Repairing Maxtor hard drive - possible to DIY?

[GS]

I have a pile of old drives from some P3's I have just retired, and am
going through them one by one to make sure there is no data on them I
need before I reformat them and give them away or use them to back
images etc. up to. I bought one of those inexpensive external drive bays
that hook up via USB as its a lot easier than constantly replacing
drives and rebooting, and it works quite well.

I have 2 Maxtor Drives, one 20GB and one 40GB - both of them make that
dreaded "clunking" sound when powered up, but after that it does sound
like they start to spin, but I'm not 100% sure. Anyway, the laptop I am
using to read them will not see these disks, not even in the disk
management module. I was wondering if its possible that there could be
something obvious I could see if I popped the cover off. I've got the
external drive bay taken apart so that the drive is just sitting on the
table, so it is in plain view when I power it up. Can the disk be run
with the cover off?

I have some photo's that I can't find that may be on one of these disks,
but there is nothing on them critical enough that I'd pay money to get
them recovered, so I really have nothing to lose, and I am curious about
taking them apart. Is there anything obvious to look for with the cover
off the drive?

thanks!

 

[Tim Phipps]

I have 2 Maxtor Drives, one 20GB and one 40GB - both of them make that
dreaded "clunking" sound when powered up, but after that it does sound
like they start to spin, but I'm not 100% sure. Anyway, the laptop I am
using to read them will not see these disks, not even in the disk
management module. I was wondering if its possible that there could be
something obvious I could see if I popped the cover off.

Don't go opening the drives up just yet. There were certain models of
Maxtor drives that had a firmware corruption problem. The firmware
would get corrupted and the system would no longer recognise the drive.
There is a freeware tool that can fix certain models available here.

http://www.salvationdata.com/hfr2.0_detail.htm

Please read the user manual - you will need to jumper the drive to 'safe
mode' otherwise the repair will not work. I would suggest that you
should connect the drives directly to a PC and not via a USB enclosure
as I'm not sure if the repair tool will work that way. I have used this
on a 20gb Maxtor drive I had a while ago and it seemed to work ok.

 

[GS]

Don't go opening the drives up just yet. There were certain models of
Maxtor drives that had a firmware corruption problem. The firmware
would get corrupted and the system would no longer recognise the drive.
There is a freeware tool that can fix certain models available here.

http://www.salvationdata.com/hfr2.0_detail.htm

Please read the user manual - you will need to jumper the drive to 'safe
mode' otherwise the repair will not work. I would suggest that you
should connect the drives directly to a PC and not via a USB enclosure
as I'm not sure if the repair tool will work that way. I have used this
on a 20gb Maxtor drive I had a while ago and it seemed to work ok.

thanks! I'll give that a whirl first! would that explain the "clunking"
though?

 

[Jeroni Paul]

The tool from Salvationdata mentioned before will fix the 20 Gb
models. I've a 40 Gb Maxtor that failed the same way and still found
no way to repair it. Tried everything I found in it.
Opening the disk will result in dust stuck between the head and disk
and there is nothing to repair there.

 

[James Sweet]

I have a pile of old drives from some P3's I have just retired, and am
going through them one by one to make sure there is no data on them I
need before I reformat them and give them away or use them to back
images etc. up to. I bought one of those inexpensive external drive bays
that hook up via USB as its a lot easier than constantly replacing
drives and rebooting, and it works quite well.

I have 2 Maxtor Drives, one 20GB and one 40GB - both of them make that
dreaded "clunking" sound when powered up, but after that it does sound
like they start to spin, but I'm not 100% sure. Anyway, the laptop I am
using to read them will not see these disks, not even in the disk
management module. I was wondering if its possible that there could be
something obvious I could see if I popped the cover off. I've got the
external drive bay taken apart so that the drive is just sitting on the
table, so it is in plain view when I power it up. Can the disk be run
with the cover off?

I have some photo's that I can't find that may be on one of these disks,
but there is nothing on them critical enough that I'd pay money to get
them recovered, so I really have nothing to lose, and I am curious about
taking them apart. Is there anything obvious to look for with the cover
off the drive?

thanks!

There's nothing you can repair inside the sealed compartment, there's
some cool magnets and bearings to salvage though.

 

[Tim Phipps]

thanks! I'll give that a whirl first! would that explain the "clunking"
though?

Hard to say without hearing it myself. The drive I had made an unusual
noise IIRC but not a loud clunking type of noise.

 

[[email protected]]

I have a pile of old drives from some P3's I have just retired, and am
going through them one by one to make sure there is no data on them I
need before I reformat them and give them away or use them to back
images etc. up to. I bought one of those inexpensive external drive bays
that hook up via USB as its a lot easier than constantly replacing
drives and rebooting, and it works quite well.

I have 2 Maxtor Drives, one 20GB and one 40GB - both of them make that
dreaded "clunking" sound when powered up, but after that it does sound
like they start to spin, but I'm not 100% sure. Anyway, the laptop I am
using to read them will not see these disks, not even in the disk
management module. I was wondering if its possible that there could be
something obvious I could see if I popped the cover off. I've got the
external drive bay taken apart so that the drive is just sitting on the
table, so it is in plain view when I power it up. Can the disk be run
with the cover off?

I have some photo's that I can't find that may be on one of these disks,
but there is nothing on them critical enough that I'd pay money to get
them recovered, so I really have nothing to lose, and I am curious about
taking them apart. Is there anything obvious to look for with the cover
off the drive?

thanks!

Youre having a problem with the controller, which is the uncovered
pcb. The sealed up bit is the drive machanics, which
a) arent the problem
b) wont survive long once opened, as the average piece of house dust
will cause a head crash.


NT

 

[Dr. Anton T. Squeegee]

I have a pile of old drives from some P3's I have just retired, and am
going through them one by one to make sure there is no data on them I

management module. I was wondering if its possible that there could be
something obvious I could see if I popped the cover off. I've got the

Extremely unlikely. In fact, you will kill the drive for certain by
opening it. Removing the cover on any modern high-density/high-capacity
hard drive, outside of at least a Class 100 positive-pressure clean-
room, is a sure recipe for disaster.

external drive bay taken apart so that the drive is just sitting on the
table, so it is in plain view when I power it up. Can the disk be run
with the cover off?

Again: No. Definitely not. Not for more than half a minute or so,
anyway. There's a reason those drives are sealed so well. At the minimal
heights those heads fly at, a dust grain that you could barely see with
the unaided eye looks like a fifty-foot high boulder to the heads.

Of course, if you want to see the actual physical result of a head
crash, go right ahead and try operating a drive with the cover off.

Now, what you CAN try is swapping circuit boards between similar
drive models. You may or may not end up with a working unit.

Given that they're Maxtors, though, I'm not sure I'd bother in any
case.

Happy tweaking.

 

[cmdrdata]

<snippety>

You didn't say the drive size, but if they are 3.5" version, I suspect
that your laptop
USB port is not able to fully power the HD. USB port I believe can
only provide
5V/500mA max, and your drives may need more. I think 3.5" drives need
both
5VDC and 12 VDC.

On the noise issue, I've taken apart a 2.5" drive that no longer
worked, and with
the cover opened, while applying 5VDC to the power pins I can see the
head
moved into position trying to read data repeatedly for about 20 times,
then it
goes to "park" position. The disk, which has lost most of its magnetic
coating
continue to spin. As mentioned, this drive is toast, since the disk
itself no
longer has a magnetic coating in 90% of the surfaces.