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ElectroGeeza

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Everything posted by ElectroGeeza

  1. Or, as said two posts before, with "normal" Freeware 7-zip. jaclaz I was unsure if 7-Zip is able to open ISO files, and if it is able to open ISO files I was still unsure if it can show the hidden boot information. Therefore, I only linked to those software applications for which I know are able to show the boot information. I love Freeware, especially the good and well supported OSS software. But there are not many options available when it comes to virtual ROM emulators and the software that are able to open and edit image files like those Shareware and Proprietary softwares I listed above. Sure, you can use Daemon Tools as your ROM emulator, but the latest versions are divided into a payed Pro version and a free "Lite" version which by the way feels like bloatware. I am personally using Virtual Clone Drive right now as my favorite virtual ROM. It's freeware, and it includes no unwanted Addware. It doesn't have as many functions as Daemon Tools but it sure works for me. 7-Zip is not just free, it's OSS I think - that is free for real. But are you really sure it supports ISO files? I am personally not using 7-Zip for compressing and decompressing archive files. Instead, I use PeaZip. Are you following Gradius' guide? Did you place an insulating material between the 3-pin motor contacts and the PCB? I need to know how you have set up your hard disk drive and which recovery guide you are using, I need to know if it's Gradius' or Aviko's guide. I have used Aviko's guide. If you are using Gradius' guide you would have to place an insulating material between the 3-pin motor contacts and the PCB. But if you are using Aviko's guide you would have to place an insulating material between the 20-pin magnetic heads contacts and the PCB. I used the latter one, and that's the one I would recommend to you. It is supposed to give the same results but I think the latter approach is a more easy and safer method. Brad Garcia has written a more clean guide titled "Fixing a Seagate 7200.11 Hard Drive" at Google Sites where he uses Aviko's method. That's the method I have used. The only thing I did differently from Brad's instructions is that in addition to them I used the F712 and the F,,22 command as originally described by Aviko in Post # 513. So you could say that I actually used Aviko's guide. I printed out them both actually.
  2. Other users have reported the same thing, and I can confirm that as well. This is normal that you can't see anything else in that ISO file. If you look at the total size of that ISO file and compare it to those files you can find in it, you will understand that the total size for the ISO file is bigger then for the total size of those files you found in it. It's a simple thing you can do without any special software, and it shows that there are system files that you can not see in Windows Explorer or any other file manager software. However if you do want to see the whole content of the ISO file in Windows or other OS you will have to open it with the special software for it like ISO Buster, Power ISO, Magic ISO, or Ultra ISO. Anyway, you don't need to actually "see" the whole content of the ISO file to "believe" that they are there. Boy, this sounds like a religious thing. Just burn the **** ISO to a CD-R or CD-RW and you are ready to go. Never burned an ISO image file to a CD? Don't worry, it's easy. There are lot of CD/DVD authoring software out there that support it. Among others, Nero Burning ROM supports burning ISO files to disc. But if you don't have Nero that's fine too because there are a lot of free software you can use. I don't have Nero either. It's true that I am an old Nero user, but I don't use Nero anymore, I stopped using it like two years ago because it just feels too much of a bloatware now. For burning image files like ISO I use ImgBurn which is my favorite right now. It's really easy to use and works flawlessly, and at top of all it's freeware! I just burned the Firmware ISO for my Seagate Barracuda two days ago by using ImgBurn, and then I successfully upgraded the FW on it from version SD15 to SD1A. If you need any help burning the ISO to CD I can help, so please write your questions. If you do have Nero and feel more comfortable with using Nero instead, then you can find a short guide on Seagate's website on how to use Nero to burn an ISO file. The link to that Web page is located on the same page where you find the Firmware download link for your drive. I don't know how you missed it, it should be a link to it there. I think this is that link: http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/self...&NewLang=en If you need any help with the Firmware (FW) upgrade procedure I can help you, so please write your questions about that as well. On the same Web page where you download the Firmware ISO file, you can find another link which tells you how to upgrade the FW eventually, after burning the ISO of it to a CD. Here is that link: http://support.seagate.com/firmware/firmwa..._procedure.html The bottom line is... It's normal if you can't see all the files in the ISO file in your file manager. This is because it's a bootable CD. The Firmware ISO you have downloaded is not corrupted, so there is nothing to be worried or amazed about it. You just need to burn it to a CD. Please note that you have to use the appropriate "image file burning" functionality of your CD authoring software, so you can't just drag and drop the file to a new CD compilation. You can in fact use DVD discs as well as CD, it shouldn't be a problem there. But I would stick to the original idea and use a CD, just in case. I had few CD-RW at home so I took one of them and burned the Firmware ISO file to it with ImgBurn. After you have the burned the Firmware ISO file to a CD successfully, you will need to boot from it. So put that CD (or DVD) into the computer on which you have connected the Barracuda disk drive, and power it on, or restart it if it's already on. If the CD doesn't load you may need to configure boot sequence order for your computer in BIOS. If you don't know how, let me know, I can help you with that. But before you do the FW upgrade, please make sure to disconnect all the other disk drives in the computer except for the ODD (CD-ROM) which you will use to read the CD and the Barracuda drive of course onto which you will load the new FW. If you have any questions please ask. I will do my best to answer it. As of Seagate and this disaster (not a minor problem), I have already said what I think about it in my previous posts so I won't spend any more of my time spitting at them. What frightens me now is that there are still disk drives in circulation on the market of this same disk drive family and Firmware version that have been affected by this problem (not all are affected). So you can still run into one of these bad drives today. Seagate didn't do any product draw backs even after realizing the problem. They still sell these bricks! That's even worse then the initial problem with the disk drives to begin with! Alright then, it's set now, I will continue to write it. Unlike Gradius I will be glad to hear your feedback on it so I can improve it. I really don't want to compete with Gradius, I just want to publish a complete and understandable guide which even those less technically minded could have use of. And I don't want it to be just "my" guide, I accept any body's contributions to it. I will publish it as a new thread here at MSFN as soon as possible. This is the least thing I can do to show my appreciation and to help others who are new to this problem and feel lost in the methods and approaches discussed in this thread. I'm sorry but I don't understand Spanish. I understand that you are using a DKU-5 data cable for Nokia cell phones. But you will need to give me some more details if I'm going to be of any help to you. Do you have a physical