not sure if |
that's even a word, let alone one that's commonly used to describe the
tool. We made them out of perspex strips with a lot of care, you need to
be very careful with such a tool as the arms the heads are mounted on
are extremely delicate and any distortion will cause an instant crash.
| Quote: |
Thanks.
Final words, if the data is important, send it for data recovery, you're |
not going to get it back and risk destroying all hope of anyone getting
it back. If you're doing this for the experience, go for it, if you're
doing it to gain a drive, then go out and buy one, you'd never be able
to trust it with any data you wanted to keep.
Good luck.
--
Clint Sharp
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Ryan Underwood
Guest
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| Posted:
Thu Dec 08, 2005 7:53 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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Ken <user@domain.invalid> writes:
| Quote: | First off, I am NOT jumping on you for anything. I just want to make
that clear. That being said, I have messed with HDs when they were no
longer functional and needed, just to see if anything could be done with
them. Most failures I have encountered with the clicking noise were due
to what I think is a failure to read the boot sector.
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That's possible, but the drive doesn't even come online. It would attempt to
read the boot sector at the point when the BIOS passes control to the boot
sector, not when the drive has just spun up.
| Quote: | board without the disk attached. I do not think this is possible,
because it takes a reading of the boot sector for the drive to be
recognized.
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I think we are just confusing the 'firmware area' with 'boot sector'.
| Quote: | There is another feature to consider when you physically change the
platters. If there is more than one disk, I believe interleave still
takes place. I may be wrong about this, but it still might be a
consideration in how you install the platters if you are able to read
them with different heads.
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Well, I wasn't planning on removing any of the platters since that just
sounds like a disaster in the making. So hopefully this won't be an
issue. |
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Ryan Underwood
Guest
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| Posted:
Thu Dec 08, 2005 7:57 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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Tom MacIntyre <tom__macintyre@hotmail.com> writes:
| Quote: | If you are so experienced, why the original question?
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How does "having run drives open without immediate catastrophe" have anything
to do with "the best device to keep heads from slamming against each other
during replacement"? Some folks with no answer for the question that was
asked preferred to demonstrate their ignorance instead. I was simply
correcting that ignorance, not attempting to lay claim to any credentials in
the area. I claim no experience whatsoever in successful head replacement. |
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Ryan Underwood
Guest
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| Posted:
Thu Dec 08, 2005 8:03 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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"3T39" <rubbishrat@hotmail.com> writes:
| Quote: | the data recovery bussiness) that WD drives are undergoing some problems
right now, and Seagate are the clear favourites.
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WD and Maxtor both have had well-known problems where the firmware will corrupt
the on-disk "GLIST", the defect list, and the drive will no longer function.
Some Russian company sells a device that repairs such drives, but it costs ~$3K
IIRC.
Not claiming any brand is better than the other, but I have had a
disproportionate number of failures in both Maxtor and WD over the years.
Also, this was the first time a Maxtor drive had failed "clicky" on me, a trait
usually reserved for WD - I had always preferred Maxtor of the two since
usually the failure was not as catastrophic. Oh well. I've been buying Seagate
ATA drives for a while now and that will probably continue. |
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Ryan Underwood
Guest
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| Posted:
Thu Dec 08, 2005 8:09 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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Clint Sharp <clint@clintsmc.demon.co.uk> writes:
| Quote: | together. I believe this may have instantly destroyed them, but I'm not
certain. It seems like I need some kind of "comb" type thing to keep the heads
separated while off the platters. Anyone have any bright ideas?
Ummm, a comb? We used to call it a spragging tool but I'm not sure if
that's even a word, let alone one that's commonly used to describe the
tool. We made them out of perspex strips with a lot of care, you need to
be very careful with such a tool as the arms the heads are mounted on
are extremely delicate and any distortion will cause an instant crash.
|
For the record, another fellow suggested Post-It notes arranged in a particular
fashion.
| Quote: | Final words, if the data is important, send it for data recovery, you're
not going to get it back and risk destroying all hope of anyone getting
it back. If you're doing this for the experience, go for it, if you're
doing it to gain a drive, then go out and buy one, you'd never be able
to trust it with any data you wanted to keep.
|
Oh, it's not a big deal. Basically, the drive housed my /usr partition and I
was caught without a backup when it happened. I can rebuild everything except
/usr/local and /usr/tmp. The former contains several years worth of admin
scripts and other tidbits, and the latter contained open source code I was
working on. Neither is a catastrophic loss by any means, but I would very
much like to have them back - they just aren't worth as much as $500 is worth
to me right now. Hence my casual approach to this issue. |
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Tom MacIntyre
Guest
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| Posted:
Fri Dec 09, 2005 1:35 am Post subject:
Re: replacing head assy in a hard drive |
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On Wed, 07 Dec 2005 19:57:40 -0600, Ryan Underwood
<nemesis@icequake.net> wrote:
| Quote: | Tom MacIntyre <tom__macintyre@hotmail.com> writes:
If you are so experienced, why the original question?
How does "having run drives open without immediate catastrophe" have anything
to do with "the best device to keep heads from slamming against each other
during replacement"? Some folks with no answer for the question that was
asked preferred to demonstrate their ignorance instead. I was simply
correcting that ignorance, not attempting to lay claim to any credentials in
the area. I claim no experience whatsoever in successful head replacement.
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Why do you use quotes when you are paraphrasing?
Tom |
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