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IWETHEY Home / IWETHEY Board / General Q&A Forum / Should have looked around a little more...
Post #304,866
by Another Scott
2/28/09 7:50:07 PM
Reply
New Should have looked around a little more...
Thanks for your thoughts on diagnosing it. I was almost certain that the remaining problem had to do with the board, not the motors, etc. I remember taking apart a 10 MB HD to see the damage inside, and figured if it came to that with this box then I'd have no hope.

I did some more searching using "Seagate 7200.8" and found forum.hddguru.com . It has lots of good information about fixing drives.

The contraption that got roasted on the original circuit board of drive is a "TVS" - Trans Voltage Suppressor. It's a diode that's designed to protect the rest of the electronics if bad things happen to the input voltage. It's apparently quite common for them to fail via a dead short (as seemed to happen in my case based on the PS issues I was having).

http://forum.hddguru...t9998.html#p70888

So I had an excuse to drag out my soldering iron. And guess what? Removing the roasted TVS fixes the drive! Woot! :-D

So, I'm out $50 for that replacement circuit board (which I'm under the impression should have worked), but I've apparently got all my old data back. But, while replacement TVS parts apparently are available, I think I'll play it safe and relegate this drive to the parts bin after I get all the data off it.

Thanks.

Cheers,
Scott.
(Who has turned it off until he can get another drive ready to back it up. And who is much more careful about hooking up power connectors on open PCs now...)
Post #304,881
by a6l6e6x
Picture of a6l6e6x
2/28/09 10:52:25 PM
Reply
New Woot!
The data is the important thing.

The "replacement board" is probably off a bad drive whose electronics failed.

Were there any jumpers to set? And if so, did you match them to original?
Alex
Post #304,882
by Another Scott
2/28/09 10:57:12 PM
Reply
New :-) No jumpers. It's the standard SATA setup.
Post #304,887
by Ashton
3/1/09 3:37:08 AM
Reply
New Nice. Save.
Indeed, it appears that this TVS did exactly what it was supposed to do -- die First before all the other stuff Would! (Forgot you had er, REVERSED POLARITY as in, bad-Scott.) I've learned to look always at that 'little-tent' in the Molexes. Too lazy to troubleshoot the consequences.

Concur re ever trusting the thing again.. with $/TB decreasing as we speak, it isn't even worth My time to futz with the stuff I was suggesting, except: data recovery doesn't care about practicality.
(Maybe the dead-short failure-mode is also intentional? All switchers would shut-down for that - right?)

Info == power! You got the exact component without a tedious tracing sans schematic.
(But I think it would have been more Fun.. had it been a fixable 'Open' inside!)

Could the Why of the new board's failure to communicate -- be a firmware thing? Go to all that trouble and find ... you have to match some firmware to a specific run of drives, etc. == bummer.

Congrats on Success!


I.
     How do I love Linux...let me count the ways! - (beepster) - (25) - Dec. 6, 2008, 11:13:18 PM EST
         /me has really stopped preaching now... - (folkert) - (24) - Dec. 6, 2008, 11:57:06 PM EST
             Ar. - (malraux) - Dec. 7, 2008, 08:39:30 AM EST
             rather backup than raid. - (boxley) - (15) - Dec. 7, 2008, 10:07:15 AM EST
                 Don't put it off. - (Another Scott) - (14) - Dec. 7, 2008, 10:32:34 AM EST
                     dont need a bootable backup - (boxley) - Dec. 7, 2008, 02:47:49 PM EST
                     Bootable? - (beepster) - (12) - Dec. 7, 2008, 04:22:09 PM EST
                         In my case, it was necessary. - (Another Scott) - (11) - Dec. 7, 2008, 09:34:51 PM EST
                             The Cosmos is in vengeance mode - - per this thread - (Ashton) - (4) - Dec. 7, 2008, 10:19:13 PM EST
                                 Try some different writing software. - (Another Scott) - (2) - Dec. 7, 2008, 10:56:44 PM EST
                                     Re: Try some different writing software. - (pwhysall) - (1) - Dec. 8, 2008, 03:21:18 PM EST
                                         I found something called ImgBurn for the same purpose. - (static) - Dec. 8, 2008, 11:28:02 PM EST
                                 Thanks, tipsters - (Ashton) - Dec. 9, 2008, 02:30:40 AM EST
                             Well, it was worth a shot, I guess... - (Another Scott) - (5) - Feb. 28, 2009, 04:28:47 PM EST
                                 Never say die.. say DAMN! - (Ashton) - (4) - Feb. 28, 2009, 05:44:41 PM EST
                                     Should have looked around a little more... - (Another Scott) - (3) - Feb. 28, 2009, 07:50:07 PM EST
                                         Woot! - (a6l6e6x) - (1) - Feb. 28, 2009, 10:52:25 PM EST
                                             :-) No jumpers. It's the standard SATA setup. -NT - (Another Scott) - Feb. 28, 2009, 10:57:12 PM EST
                                         Nice. Save. - (Ashton) - March 1, 2009, 03:37:08 AM EST
             Sounds a lot like UPSs. - (Andrew Grygus) - (6) - Dec. 7, 2008, 01:00:21 PM EST
                 Re: Sounds a lot like UPSs. - (folkert) - Dec. 7, 2008, 06:31:22 PM EST
                 Or tape backups. - (static) - (4) - Dec. 8, 2008, 11:29:39 PM EST
                     I had one client . . . - (Andrew Grygus) - (3) - Dec. 9, 2008, 02:00:18 AM EST
                         Hah. - (static) - (2) - Dec. 9, 2008, 06:12:39 AM EST
                             Such tales through the decades have convinced me that.. - (Ashton) - (1) - Dec. 9, 2008, 03:02:45 PM EST
                                 there is only one reliable backup - (boxley) - Dec. 9, 2008, 08:00:42 PM EST

I'm picturing tablizer on a laptop dragging around a 486 whitebox running Linux attached to a really long extension cord.
108 ms