COM (RS232 - serial) port on your computer? If not, are you using a USB to RS232 converter cable? If so, did you install the drivers for it? What's the make and model of the USB to RS232 adapter cable? What version of Windows are you using? It you do have a physical COM (RS232) port on your computer, do you have only one? If you have several COM ports, did you try to connect the DKU-5 through the second or first COM port (you say you tried COM three)? Are you sure your cable is a DKU-5? It must be a CA-42 or DKU-5. If it's a DKU-2 or CA-53 or CA-70 it won't work. What happens if you connect the DKU-5 to a USB port? Does Windows tell you it's installing drivers or asks you to install drivers? The ISO image is a bootable one. Once you write it on a CD you can boot from it, and all the code which updates the firmware is in the bootable part which is invisible in Windows (or in any other OS), unless you use a specific application like WinISO or similar. The firmware update must be done at the lowest level possible of OS (read "good ol' DOS" ), thus the necessity to have a bootable CD image. Correct! The ISO image is a bootable one. Once you write it on a CD you can boot from it, and all the code which updates the firmware is in the bootable part which is invisible in Windows (or in any other OS), unless you use a specific application like WinISO or similar. The firmware update must be done at the lowest level possible of OS (read "good ol' DOS" ), thus the necessity to have a bootable CD image. hummm, interesting. I mounted the ISO but could only see 2 files (readme and the detectdrive.exe)... I'll try burning it then... Thanks! Did anyone experience problems with the firmware update? Possible data loss? What CD/DVD emulator are you using to mount the ISO? I'm just curious... You have to burn them! Even if you manage to see the "hidden" system files, you will still need to burn that ISO file to a CD in order to use it to upgrade the Firmware on your disk drive, just as I explained to you above. It's not like you can upgrade the Firmware from within Windows, and even if this was possible it would be so much more risky. I remember reading quite recently about Asus users who bricked their Asus motherboards when they tried to upgrade their BIOS version by using the BIOS upgrade utility software for Windows made by Asus. So for these types of applications like when upgrading Firmware or BIOS on your computer it's better to use DOS type of software at boot point. That's why Seagate is doing exactly that, so that's at least one good thing from Seagate's part. As I wrote above, I upgraded the Firmware on my Barracuda two days ago. I downloaded the Firmware ISO, and then burned it to a CD-RW by using ImgBurn. Then I powered off the computer and disconnected every other HDD and external peripheral devices except the affected Barracuda HDD, the ODD (CD-ROM) and the mouse and keyboard. Then I powered it on again, the Firmware upgrade utility loads, then I upgrade the firmware for my HDD. After upgrading the Firmware the new version is SD1A while the old one was SD15, so it's a successful upgrade. No data was affected by the upgrade. All thou I did backup the most important files from this HDD before upgrading the FW on it. Nice pictures! I specially like the one on top - HDD equal brick! You should have added the Seagate logo to the HDD.
  3. By the way... Is any of you guys interested in a new re-written recovery guide for this BSY (or LBA=0) error? I had started to write one on my own, but I stopped when I found Brad Garcia's guide because he had already taken many of my original ideas for it. But he's is much shorter then mine. I still have this 30 611 byte of text on the computer, and if anyone is interested I would try to finish it and publish it as a new thread here at MSFN. I have also documented every step of my own recovery work so I'm sure it could be a pretty nice guide with lots of pictures. I won't work on it if there is no interest for it thou. As someone already noted before me, it's interesting to see that this thread is still very active and people are reading it and posting new messages in it. I think that has to do mostly because of the "black cloud of confusion" as I recall referring to it in an previous post. There are many confusions surrounding this topic and this specific thread in particular. I would try to shed some light on those. I think it's senseless to continue on to post in this same thread. It's 60 pages for God sake! Who will ever read it in full? That's another reason why there are so many messages and posts in it. Well, tell me what you think about it.
  4. Grattis! Did you use Aviko's instruction set and method, or Gradius'? It depends on what instructions and method you are using. If you are following Gradius' method then you are supposed to insulate the 3-pin motor contacts from the PCB. If you are following Aviko's (originally Okzo's a.k.a Yura's) method then you are supposed to insulate the 20-pin heade contacts from the PCB. You should choose one method to follow, not a mix of these. I used Aviko's method and successfully recovered my Barracuda. I refused to use Gradius' method after reading the first 30 pages of this thread. I think Aviko's method is much easier and safer to use. Do you know which wire is RX and which is TX on the cable? Maybe these links can help. http://buffalo.nas-central.org/index.php/U...RM9_Linkstation http://pinouts.ru/CellularPhonesCables/nok...le_pinout.shtml It's not so important to connect TX to RX, and RX to TX. You won't destroy anything if you connect them as TX to TX and RX to RX, but you won't be able to do anything until you swap the two wires. So you don't have to worry about which is TX and which is RX. I don't think you have to worry about the Vcc (Common-collector voltage) and GND (ground) wires. The TTL circuit should be powered through the USB port of the computer to which you connect it. But you may need to connect the GND wire to the GND pin on the disk drive. They need to have common ground. I used a CR2032 button cell lithium battery of 3 Volt to power my Sparkfun TTL to RS232 adapter module, and I had to connect the GND on the adapter module to the disk drive so that they would have common ground. So I used different adapter, I didn't use the mobile phone cable like you, so therefore I'm not 100% sure. But I am pretty sure that the TTL circuitry in your cable will be powered from the USB port of the computer to which you connect it, and that you need to connect the GND from the cable to the GND on the disk drive. You mean the problem where the computer freezes for about 30 seconds? I have two ST3500320AS with SD15 FW One of them is was affected by the BSY error problem, the other is not affected at all. The affected drive locked into BSY state on first of April, and I have unlocked it by following Aviko's method and then I upgraded the FW on it. So, I did not have the problem you describe, but I did read about it on some tech new site. But I don't know of any solution for it, sorry. How much did you read of this thread? I have read the first 31 pages in full before I made the decision to follow Aviko's recovery method instead of Gradius' original. However, I have not seen anything about the problem you are having. Maybe someone has mentioned it in some post from page 31 in this thread and onwards, but you can be pretty sure that there is absolutely no mention of it in the first 31 pages of this thread. If you want you can continue reading from where I stopped, but I wouldn't expect to find anything specific on that problem in this thread since it's actually titled "The Solution for Seagate 7200.11 HDDs". So I would say that 80% of the users in this thread are having the BSY error, while remaining 20% are having the LBA=0 a.k.a 0 GB variation of it. What makes you think that setting the ERC timeout would solve the problem in first place? What makes you think it's even possible? You could try to contact Aviko and beg him to help you. He claims to work