HDD faulty electronics - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / repair

author: kamtar
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 04:46:29 pm
content: Hello,I have some problems with a hardrive WD5000AAKX. My conclusion is that it is a problem with the harddrive electronics.I'm getting some timeouts, after which system tries to issue a reset into HDD, this helps but after few seconds the harddrive is again unresponsive, it takes 10-20 software resets to fix it or complete reboot.Most of times reboot helps but sometimes HDD isnt recognized by BIOS and i have to do few more reboots to get it working. And I'm unable to see any pattern in when this timeouts appear.It seems that:There is no problem with sata controller (other HDD works fine, but it is only a SATA I)There is no problem with OS, i have tried few reinstalls of W8 and W7. The only diffrence is that in W7 harddrive is switched into PIO mode after timeout.There is no problem with mechanical side of HDD - I have done few complete tests and no problems/ no bad sectors.My question is: Could this be because of faulty electronics? And if so have someone some ideas? There is some generic 128MB RAM IC, do you think that its possible that some faulty memory places could be the cause here?The harddrive is without warranty but it would be nice if i could fix it just with few bucks component.btw. I have tried to reflow it with hot air just for fun but nothing.

author: kripton2035
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 05:36:49 pm
content: entry level hard drive... more than a year... don't even bother with repair, buy a new one around 55 eurosit will cost you less than the time you will spend trying to repair it...

author: kamtar
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 05:44:13 pm
content: not everything have to be racional and about money/time. Maybe somebody want to do it just for fun and experience?

author: con-f-use
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 05:47:55 pm
content: See if it's an easy problem, bad connection on the USB, gone electrolytic cap or the like. Should take you 5 minutes. If it's not throw it a way.

author: retrolefty
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 07:20:59 pm
content: May not be your problem but I often had problems on my prior desktop PC (once or twice a year) when suddenly the system would not recognize the SATA DVD drive and sometimes also on a second hard drive and rebooting or powering off and on would not fix. The usual fix for me was to unplug the SATA cable from both ends and reinsert a couple of times. That would always make the problem go away till the next time.

author: Monkeh
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 07:24:35 pm
content: Quote from: con-f-use on July 20, 2015, 05:47:55 pmThere is no USB or electrolytics involved here..

author: helius
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 07:42:45 pm
content: If you can find the same model drive you can try a pcb swap. It's pretty easy to do, you don't even need to open the environmental seal of the disk. All depends on how much the data is worth...

author: kripton2035
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 07:43:51 pm
content: Quote from: kamtar onTodayat 04:44:13yes but in that case you have 95% chance to end with a bad IC with no available equivalentno schematic - no most available part to replace... sorry but even for fun it's not something I would follow ...by the way did you put it in another computer and experience the same failure ?that's the first thing I would try, reproduce the failure somewhere else.

author: kamtar
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 08:44:19 pm
content: Yes i tried it in other computer.. And there is no need for saving data, disk works fine this issue is occurring only temporarily. I just wanted to know if there is some real possibility for "modern" RAM IO (http://www.esmt.com.tw/DB/manager/upload/M13S128168A%282N%29.pdf) to have bad some memory location.

author: Monkeh
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 20, 2015, 08:51:32 pm
content: Quote from: kamtar on July 20, 2015, 08:44:19 pmEr, sure, but you can't just pin it on the RAM.The disk is unreliable, what gives you the impression your data is safe on it?

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 01:16:33 am
content: Quote from: kamtar on July 20, 2015, 04:46:29 pmDid you try to use it in another computer? Did you try to connect it to different SATA ports - SATA-2 / SATA-3?The fact that some HDDs work ok with particular controller doesn't mean that controller is OK, especially if those HDDs are of older type with previous SATA revision. Also SATA cables tend to die causing some strange and intermittent issues. If using HDD on with the SATA-3 port, you should use appropriate cable too which is specified for SATA-3 operation (usually black color). Red and yellow cables shouldn't be used with SATA-3. Trying to use newer HDDs with very old sata controllers can cause some strange stuff (have seen that). FYI some of the Intel chipsets from Sandy bridge time had silicon bug which caused sata 3 ports to die. Post the SMART data here.Quote from: retrolefty on July 20, 2015, 07:20:59 pmThe normal fix would to throw a cable in the trash can. If such cable was used with HDD, it very likely it would cause "UltraDMA CRC Error Count" to grow in the SMART.

author: Monkeh
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 01:21:33 am
content: Quote from: wraper on July 21, 2015, 01:16:33 amYou what? The colour means nothing (btw, I have red, blue, black, and orange cables.. and have seen grey, yellow, green, white...), and SATA 3.0 did not introduce any new cable requirements over SATA 2.0. As far as I know, nor did SATA 2.0 over SATA 1.0!

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 01:28:28 am
content: Quote from: kamtar on July 20, 2015, 08:44:19 pmDisk works reliably... Until the next day it isn't recognized anymore at all and all of your data is gone.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 01:31:54 am
content: Quote from: Monkeh on July 21, 2015, 01:21:33 amYes it did introduce new cable. Often motherboards come with both types of cables. SATA-2 cables will work fine with SATA-3 speed, but not guaranteed. Yes they are of various colors, but unless fancy stuff, SATA-3 cables usually are black and marked with text. Older cables more often are red and yellow and sometimes black too.

author: Monkeh
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 01:35:39 am
content: Quote from: wraper on July 21, 2015, 01:31:54 amI would appreciate a reliable source for this. I'll give you mine:https://www.sata-io.org/system/files/member-downloads/SATA-6-Gbs-The-Path-from-3gbs-to-6gbs.pdfQuotehttps://www.sata-io.org/system/files/member-downloads/SATA-6Gbs-Fast-Just-Got-Faster_2.pdfQuoteetc etc.Additionally, at the bottom ofthis documentyou'll find SATA 3.0 cable specs.And inthis onefrom 2003, ie. SATA 1.0, you will find.. exactly the same specs! Shocking.

author: fluxcapacitor
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 21, 2015, 02:25:55 am
content: Try scanning the drive with MHDD ,if youve got an old motherboard with IDE buy a SATA to IDE adapter. The WD5000AAKX has known problems with ROM and SA (service area) corruption. You could try a donor pcb and swap the rom.http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=26722

author: poot36
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: July 23, 2015, 05:21:41 am
content: Have you tried updateing the drives firmware? On some models of 500Gb drives I remember that there was an improperly programed lookup table and when that filled up the hdd stopped working. You had to unbrick it using a programmer cable and some fancy pin isolation on the drive head to drive motherboard header.

author: samnmax
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: July 24, 2015, 09:35:03 am
content: Quote from: poot36 on July 23, 2015, 05:21:41 amI think you mean the Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 series.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: July 24, 2015, 10:04:57 am
content: Quote from: samnmax on July 24, 2015, 09:35:03 amYeah, should mean those Seagates, but the issue wasn't limited to 500GB only IIRC. Though, the root cause wan't the firmware issue but inferior quality actually. If some corruption of the disk surface occurred, HDD could lock out due to the firmware bug. Even if undricked, only idiot would use it later as it would soon die anyway. I have two such 500GB Seagates laying somewhere, they didn't lock out but are full of bad sectors.