Common hard drive faults

COMMON HARD DRIVE FAULTS

This area will be slowly updated with common faults from hard drives that I see on a daily bases, these will consist of jammed spindle motors to system area faults, head crashes, PCB component issues, stuck read write heads to the unfortunate unrepair-able faults

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COMMON HARD DRIVE FAULTS

Printed Circuit Board Failure (PCB)

These range from spindle IC failure such as overheating and even a physical burn out of components

This could even be the aftermath of more serious problems such as the bearings locking up of the spindle motor that rotates the internal platters at variable speeds

Spindle Motor Jam

As mentioned above this can cause all sorts of problems... you might even think there is no power getting to the drive and yet every time you try something new in the hopes of retrieving data... all you accomplish is more damage to critical components

Head Crash Related

This can be caused by several different scenarios from rotational speed enabling the read write heads to make contact with the platters, which would normally cause a ring or scratch around the platters surface.

Head Slap or violent knocking of the armature causing the heads to become misaligned

Unsuccessful park when from an improper shut down

System Area Problems

Bad Translator, Grown Defects, Log Files & Smart can cause havoc with a drive

Common Model Faults: IBM Hitachi Notebook Hard Disk Drives

HTS541040G9AT00........

HTS548020M9AT00........

HTS726060M9AT00........

HTS548040M9AT00........

IC25N060ATMR04-0.......

IC25N030ATMR04-0.......

IC25N040ATMR04-0.......

IC25N040ATCS05-0.......

IC25N020ATCS04-0.......

Although with the naked eye the platter seems intact.. but as in this example I have removed the platters and sprayed the drive with a tell all solution, a very fine ring appears, although small, this is enough to kill any replacement parts in seconds

Seagate Jammed, Stuck Spindle Motor

This is a very common issue especially with hard drives 250 gigabyte and up, This is mostly caused by a sharp shock to the drive while in motion, such as knocking the drive over in an external USB enclosure.

Below I have pulled this jammed spindle motor apart to demonstrate where the fault lies and what not to do!

First of all

Problem #1

This is NOT a spindle Bearing problem so trying to put any type of oil is not going to achieve anything but unrecoverable platter damage, if you do indeed manage to resurrect the drive to spin.. rotational gravity will take over and seep any oil away from the bearings and all over your platter.

This is a true story I have seen many times.

As you can see in the diagram the spindles shaft has caused unrepair-able abrasions in the spindles cylinder... this is much like a piston from a car engine, it needs to move freely and if damaged this would need to be machined smooth or re-bored

So forcing of the spindle to turn, will only make matters worse... this spindle motor needs to be replaced!

Problem #2

The Spindle Motor in a Seagate Drive is Mounted to the hard drive assembly! So what this means is you now have to remove the platters and you need a whole new matching hard drive assembly to remount the drives platters.

This is a major problem as Hard drives have gotten bigger in density but not in size, so the are very delicate.

These Platters are sensitive to dust as well as containing delicate components easily damaged by static electricity, so opening these drives on your desk and attempting to loosen the drives spindle by putting screwdrivers or sharp objects in the vacant screw holes will only damage the platters components and of course the famous slip from whatever tool you are using to cause a great scratch on the surface of the platters... once again I have seen this many times.

Problem #3

Balancing and Alignment of the Platters are Crucial to any recovery so do not disturb there original position for any reason or you might as well bin the drive. These Platters need to be taken out as a set without being disturbed.

Problem #4

The read write heads are now stuck to the platter of the drive! What this means is read write heads are not designed to touch the platter of the drive, But there is a park area on the platter for the drive to land on when turned off, this area has many tiny holes to prevent the heads from sticking to the surface of the platter. what our problem is with a hard drive that is jammed is removing these heads from the drive with out touching the platter of the drive, remember the platters are stuck... they do not move so any attempt to slide the heads off will result in the heads sticking to the platters and altering the heads alignment as well as possible platter damage.

These Jammed Seagate Spindle Motors are a very serious problem, If your hard drive is stuck or not spinning or making a slight grinding noise and you suspect that it is jammed...

Call the Number at the top of the page!

Bad sectors

Stuck Heads

Common Fine Ring Around Platter

Jammed Spindle Motor

Not Recognized...can have system area damage

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What is the problem?

Does the hard drive spin?

If so does it click?

Does the armature kick out?

Do the hard drives heads vibrate to initiate?

Is there an odd smell to the drive?

If it doesn't spin do you here a slight or faint ticking sound?

Does the BIOS see the hard drive?

Does the BIOS see the hard drive as the correct model?

Are there funny characters showing on boot?

Does the operating system blue screen?

Important things you should be aware of before you do anything to a suspected failed hard drive

Static discharge will kill a hard drive when handling... especially the internal components

Dust will destroy your data... DO NOT OPEN! In my experience I see so many hard drives destroyed by helpful neighbors when the problem was not situated internal of the hard drive assembly. Just because it clicks doesn't always represent an internal failure.

Swapping the electronics runs the risk of further damage, especially if the revision number of the PCB is different.

You will have a greater success of data recovery with less risk if the original electronics is repaired.

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