in a well known data recovery company in Poland, and he also claims to have worked with data recovery for the last 6 years. You can try to contact him by PM here at MSFN, or you could look up his MSN Messenger e-mail which he published in some previous post. I don't know if he has written the address in his User Profile, but he did write it in one of his posts on like page 15 or above. I don't have time to look it up. But I'm sure it's still there. He published the address for those who were having the BSY or LBA=0 error so that he could assist them over MSN Messenger. But I'm sure he wouldn't be bothered if you dropped him a slightly different question. All thou, I can't possibly know if he knows the answer or if he would tell you. Otherwise, if you are having 8 disk drives of this kind where each is 1.5 TB as you wrote on the Seagate forum then it sounds to me like a visit to data recovery company is the only choice for you. That is if you don't find a working solution any time soon that you can replicate several times on all your 8 drives. Why buy 1.5 TB disk drive models in first place? It seems little bit senseless to me. When it breaks down, it's more probable that you will loose all your data. A 500 GB disk drive is a too big capacity, not to mention those competing for numbers of Terrabytes they can squeeze into it. How do you even backup something so big with so much information on it? The answer is probably for most users that you don't, you expect for it to work. Then when it doesn't they cry. Backup onto what? It's not like you can buy a cheap 320 GB or 500 GB drive to backup a 1,5 TB = 1500 GB disk drive. That's why users here first order they replacement disk drives before attempting to recover the failed Barracuda. And those who say that data storage is cheap these days are wrong. Not all users have so much money that they can buy 2 - 5 of these drives of the same model just to make sure one of them works by setting up an RAID array, because that's exactly what you would have to do - buy 2 to 5 drive of same model and then set them up in an RAID array or make up some other complex storage system. The bigger the capacity, the more complex the drives will get, and the more complex they are, the more they are prone to error and failure. Ironically, the traditional diskettes are probably the most failsafe data carrier today. At last, the golden rule of computing is backup! Congratulations! I see you don't really need help, but I answered your previous questions anyway. Maybe someone else may have the same question. Yeah, it's totally irresponsible from Seagate's part. I followed the original "falling down" thread at Seagate's community forum, among other threads. First they didn't warn about the issues that these disk drives might have all thou there are several indications that they knew about it from beginning or very early in year 2008. Then they didn't answer to users' complains for a long time or not at all. Then they refused to acknowledge the problem. Then they acknowledged it. Then they published the new firmware version for affected disk drives, but refused to cover the data recovery and firmware upgrade fees for those users who's drives were already locked in BSY state and couldn't do the upgrade themselves. Then they said they would do the unlocking of these drives for free and upgrade the firmware, but I haven't seen not a single example of success story of this kind. Those users who sent their disk drives to Seagate with their precious data on it in hope that Seagate would repair it and send it back as is with data intact were very disappointed by getting a completely new replacement disk drive with no data on. Their data is probably gone for ever on that original drive, don't think Seagate is able to return it back to them. Those are probably slaughtered (disassembled) and the parts are re-used in new drives, and data destroyed. First time I chatted with Seagate US Technical Support, the guy told me to RMA the drive and that I would get a new one. If I wanted to keep my data I would have to contact an DR (data recovery) firm, so he suggested their own i365 (Seagate company). As of recovery fees and shipping charges I would have to take it all on my own expense. He didn't even give me at least a voucher so that I wouldn't have to pay the full price, or at least refund my shipping charges (shipping to US of A is not cheap). He didn't even seem aware of the nature of my problem. Second time I chatted with Seagate US Technical Support, the guy seemed at least aware of the nature of my problem and told me to contact i365 - UK department at +44(0)845 258 5500 to make some arrangements with them and that they would upgrade the firmware for me, free of charges. What about my data I asked. He told me that data recovery was not included in the free firmware upgrade service. How the hell would they upgrade the f***ing firmware then if they don't want to risk the data?! I don't know. Still, shipment would not be refunded, but at least it would be cheaper then sending the drive over seas to the US. I never called that number since I found this thread. The third time I chatted with Seagate Brazil Technical Support, the guy was trying to convince me that the reason for the failure of my disk drive was due to a computer virus. ROFLOL! A good one! He wouldn't even pay attention to what I asked him. Instead he was making confusions, mostly to himself, by asking me irrelevant questions like how I managed to log on to their support system twice simultaneously. I should have told him I'm a Black Hat to scare the s*** out of him! But since I'm not, by definitions I'm probably a White Hat, I explained it to him. And then we got on to the real question, which he barely answered. I wanted to ask those clowns what they are doing to prevent this from happening in the future. At some point of ending the conversion he just cut me off the line and ended the session. If anyone is a Black Hat, it's Seagate! Those are the real bad guys! First they drug you, then they take your money, and then they finally f*** you up! But you would only realize that the morning after. Then you sue them for sexual abuse, but they won't admit it of course. And then they go free and decide to take revenge on you so they send you to their friends at i365 to gang bang you and f*** you up even more, so much that you won't remember it this time! I guess you can tell how much I hate them now. This is exactly what they did to us, literally speaking. I just hope not many of us went to the i365 corner looking for help! I don't think I will ever in my lifespan buy a Seagate disk drive again. It would be reckless. It is said that you should never let the same snake bit you twice. If you do, then it's probably because you're stupid. I don't think thou that we have so many more options to go with, except for WD and Samsung. The major reason why I chose Seagate for this build was because I had great experience with Maxtor drives, and since Seagate acquired Maxtor I thought their drives would be just as good. Now we see that's not true, both Seagate's own disk drive family Barracuda and the Maxtor family are having the same problems. I think I will go with WD next time. We must support WD and Samsung! So all of you who had this experience please stop buying Seagate disk drives! If you continue to buy Seagate drives, you will only make them stronger and they may even buy their only major competitor, namely WD! Then we won't have any choice but to buy Seagate drives in the future, regardless of how bad they may be. They may sell you a peace of poo-poo, and you will still have to buy it no matter what you think about having to pay for their poo-poo, because you won't have an option. I have spent 716 SEK (~64 EUR or 83 USD) on parts, materials and tools for recovering my disk drive. But to me, it was worth it. I don't think I would have gotten away cheaper if I had went to a professional DR company, it would probably be at least eight times the price, in best case.
