Portable drives · head fault · ADR-2025-3185
He Had Read His Own Drive Correctly.
The man’s phone description of the drive was much better than many. He said that his Toshiba 2TB, which is approximately one to two years old, had started making clicking noises
and that both his PC and Xbox would no longer recognise the drive. That did not stop him. In addition to this, the LED lights up
, he said, and he could hear/feel the spindle turning
; however, with a hand flat against the side of the case he could feel the head rapidly clicking back and forth, as if it cant read
. Then came the number that matters: 1.9TB on it alone.
Same story on yours? Tell us what it does — the look is free.
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What failed, and why.
There are two systems that have to work together in this case and only one of them was still operating. The motor was bringing the platter(s) up to spinning speed, which is what he could feel through the enclosure. We do know the heads failed. They sweep past the disk surface looking for the servo track pattern which identifies their location relative to the disk surface, they don't find it and reset and repeat. Since there was never sufficient progress made by this drive to identify itself to a computer, both the Xbox and the PC said the same thing. This also explains why turning it back on again is the one thing to avoid, since every sweep carries the failing heads over the very disk surfaces that the 1.9TB of data is written on.
What the bench did with it.
The order of the job →| Equipment used | Its work on this job | The reason for it |
|---|---|---|
| DeepSpar Disk Imager 4 | Each surface was imaged individually after replacement heads were installed and properly aligned. | Mapped the heads first, then imaged one face of a platter per pass, with every reset, timeout and the power itself kept under our own control |
| PC-3000 Data Extractor | Determine how to read data off the disk: perform all forward reads first, then hold any reluctant areas back to the end. | Instead of working around the drive's firmware and controller, it works with the two natively |
| ACE Lab PC-3000 Express | After making this change, the drive came up past the USB bridge and identified itself to us. | This allows access to the manufacturer's service area (where normal ATA commands cannot go) |
What the bench did with it.
The magnifier settles it, not the ear
Checked under magnification, his reading of it held up: the heads had failed; however, the surfaces of the disks themselves remained intact. The tracks on each disk showed no damage caused by the sliding heads, which is good news for a drive of this age (it's what you hope for, but never assume). All other parts of the mechanical system were functioning normally, with the exception of the heads. The spindle was running smoothly and quietly, and thus the whole problem lay within the head assembly stack above it.
A matched head set, and the alignment with it
No head gets repaired. No heads get "straightened". The flying height of each head is determined at time of manufacturing in nanometres; therefore, the only option is a head set from a corresponding family and firmware generation, installed with an appropriate alignment setting established on the bench as opposed to by chance. It powered up after being installed, it ran through the normal boot process, reported its model number string and remained there. Only then did a single sector read follow.
One run, and the sound ground read first
Imaging began as soon as the drive was able to read and continued until a complete copy was produced, because once a mechanical system has been repaired, it typically works at its best on its initial usage cycle and rarely if ever works as well thereafter. All solid ground passed at full rate. Whatever resistance was encountered was noted, simply "stepped over" and given short passes right at the end.
What went home.
The completed image was whole, therefore anything that occurred afterwards took place against the copied version of the original and not against the drive. The folders returned under their original names, and files were viewed and accessed here prior to being transferred. What went home was the 1.9TB of data he had been counting on, successfully recovered onto new media. Rather than sending the drive back into service with someone else's head assemblies attached, we elected to keep it instead. A drive containing someone else's head assemblies is merely one step in a recovery operation, not a viable candidate for continued use. The charge followed our published single-drive band of £300 + VAT, which was quoted to him in writing while the drive was still unopened.
Begin here if yours is doing the same thing.
Further portable-drive jobs, written up.
Yours doing something similar? Power it down first.
Published prices are fixed. Memory cards and USB sticks are £250 + VAT. Any stand-alone drive is £300 + VAT. Drive configurations containing multiple disks (RAID, NAS or server) start at £500 + VAT. First assessments are always complimentary. Thereafter, data recovery charges are also fixed in advance and in writing, so you'll always know how much you owe before paying any money. Shut it down, get a quote first (by phone or with the form), then send it in or drop it off at our Guildford intake laboratory, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm (no appointment needed). On most jobs you only pay if we recover your data.