"Do it Yourself Hard Disk Repair"

Solution:

Cannibalize parts from another hard drive to get the first one functional.

I purchased an identical drive on eBay. However, I first tried the easy way out. I moved the new controller on to the old drive and powered it up.

BIG MISTAKE. The new controller immediately cooked itself. Now I was definitely sure that the chip mounted on the side of the head armature was directly responsible for dropping the voltage applied to the spindle motor. I imagine this pin shorts the controller which then stops applying voltage to the spindle motor. So I was exactly back where I began except that now I had two burned controllers.

I decided to do what had to be done and move the head from the good drive to the old drive. Moving the platters seemed impossible and obtaining the right tools would not be easy.

Required Tools:

• Needle Nose Pliers.
• Philips Head Screw Driver.
• Small Flat Head Screw Driver
• T9 Torx Head Screw Driver.

General Tips Before Starting:

Attempt to work in the cleanest area possible. A garage is usually not a good choice.

While working within the drive, work slowly and carefully. Be sure not to touch the platters with your fingers or tools! This will most likely damage the data on them.

The goal is to remove the heads from the good drive and then later transplanting them into the broken drive. Again, we are moving the heads since the bad chip is affixed to the head armature which directly connects to the actual read / write head. Since there is little chance of removing the chip successfully, I am attempting to move the entire head / arm mechanism instead.

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