  5. Just my 2c - I've read a few posts that have pointed out that that Brad's guide is missing a crucial step. In his guide he writes: ********** And do a S.M.A.R.T. erase (create S.M.A.R.T. sector): F3 1>N1 (enter) Finally, do partition regeneration: F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 (enter) *********** According to Gradiss' post, you MUST turn off the hard drive prior to the partition regeneration step and that this is a crucial step. For me, I followed Gradius' guide and unbricked my drive....if I'm wrong in this, please feel free to jump in and correct me. The only thing missing in Brad Garcia's guide which I noticed the first time I read it lies in exactly that command text you just quoted. The missing part in it is that you have to send the / or the /T command in order to access the T Level. Otherwise, there's no error in Brad Garcia's guide. It's totally bulletproof! In fact, I can confirm that it really works, because I took all the "risks" as you guys describe it, and I followed his guide. Actually I knew in first place it wasn't any big risk to follow Brad Garcia's guide because I knew he used Aviko's instruction set, and I trust Aviko's judgment since other users have reported to have recovered their drives using his instructions and method. I refused to use Gradius' instructions and method after reading about all the risks and flaws in it, so I followed the Aviko's (originally Okzo's a.k.a Yura's) instructions and method as described by Brad Garcia and Aviko. And you know what? I successfully recovered my Barracuda drive! The drive is by the way a 500 GB, ST3500320AS with SD15 FW. I have two of these, but the other one is not listed as affected and has no problem so I won't upgrade the FW on that one, at least not yet. The only exception that Brad Garcia made from the Aviko's "complete solution" is that he didn't use the F712 nor the F,,22 command in his guide. Otherwise it's the same thing. However, I personally did use those two commands for my ST3500320AS. As I understand it, the F712 is only to be used for this model, if you have other model you should be able to use the F command without any number after it, and then the F,,22 as usual. When and why you should use these? I won't bother explaining it to you since Aviko already has, so find out in Aviko's "complete solution". You can find Aviko's solution in Post # 513. He doesn't describe these particular commands in detail in that post, but he does describe it in his posts before that, you only need to read like I did. The only reason I link to this # 513 post is to make it at least little easy on you so you can compare Aviko's full and complete solution with Brad Garcia's guide. That's supposed to be Aviko's most complete and official solution, in his own opinion, and that's the imortant part in this story. For other details, I think you really should read this thread at least up to page 30 or so. It's Gradius, not Gratis. By the way, "gratis" means free in Swedish, as in free of charge. Yes, so I noticed. I think he removed the pictures while I was reading through the thread from the first post to the last (I originally intended to read the whole thread, but ended up reading the first 31 pages). I think I was like at page 25 when I noticed that Gradius' pictures had disappear when I was referring to the first post while reading. How is this possible? At the moment when I arrived to this thread on MSFN for the first time, I was curious and wondered if the pictures I found in Gradius' first post were hosted by MSFN or if they were hosted by some external website. I wondered because I like forums that allow users to upload pictures right to it without using other hosting websites. To find out, I right-clicked on each picture on Gradius' first post and chose Properties in order to see the host server address. What I found out is that Gradius was using some server from Brazil to host his pictures. Sorry, I can't remember the whole domain name, but it did have the top level domain (CCTLD) BR at the end which if I'm not mistaken is the CCTLD for Brazil. It was this website I have never ever heard of. I know of free file hosting services like ImageHost.org, ImageShack.us, Megaupload.com and Rapidshare.com. But this was something totally different, probably a private website. Believe it or not, I remember wondering for how long these pictures would be up, and whether or not I should download them to my own computer just in case they disappear. I wondered because I know from experience from using free file hosting services that there are usually rules about for how long the file is up and when it will be taken down automatically. For some of these services that's half a year, for some a whole year, and that's mostly why ImageShack is my favorite free file hosting service because they are the most generous with uptime. Unfortunately I didn't download those pictures that Gradius uploaded, otherwise I could have re-uploaded them now to ImageShack. Now I feel bad for not downloading them. I just didn't expect them to disappear so soon, otherwise I would have downloaded them. But don't blame me, you people should have thought about it yourself. Not the Internet nor the Web is an infinite and failsafe resource as people have come to think of it today. The electric power is not an infinite and failsafe resource, then how could the Web be that? One power outlet and you're out of the game and out of the business. That's why paper and written text still rules as king of all information! So what happened to those pictures? Well, as I described above there are these free file hosting services available which would normally delete the pictures (or other file types) after a certain period of time. That's one theory what could have happened to those pictures Gradius uploaded. The second theory is that they were uploaded on Gradius' personal website (registered with BR CCTLD) and that it is Gradius who took down the link to them or removed the pictures. Why would he do that you ask? Well, after reading all the complains about his "method" of recovering Barracuda 7200.11 drives and after he was attacked by others for removing the credits to the original sources of this recovery information, Gradius probably got p***ed off so he layd his anger on us who desperately need this information and who least deserve to be p***ed at. If there is someone he should be p***ed on it should be Aviko, and Yura's Friend who were most accusing and attacking him all the time and who probably initially registered here at MSFN to express their anger at Gradius for stealing their information and techniques and calling it his, and for removing the credits to the original sources (them - Aviko, Okzo, Yura, and some other). And they are absolutely right about it!!! Gradius is an as***** for taking other peoples effort and information and calling it his own with little or none re-work and addition to it! As Wilson Mizner once said "copy from one, it's plagiarism; copy from two, it's research". Gradius didn't copy from two, he just copied from the first best source, without even understanding the language of the original author. He just used Google Translate or similar Web service to translate the original text. Even if he did copy from two and made a mix of it, it's still not research. As someone noted before me, Gradius is a compiler, not a translator, nor a researcher. And even if it is to be called research, it still isn't fair play not to refer and give credit to the original sources (the above mentioned). Now Gradius has shown he's real face and proved it to us that what kind of as***** he is by deleting the links to the pictures or the pictures. Period. If Gradius has his own personal website on which he originally uploaded the pictures, he may have run out of money so that he was not able to pay the hosting fees. I say this because I think he once mentioned something about having to pay for some Web related costs. But if this is true, it's still lame not to allow oneself to upload the **** pictures to a free file hosting service like ImageShack where it is FREE to host the pictures! So that's just not an excuse!! Or why not upload them here locally to MSFN? I think he wanted to keep the control over the pictures so that he could delete them like he did now, that's why he didn't upload them to ImageShack here nor to MSFN! I am sure he also wishes that no one ever found out that he had removed the credits to the original sources from his guide. First he removes the links and the credit to the original sources for this information. Now he removed the pictures. What's next? Will he remove the whole content of his guide, or maybe mess it up and write wrong commands so that we would destory our drives? You make up you're own mind about Gradius, I have already made up mine, and I know for sure that what he did is not right. Discrediting other peoples' efforts and then removing the pictures or neglecting to save them by uploading them to a free file hosting service is overshadowing Gradius' own original effort of compiling this information in one place (here at MSFN)! You can't possibly have trust in people who act like that, specially not in so crucial important situations as salvaging your data from the disk drive. So please guys, don't follow in his footprints! Please give credit to other peoples efforts and refer to your sources, we have learned these things in primary school. So stay true if you want to earn other peoples trust and full respect! Can the pictures be re-uploaded? Obviously not the original ones that Gradius posted, unless something hits Gradius to re-upload them. What I can do is upload the pictures I have taken from my own recovery process. But I didn't follow Gradius' recovery method, so if you're interested in seeing how I set up the hard disk drive for the recovery work then you will probably be disappointed because it is not in accordance with the method Gradius described. I followed Aviko's method. Which pin is TX and which is RX is not so important actually. You can't destroy anything by connecting TX to TX and RX to RX. So you don't have to worry much about which is which. If you can't get into the F3>T prompt then you can try swapping the TX and RX wires. So I would suggest you just try it out. I also had to do this, I had to swap the TX and RX because they were connected in wrong direction. After swapping them, I got to the prompt. Chris - You can have a look at Brad's site where he has a photo of the pins: http://sites.google.com/site/seagatefix/ Just keep in mind you should use Gradius' instructions, not Brad's as per my previous post, Brad doesn't have the step of restarting the HDD prior to the partition regeneration. Good luck with the fix! Why should he use Gradius' instructions and not Brad's or Aviko's? Because they don't include the power off and on the drive? That's just ridiculous! There is no need to power off and on the drive. If you would have had read this whole thread or at least up to page 30 you would understand why this is not important. In fact, powering off and then on the drive at this "crucial" step can make more damage then good!!! I would say like this. If you are following Gradius' recovery method, then maybe you should do the power off and on step. But If you are following Brad's (originally Aviko's and Okzo's a.k.a. Yura's) method then there is no need to power off and on. But you don't really need to follow Gradius' recovery method, I believe more in Aviko's method. I think it's much easier and safer to use. Please, please, please, do not swap PCB's! Ever! I also have two of ST3500320AS model Barracuda 7200.11 drives. One which is affected, and one which is not. But luckily enough, I wasn't stupid enough to swap the PCB's. I just followed Aviko's method and I got my drive recovered successfully. Why didn't you use Gradius' or Aviko's method? Ask Gradius, he was the one who uploaded them, and he is probably the one who deleted the links to them or the pictures. You can read more in my reply to Santropez on this above. Good link! Thanks! It has lot of pictures. Hehe, maybe just a little bit too many pictures. I wish thou I could understand the text as well.
