Hard Drive Clicking (Another one)

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The_Unnamed

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I have a 500GB WD Hard drive that has been sitting in my drawer for a long time. I decided to take it out to copy an old game off it and when i plugged it in i get the click of death!! The drive had not been in any bumps or knocks that i know of. Its just been sitting loose in a drawer. (No static bag or anything)

Now, i have an almost identical (Just the DCM number is different, no idea what that is) 500Gb WD drive that works 100%. Would it be worth my while to backup everything on the working drive and then swap the circuit boards around to maybe have a chance of getting the broken one working temporarily again?

DSC_0278.jpg
DSC_0277.jpg

I have attached photos of the drives details.
 
Its obviously a zulu drive. U must teach it english to stop the clicking.
 
Swapping the boards may work, but I'd rather suggest you put the drive into two ziploc bags, or a few layers (5 should do the trick) of clingwrap, and put the drive into the freezer for at least twelve hours (24 preferable and in some cases recommended). Make sure there's as little air inside with the drive as possible, since you don't want moisture getting into it. When you take it out put it into your PC immediately and see if you can attempt any data recovery. If the drive works beyond a day, then you may have saved it from the brink of death.

The reason why this should work is because the platters inside may have oxidised and enlarged a bit, causing the surface to warp in some places, enough to make the platter bump against the head while its spinning up. Freezing it condenses the platter's surface and makes it more even.
 
take the drive to a data recovery place if u really want something off it. otherwise throw it away
 
Take it apart, remove the platters, apparently they fit 100% in sony blu-ray drive and you have the ability to record.
 
I know NAG - Wesley is trying to help, but the information and advice are completely wrong.

Do not put the drive in a fridge or freezer, unless you want water vapour condensing on the platters and internals. Freezing does not 'flatten out' and surfaces and the problem is not any 'oxidation' that caused the surfaces to enlarge.

Your drive is clicking because it cannot read the service area (firmware) stored on the drive, more specifically on the platters. If the drive spins up, clicks a few times, and then spins down, it is >90% a head problem. It could also be a problem with the MCU on the PCB, but this cannot be solved by merely swapping the PCB. These drives have endless firmware revisions, a small portion of which is stored in ROM on the PCB, the remainder on the platters. These need to match exactly. This ROM also stores other information unique to the particular drive it is mounted to.

You have less than 1% chance of a successful PCB swap. Considering that the problem is most likely not the PCB, swapping the PCB is basically pointless.

If you value the data on the drive then send it in for data recovery. If not, and you want to experiment and do some DIY, then have some fun, accept the risks and maybe lady luck is shining down on you :)

P.S. The DCM you refer to is a Western Digital term and it translates to the drive configuration, each letter resembles a particular component such as head stack, media type, etc etc.
 
Well, I'll sheepishly raise my hand and say that I learned something today!
 
yeh come on, do the nag dudes freezer thingy and give us feed back, drive is stuffed anyhow, so what you got to lose?
what game you trying to recover btw?

oh yeh if it gets wet in the freezer then you can drop it in some rice :whistle:
 
I use to have a bad drive I freeze now and then to recover stuff...but I never got to copy those large movies off 100%...eventually it just wouldnt even read anymore.

Just movies though...nothing much~
 
South_Bit said:
I know NAG - Wesley is trying to help, but the information and advice are completely wrong.

Do not put the drive in a fridge or freezer, unless you want water vapour condensing on the platters and internals. Freezing does not 'flatten out' and surfaces and the problem is not any 'oxidation' that caused the surfaces to enlarge.

Your drive is clicking because it cannot read the service area (firmware) stored on the drive, more specifically on the platters. If the drive spins up, clicks a few times, and then spins down, it is >90% a head problem. It could also be a problem with the MCU on the PCB, but this cannot be solved by merely swapping the PCB. These drives have endless firmware revisions, a small portion of which is stored in ROM on the PCB, the remainder on the platters. These need to match exactly. This ROM also stores other information unique to the particular drive it is mounted to.

You have less than 1% chance of a successful PCB swap. Considering that the problem is most likely not the PCB, swapping the PCB is basically pointless.

If you value the data on the drive then send it in for data recovery. If not, and you want to experiment and do some DIY, then have some fun, accept the risks and maybe lady luck is shining down on you :)

P.S. The DCM you refer to is a Western Digital term and it translates to the drive configuration, each letter resembles a particular component such as head stack, media type, etc etc.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice. The drive spins up for a while makes no clicking noise, then after say 30 seconds it makes a big "clunk" noise, stops spinning, spins up again and repeats.

lived666 said:
yeh come on, do the nag dudes freezer thingy and give us feed back, drive is stuffed anyhow, so what you got to lose?
what game you trying to recover btw?

oh yeh if it gets wet in the freezer then you can drop it in some rice :whistle:
Click to expand...

I have tried the freezer trick twice before. It didnt work. So i won't be doing it again. There is nothing important on either drives, its just some stuff that i would like to save time by not downloading again.
 
I have recovered from a hard drive click before.
I stood the drive on its side and then powered up and it worked. Try it in different positions - left side, right side, upside down, standing up on the front etc. Perhaps also try a light tap on one side and then connect it up. If still clicking try again on another side.

If the data is important send it in for professional recovery, but in this case it is worth playing around a bit.
 
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:erm:my sea-gate external always clicks on start-up and then works fine .... been clicking like this for 3years? few weeks back it got stuck when it stared up clicked 6 to 10 times in a row .. and then worked fine again i wonder
 
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