How to repair Western Digital Hard Disk 1200JB & Other HDD

It would appear this chip blowing is allegedly a common problem on Western digital Hard disks as I have come across others with exactly the same problem.

When this chip blows, you need to get an identical disk and swap the Circuit Board, but you also need to swap the firmware chip which is the 8 pin chip at the U12 position. (Just above the Big chip).  You may get lucky if you get an exact duplicate hard disk, made at the same time on the same production line and same batch, but this is unlikely.  Just swapping the board may give other symptons, so for a complete solution, the Firmware chip needs to be swapped.  The Platters have an identical copy of the firmware on the chip.  These both must match to get the disk to be recongnised by PC's Bios.  Just swapping boards normally gets the disk spinning up, but not recognised by PC's Bios.   If your soldering skills are not up to scratch, you need to get someone to do the job properly, with the right tools.

MY ORIGINAL TEXT FROM ACTION FRONT WEBSITE.

Hard Drive Repair Success ? thanks to Action Forum, by changing the Firmware Chip at the U12 Position on the Circuit Board. A Board swap does not always work, as you have to match the Firmware on the Disk Platters with the Firmware on the Serial Chip on the board. If the original board is blown, it usually will not spin up. By swapping the board, the drive will spin up but may not be recognised in bios of the PC. If it is seen by Bios, you may not see any data. You will have to swap the Firmware chip to the good board to be able to see the data. Also the DCM code should match as should the serial number in full.

http://forums.actionfront.com/showthread.php?t=635

Yes, I have repaired the hard disk, much to my amazement and happiness. When I described the problem in detail to data recovery companies in the UK, I think they knew what the problem was and how quickly it would be fixed, but they all gave me the "White Room Recovery" line.  However, I had read that 95% of all data recovery was possible without opening the hard disk and accessing the platters, so I persisted in trying to find out. Luckily for me I came across Action Fronts Web site.

I work in Helpdesk support, but we keep good backups at work. This disk was my friends who is a wedding photographer and had not backed up his data.

How I did it.
On the blown board, I used dentist type tools (bought from Maplins, a local electronics store) to lift up the legs of the chip from one side, while heating them up with my standard soldering iron. I managed to bend the legs and lift up one of the pads and the track. I heated each pin again, and used a sharp point to separate the solder from the legs. On the otherside of the chip, I used the side of the soldering iron and managed to heat all four pins together and push the chip off the pads.

Having practiced with the blown board, I used a pair or tweezers to hold the chip nearest the pins being heated on the good circuit board, and heated all the pins and pulling on the chip. The chip raised up but the solder underneath also lifted up in points. I heated each pin and used a sharp point to separate the solder from the pins. I then heated the legs on the other side of the chip and pushed the chip away from the pads.

I soldered one leg from the required chip, onto the donor new circuit board. Posited the other legs and heated all the legs, one side at a time. Reassembled the board onto the faulty drive and inserted the drive into my PC Caddy. When I powered up the PC, the Bios recognised
the drive as a Western Digital and the PC booted up normally. Opening Windows Explorer I saw the drive. I made a new folder on another drive, highlighted all the files from the now fixed drive and dragged all the files to the new folder. The files started copying 80Gb of data and said it would take 70 minutes. It is currently copying the data. To all intents and purposes, the drive is now OK but I am copying it just in case my friend messes up again. The drive came from an external USB Caddy, with an external power supply, which must have surged. Now the new drive is no longer working as I have removed it's Circuit board and it is on the old faulty drive but it was a necessary 80 Pounds spent, getting it from ebay and shipping it from Germany to
the UK.

Removing the IC was not easy without the proper tools. The tools I used and the method I used was not the correct one. I have seen it done properly on the internet with a proper hot air gun and a solution called Quick Chip. I may have damaged the pads and circuit board of the donor board and would have been down 80 UK pounds, but all worked out. I also bought security screw driver, a new soldering iron (my old one died last year), and a magnifying glass with bulb. (I now wish I had bought one with a tube light as the bulb kept burning my hand, well made it very hot !!), dentist type tools and a pack of tweezers. Plus trying to find some time to sit down and fix the board.

Now that I know what is involved, and know where the problem lies, I would be more inclined to hagel with the Data Recovery company or some other company who specialises in soldering and has a rework station to exchange the chips. The cheapest data recovery I found in the UK, was 300 pounds.

Thank you Action Front and thanks especially to John and Dmitry of Action Front and the Guru. The internet has indeed been used for what it was intented; the exchange of information and helping ones fellow man.

Amit.

Hey Amit,
 
Thanks for your site and the ilnk to the ActionFront forums. I succeeded 
in repairing my drive (which didn't suffer the exact same symptoms as 
yours) by replacing U12.
 

Anyway, it was encouraging to read other peoples' success stories, thanks.
 
Sauce

From:
 Stephen Palmore
You may not know this sender.Mark as safe|Mark as junk
Sent:
21 July 2007 07:19:05
To: 

I want to thank you for the detailed photos, helps a lot and wish me luckkkkkkkkkk
 
 
Steve

From:
 Dan Houlihan 
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Sent:
11 June 2008 20:11:53
To: 
amitvirdi@hotmail.com
I am in the beginning stages of recovering a WD2500JB, looks like the same blown controller chip, 
but have yet to get it in my hands to verify.
 
Good info, thanks again.
 
Dan

To: amitvirdi@hotmail.com
Subject: Thank you for your help!
Date: Thu, 16 Sep 2010 17:26:59 +0200

Hey!
 
I read your description of repair a Western Digital Hard Drive. I've got the same drive, with exactly the 
same problem! So I followed your description an bought a new hard drive, replace the old PCB with ne new one. 
It doesn't work. So I changed the R12 firmware chip with an air gun, and now it works!
 
Thank you very mutch. That was a nice work. 
 
 
Thankfull,
 
Carsten from Germany