  6. Since when is the Momentus on the list of affected drives? This Gradius' (originally Okzo's a.k.a Yura's) recovery method is intended for the Barracuda 7200.11 and various Maxtor disk drives. It was not intended to be used on Momentus disk drives. So I'm not so surprised it doesn't work for you on your disk drive. How did you manage to recover your disk drive then? Well, obviously not by using this method, you said it yourself. Why do you think your Momentus disk drive is stuck in the BSY state? What made you think that you could use this recovery method on your drive as well? Does it even have any of the symptoms described in this thread? What do you mean by "rebricked? Is it bricked again? Is it working now or not? What model is your Sony laptop? If you Momentus disk drive came in your Sony laptop, and it wasn't you who added it in it, then Sony should be able to help you better then this recovery method.
  7. Hi all! I just dropped in to report that I have successfully recovered my Barracuda from BSY state! B) I recovered it on monday (2009-04-20) at about 16:00 CET, and late at night at about 01:00 CET I successfully upgraded the FW on it as well. The operation was successful and the patient survived! It was a peace of cake! The only problem I had was that the TX/RX wires were flipped. That's mostly because different people say different things, some say that TX is to the right of RX and next to the SATA port, some say it's the opposite. But that really depends on the point of view. That's why some users call it "UART dyslexia", because there is a standard procedure in electronics which dictates how you should read out the marking on devices, and some people, specially the amateurs don't keep to it. Here is a funny quote that user called MotiveForce wrote as comment on the TTL to RS232 adapter from Sparkfun Electronics at their Website. So, I had to flip those TX and RX wires, like so many before me. Well except of that, I had no problem recovering the drive from BSY state. I will list the parts and methods I have used later.
  8. I also had the option to purchase the TTL-232R-3V3 adapter cable (from ELFA) manufactured by FTDI. But I chose to stick to the RS232 to TTL adapter "module" (from Electrokit) as described in this guide. It just happened to be the same brand (Sparkfun Electronics) as the one Gradius was using. But I have read that other users, in particular those from Sweden (Alexx among others), who used exactly the same adapter cable as you are using have managed to recover their HDD from the BSY state once they figured out how to wire it and set everything up. So, as far as the TTL adapter is concerned, your cable should work flawlessly, so there's no problem there. However, I am not able to enter command Z - Are you saying that you are not able to type in the Z command in the terminal software? Or are you not able to send the Z command to your HDD? Did you try to wait 30-60 seconds before typing or sending the Z command to the HDD? I remember that Aviko said to TechnoFreak to let 30-60 pass at this point. TechnoFreak was also having the same or similar error as you have. For details, see the link to post # 458 in the list above in my previous post. You have two 1 TB drives with the BSY error? Please try to follow the instructions. You are NOT supposed to remove the PCB completely. For example, according to Aviko, some newer HDD FW's require that the motor contacts of the HDD are connected or it will not allow you to enter the terminal. That's why Aviko pointed out that it's better to insulate the MHA contacts (20 pin) then the motor contacts (3 pin) as Gradius suggested. I think you are only supposed to remove the PCB completely if you're having trouble entering the terminal. If you are using Gradius' method to recover your HDD, then you are supposed to place an insulating material between the PCB and the HDA at the 3 pin contacts for the motor. If you are following Aviko's (originally Okzo's aka Yura's) method, then you are supposed to place an insulating material between the PCB and the HDA at the 20 pin contacts for the MHA (manetic heads assembly). The insulating material can be anything non-conductive, but plastics is not to be preferred since they can be statically charged so you should use some thick peace of paper (card stock or similar). I just came to think that you may actually have been confused with the whole HDD preparation process. I'll explain it to you in short. Gradius' recovery method (the OP who posted the first post in this thread) suggests ONLY removing one or two Torx screws near the 3 pin contacts for the motor, and then just sliding some insulating material there in between. However, I think that the original source for using this whole Barracuda 7200.11 recovery procedure said that you should REMOVE the PCB completely, and then place an insulator on the MHA contacts and then REPLACE the PCB. And that's the method (the Okzo's a.k.a Yura's method) that Aviko is referring to in this thread. So in other words, if you are removing the PCB, you are doing it in order to insulate the 20-pin MHA contacts from the HDA and then replacing it back with one or two screws slightly loose (to prevent contact). Gradius' method is a less intrusive one and I think he's aim with it was that he's whole HDD recovery process would be more easy to do even for those who are intimidated by removing a PCB or don't even know what it is. So, originally (Okzo's a.k.a Yura's method) you were actually supposed to remove the PCB, place an insulator, and replace the PCB back on the HDA with one or two screws loose. And then when you get the prompt in terminal, you were supposed to remove the insulator and fasten the screws. Do I have to remind you to use upper-case letter Z, and not lower-case z? I read before how some user used the small (lower-case) letter z instead of the big Z. Thankfully nothing happened because the HDD didn't react to it. But be aware of this! Also, you may want to refer to Brad Garcia's description in his own guide titled Fixing a Seagate 7200.11 Hard Drive at Google Sites, who is using Aviko's (originally Okzo's a.k.a Yura's) method. Here is a check-list of things you have to pay attention to. The TTL-232R-3V3 adapter cable by FTDI is just as good as the RS232 to TTL adapter "module" by Sparkfun Electronics. Try to wait 30-60 seconds before typing or sending the Z command to the HDD. Make sure you are typing in the upper-case letter Z, not the lower-case z. If you're afraid, then don't remove the PCB completely. In this case use Gradius' method of loosening one or two screw near the 3-pin motor contacts and slide in an insulating material in that area (make sure you slide it until you feel it hits an obstacle which is the sponge beneath the PCB). If you're not intimidated by removing the PCB completely, as you already have done this, make sure to place it back on once you have placed an insulating material on the 20-pin MHA contacts. The PCB needs to have connection with the 3-pin motor contacts! So, you either place the insulator on the 20-pin MHA contacts (involves removing AND replacing the PCB with motor contacts connected) OR you insulate the 3-pin motor contacts and leave the 20-pin MHA contacts connected. You have to chose only one method, so I don't think disconnecting them both by removing the PCB completely and powering it on that way will ever work. Hope that will help.
  9. If I can just get hold of a new FW version for this HDD, I will be officially ready to kick some Seagate Barracuda butt!!! I will try using Aviko's (originally Okzo's aka Yura's) method. As the French man wrote (can't remember the name), this method seems to me less disruptive. Apart of that, it seems to be much safer method too. Therefore I have decided to stick to Aviko's method. But I have few questions I need to ask just to be 100% sure of what I'm doing. The F3 T>i4,1,22 command at Level T is potentially dangerous for data and is not really needed? Erasing S.M.A.R.T with N1 command at Level 1 is only needed for BSY error and not for LBA=0 type of error? Is the m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 command the same as m0,2,2,,,,,22 at Level 1? It doesn't matter then which I use? Do I have to wait few seconds after pressing CTRL+Z or sending the Z command at Level 2? There is no no need to power the drive off and then on again before sending the m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 command at Level 1? The F712 command at Level T is only for testing purposes, and it does nothing with the my data? I don't really understand how to interpret the results from F712 command, can someone explain? Aviko tried to explain it to one user but I still don't understand what columns and values to look for. The F712 command at Level T is only for 500 GB Barracuda 7200.11 models? For other Barracuda 7200.11 models, the command should be F without any number? I think I understand why Aviko is writing a number 712 after the letter F. It makes it easy to see the test result values at line 712, that's why he was unsure if it's 712 for this drive family. There is something that should be listed on this 712th line, so you could probably send either the F or the F712 to make it easy to find it. But Aviko also at some point mentioned that it should be listed at line 716 (as he said before, he was unsure of the right line number). So you can probably use either F, or F712, or F716. If you feel unsure, just send F, and then you can look for values and columns between line 712 and 716. The F,,22 command at Level T is for restoring drive configuration to default settings when and if the F (or F712, or F716) command above shows negative results? When do I send the F (or F712, or F716) and F,,22 commands above? The command m0,1,1,0,0,0,0,22, or m0,1,1,2,2,0,0,22, or m0 2,2,0,0,0,0,22 should NOT be used under ANY circumstances, regardless of if you follow Aviko's method or Gradius' method? The post # 513 that I have linked to in the reference list below is supposed to illustrate Aviko's complete and official recovery method. Can anyone confirm that? I have compared it with the method that Brad Garcia described in his own guide titled Fixing a Seagate 7200.11 Hard Drive at Google Sites and it does seem as he is using Aviko's (originally Okzo's a.k.a Yura's) method. I wonder how many of you have followed Brad Garcias' guide to recover your HDD's, it really does seem to be much easier to follow then this messy guide Gradius posted (and the rest of this thread). However, Brad does recommend others reading this thread first. He also read this thread and then he decided to follow Aviko's instructions just like I will. I hope to hear from you guys before I continue with my recovery attempt. If there is anything else you would like to add or warn me about before proceeding, please let me know. Thanks in advance! Referrence: Seagate 7200.11 Hard Drive at Google Sites, by Brad Garcia Post # 439 Post # 441 Post # 457 Post # 458 Post # 466 Post # 469 Post # 474 Post # 475 Post # 477 Post # 507 Post # 513
  10. My HDD is an ST3500320AS with FW SD15. What FW version will I need for it? I read about some SD1A version. Is that the old ("fixed") bad one or the latest good one? Where exactly do I download it? I know about that Knowledge Base article (207931) at Seagate's website. But I am not so sure if the FW available there is the good and working one. Correct me if I'm wrong, but as I understand it Seagate have released two FW version since this SD15 vs. Barracuda 7200.11 disaster. One of them fixed the BSY and LBA=0 problem but brought up completely new problems because the software engineers very little time on them to release a solution so they didn't test the new FW properly. Then they released another one which solved it all. Am I right? So you understand my confusion? So, where can I download that latest and stable version? Do I have to upgrade FW in any special order, like from SD15 to SD1A, and then from SD1A to the "XXXX" version which is supposed to be the latest and stable one? (I am making a comparison here with BIOS upgrades as example, where it is usually wise to upgrade the BIOS version by version and not make too big jumps from one version to another. So, not like version F3 to F8, but rather upgrade like from version F3, to F4, to F5, to F6, to F7, to F8. You know what I mean?) After upgrading to the latest FW version, is it by any chance possible to go back to the original version? Not that I would like to go back to SD15, but just checking, just in case. Do I have to make the upgrade from a USB Flash drive (UFD) or is the Seagate proposed method with upgrading from CD okay? I've read here or in the firmware thread that some of you discussed how to upgrade from a UFD. I didn't understand really, why not just write the FW to the CD just like it says on Seagate's website? Is there a reason for not doing so? I mean I do have both a DVD/CD writer and a UFD, but I'm just trying to understand what's the cache here in using UFD instead of CD-ROM.
  11. Did any of you guys manage to upgrade the Firmware on your HDD after recovering it from the BSY state? Were you able to upgrade the Firmware without altering/affecting any of the data stored on the HDD? The reason why I ask this is because I don't have any extra HDD on which the data from the BSY Barracuda HDD will fit. I will order one as soon as possible, but I would rather not wait for it to arrive, I need to save the important data (not all is important) from this BSY Barracuda HDD right now.
  12. A terminal program converts your input on the keyboard into text that is shown in the terminal window and to "something" that is sent to the RS232 interface (directly or through the USB adapter). Basically a Serial port (RS232) sends the "something" through the TX cable (and can receive "something" from RX cable). The terminal program converts back the "something" it receives from the RX to text in the terminal window. The RS232to TTL converter converts "something" to "something else", both inbound and outbound. You do not need to know what is the "something" or what is the "something else". You type some text, possibly human readable one, say for example, "HELLO". HELLO is displayed on the terminal windows and converted to "something" sent to the RS232. If nothing is connected to the RS232 bus this "something" is lost forever. If a converter is connected to the RS232 this "something" is converted to "something else". If nothing is connected to the converter this "something else" is lost forever. If you connect the TX and RX of the RS232 port together, the "something" loops back, gets to the terminal and is translated back to "HELLO", which is displayed. If you connect the TX and RX of the TTL converter together, the "something else" loops back, gets to the RS232 RX, it is converted to "something" and then gets to the terminal and is translated back to "HELLO", which is displayed. In other words, a loopback test is the same no matter how long is the "chain" involved, you type some text and the same text should appear TWICE in the terminal window. Input: HELLO->terminal display: HELLO->sent to RS232 port->TX and RX together->loops back to RS232 RX->terminal display: HELLO With the TTL converter: Input: HELLO->terminal display: HELLO->sent to RS232 port->TTL Converter->TX and RX together->loops back to TTL Converter RX-> RS232 RX ->terminal display: HELLO If you have previously a USB adapter: Input: HELLO->terminal display: HELLO->sent to USB adapter->RS232 port->TX and RX together->loops back to RS232 RX->USB adapter->terminal display: HELLO or: Input: HELLO->terminal display: HELLO->sent to USB adapter->RS232 port->TTL Converter->TX and RX together->loops back to TTL Converter RX-> RS232 RX ->USB adapter->terminal display: HELLO of course, even if everything works well, if you input "garbage" like it is more difficult to understand if what you get back is the same "garbage" you sent. jaclaz Wow, that's deep man!! But what are you saying?... that "something" can become "something else" out of "nothing"?... or that everything can become "something" when you talk to someone who knows "nothing"? Just kidding! I do like long replies, especially when they are well written or are written in an most uncommon but innovative way! Well, anyway. I have it all figured out by now, and I was able to confirm that my RS232 to TTL transceiver is working properly. I got some help from our friends at Sparkfun Electronics forum. They told me I should try the Teraterm terminal emulator software application which turned out to be a pretty good one actually. I will quote myself here now as I wrote about Teraterm in a post over at Sparkfun Electronics forum. You can read my whole thread over at Sparkfun Electronics forum which is titled "Loopback testing RS232 to TTL transceiver".I am very thankful to those guys at Sparkfun Electronics forum. They are very helpful and very kind, even to a novice like myself. It makes it a pleasant place to hang out at. Thank you! Please don't feel now like you were useless Jaclaz! Like I said, I have almost read this thread wholly and completely and when you do that you can't help but notice few user names that bring up your attention. Some of them are very common and write often, some don't. Some have a bad attitude, some don't. Some are helpful, some are not. You Jaclaz may not be the most frequent writer in this thread but the actions you've taken in your attempts to help others can, should and definitely will echo in eternity! I see that you at least are trying to be of help, unlike many others, and you are always polite. I appreciate that, thank you! Note: Sorry about quoting your lengthy reply. Don't take it personal, I will try to quote on every reply I write since people here like so much to edit their original postings and then play dumb and say that they didn't say or write things they actually did. I really wish sometimes it wasn't possible to edit posts once published, just because of this. Since this is not a good thing for those truthful users, the only thing we can do is remember not to believe too much in those posts where it says "post edited" at the bottom, and for those of us who write new posts not to edit the post too much or rather not edit it at all. Or if you do edit your post, please motivate why you edited it. I'll go ahead and be the first one. The reason why I edited this post is because I was not allowed to have as many emoticons in it as I originally added so I then replaced one emoticon with another one since I couldn't keep the last two.
  13. Hey guys! I just got my RS232 - TTL adapter yesterday. I also got the USB - RS232 adapter cable which seems to be working properly after installing the driver for it (there is continuity and voltage between pin 5 and 3, and the listed device in Device Manager has no exclamation mark). Now, the next thing I would like to do is to perform a loopback test to verify that the RS2323 - TTL adapter works properly as well. Before you jump on me and telling me that my question has been answered already and that I should read from the beginning of the thread, I can inform you that I have read through exactly all the posts in the first half of this loooong thread (first 31 pages out of 60). So please, please do me a favor and either tell me how to do it or give me a direct link to the post which you think explains it well. Please, please, please don't tell me to read the whole f***ing thread, because, as I said, for one I have already ready half of it (which turned out to be more than enough), and for two I don't see any point in reading it any further when there is so much bulls***ting going on and off topic spin offs throughout the whole thread so I don't feel encouraged to read it anymore. I have read about doing the loopback test, and I got the link to the "How to Do a Serial Loopback Test" article in the NI Developer Zone that Jaclaz posted earlier in post # 385. But that article seem to be just too overwhelming and doesn't seem to be very relevant for this context. I mean in that article they are explaining how to do a loopback test with real serial ports (DE-9), it has no coverage on the TTL adapters we are using here, and we have already established early in this thread that attaching "pure" or "direct" RS232 cables to the disk drive won't work. So please, can someone tell me how to do a loopback test so that I can verify that my RS232 - TTL adapter works? It would be of great help. I understand that the TX and RX must be connected together on the TTL adapter. But how do I set it all up? How do I set up the terminal emulation software? What are the exact messages I need to send? People are talking about typing "random" characters and check that they can receive it. Is that really it? Is that all I have to type? No special commands needed for loopback testing? So I can just type "ffkjfnl fkj knj fjn fjao3ofpe n fkdfs bla bla bla bla" et cetera and see if I get the same in return? I would really appreciate some further explanation on the loopback testing part. Thanks in advance!
  14. Hi all! I just found a similar guide for fixing the BSY type of error on Barracuda 7200.11 written by Brad Garcia at Google Sites. I have read it through but I still have some questions about the instructions given there. I hope someone here can give me the answers or explanations to them. Here, I will copy and paste the instructions given at the above mentioned website. I will indicate a question by an boldface upper-case Q. Loosen or remove the PCB from the hard drive Place cardstock between the PCB and the contacts for the drive head. Leave the drive motor contacts in place. Q: I think the guide written by Guardian2 suggested placing something between the PCB and the motor contacts. Was that wrong? I have to place the cardstock between the PCB and the contacts for the drive head and not the motor contacts? Tighten the three screws closest to the motor contacts. Leave the other three screws loose or removed. Connect a power supply to the hard drive PCB, but do not yet turn it on. Q: What power supply? Can this be the power supply from the PC that's going to be running the terminal software? In other words, can I use only one computer for the whole repair work? Connect the RS232-to-TTL adapter to your computer's serial port. This is the computer you will be using as a terminal to communicate with the hard drive. Q: Can this be the serial port of the same computer that's going to power the hard disk drive? Connect the RS232-to-TTL adapter to the hard drive's jumper block. You will be connecting two wires: receive & transmit for the serial connection. Connect power to adapter - use +3.3v from the same power supply you will use to power the hard drive (orange wire is 3.3v, black is ground), or a 3V battery. If using a battery, connect the adapter's ground pin to the hard drive ground pin. You will need a terminal program. You can use Hyperterminal, which comes with Windows XP & earlier. I suggest using putty. Configure your terminal program to use the serial port with the following settings: Baud: 38400, Data Bits: 8, Stop Bits: 1, Parity: none, Flow Control: none Q: Can the terminal emulator program be running on the same computer that is going to power the hard disk drive and the RS232-to-TTL adapter? Turn on power to the RS232-to-TTL adapter and the hard drive. After a few seconds, Press CTRL+z. You should then see a prompt like this: F3 T> If not, swap TX & RX wires. Access Level 2 (type /2). Then spin down the (disconnected) motor. Q: What do you mean by disconnected motor? Should I place a cardstock between the motor contacts as well as the head contacts? It sounds to me like the motor is not supposed to be connected with the PCB at this point. Very carefully, remove the cardstock that you placed between the PCB and the drive head contacts. Carefully replace and tighten the 3 loose screws. I suggest using a small piece of masking tape to help you hold the screws while you put them back in place. Then start the motor (type U). Next go to Level 1 (type /1). And do a S.M.A.R.T. erase (create S.M.A.R.T. sector). Q: Gradius2 (OP) writes in the first post "Power OFF/ON the drive (very important!) Wait 10 seconds and now Power ON your drive. Press CTRL+Z on terminal and type[...]" at this point, before doing the partition regeneration. What does he mean by powering the drive off and on? Brad Garcia is not mentioning anything about this. Finally, do partition regeneration (F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 (enter)) Q: Do I have to do the partition regeneration at Level T or Level 1? If it's at Level T, then there is one instruction missing in the guide by Brad Garcia that would instruct the user to type /T to go back to T Level, and then type this to regenerate the partition. After 15-30 seconds, you should see something like: Max Wr Retries = 00, Max Rd Retries = 00, Max ECC T-Level = 14, Max Certify Rewrite Retries = 00C8 User Partition Format 10% complete, Zone 00, Pass 00, LBA 00004339, ErrCode 00000080, Elapsed Time 0 mins 05 secs User Partition Format Successful - Elapsed Time 0 mins 05 secs Do not turn off drive until you see this message. Once seen, drive can be turned off. Power down everything, place drive back into your computer, and confirm that it's working. Q: At what point am I supposed to test the RS232-to-TTL adapter? Q: The pictures that Gradius2 has posted are suggesting that the pins on the back of the hard disk drive are TX, and then RX (from left to right in the orientation where you have the SATA and power connectors on your right hand side). The picture that Brad Garcia has uploaded is suggesting the opposite where the RX comes first and then TX which is the closest to the SATA connector. Who is right, and who is wrong? Q: In post post # 101, Gradius has written "F3 T> <<< At this step you'll need to POWER OFF your HD for 10sec, and then POWER ON again. By power off, remove the SATA power (not PCB!)". What is he talking about? He said before that I shouldn't power off ANYTHING until I get the following message Max Wr Retries = 00, Max Rd Retries = 00, Max ECC T-Level = 14, Max Certify Rewrite Retries = 00C8 User Partition Format 10% complete, Zone 00, Pass 00, LBA 00004339, ErrCode 00000080, Elapsed Time 0 mins 05 secs User Partition Format Successful - Elapsed Time 0 mins 05 secs Here below, I'll mark he's exact words. So, I'll ask again, what is he talking about? He obviously contradicts himself here. It's no wonder that people don't fully understand this guide. Should I do it or should I not do it? Should I power off the HDD at this point or should I not? And how am I supposed to power it off? Just unplug the SATA power connector whilst the HDD is working? That doesn't sound right. He said "By power off, remove the SATA power (not PCB!)" so what else could that possibly mean then unplugging the SATA power connector while the HDD is still on? Shouldn't I power it off the normal and regular way, i.e. by powering off the computer which is providing power to the disk drive? (I mean the normal Windows start button -> shut down command.) Q: In the same post # 101, Gradius has written F3 T>m0,2,2,,,,,22 <<< This command takes a little over a minute to complete!. This supposedly applies to BSY error. For the LBA 0 error he writes that one should use F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 (enter). In the above mentioned guide written by Brad Garcia at Google Sites, he is suggesting to use the F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 command for the BSY error (which Guardian suggested using for LBA 0 error). So my question here is, should I use m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22 or m0,2,2,,,,,22 for BSY error? Q: In the same post # 101, Gradius has written "The wires was inverted to me and I didn't get nothing, so I just reverted and finally got a terminal answer". Doesn't that mean that Gradius was wrong and Brad Garcia was right on the question I asked above, as of which pin is TX and which is RX on the back of the HDD? The TX is the one that's closest to the SATA data and power connectors on the right hand side, right? Q: In post # 160, Gradius writes "Keep in mind, for BSY errors, you need to disconnect the Spin motor, or the drive will enter in that state (in around 2 secs) after it occurs you cannot enter anything, not even CTRL+Z". Do I have to isolate/disconnect the disk drive head contacts or the spin motor contacts from the PCB? Brad Garcia at Google Sites is writing that it's the head contacts I need to isolate from PCB. Anyone know for sure? If I, let's say, forget to isolate the motor contacts from the PCB and power it on like that. Would this mean that powering it on and entering the terminal software in this state will render the hard disk drive unaccessible permanently, or only temporarily until I isolate the motor contacts and retry again? I'm not a newbie at this, I'm a DIYer my self but this whole black cloud of confusion surrounding this topic is what scares me. So many people say so many different things and tell of different approaches to the problem. The guide written by Brad Garcia is probably the most well written one so far. I was actually planning on writing one comprehensive and understandable guide my self, I already had began writing it actually. But after reading the guide by Brad Garcia I may just skip it, since he has already written he's guide the way I like it and would have written mine. Thanks Brad, very well written, you read my mind! Thanks in advance!
  15. I couldn't agree more, this discussion is going a way off topic, and as such it doesn't help users much with the initial problem with the Seagate disk drives. I wouldn't say that it's totally unrelated, partitioning, formatting, changing disk geometry, checking for errors or any such task is absolutely related with hard disk drives. These are usually the software tools used for maintaining, administrating and or solving disk drive related problems. So it's not like we're discussing Diesel engines or Rocket science here, this discussion is absolutely related to this topic, but we've moved the focus a bit too far away from the initial problem of this topic. Could we go back to the original problem now? But before we do that, here is how I think we can summarize this spin-off discussion. Using disk partition manipulation utilities is a tricky business. I agree on that. The firmware of a device such as the hard disk drive (HDD) is a microcode which is stored on a reserved memory on a EEPROM, EPROM or PROM chip in the device itself, while the partition-information of a disk drive is stored on the disk platters. Therefore, changes made to the disk partitions can not affect the firmware. The statement that "what you did at software level carries NO CONSEQUENCES whatever at firmware one" does not hold true. I am assuming that what you were probably trying to say is what I said above - changes made to the disk partitions can not affect the firmware - but your expressed it in a wrong way. It's wrong because the use of computer software (software level or software layer) can and will have consequences for the firmware if designed so. For a relevant comparison, take the following in consideration. After the reports of bad firmware on the Barracuda family disk drives came in to Seagate, they have designed a new firmware or re-designed the bad firmware to address the problems in it. In order to allow the end-users to deploy the new firmware to their disk drives, Seagate have also designed a special software for making this possible, which, once executed, would re-program the ROM chip of the disk drive with the new firmware. If that's not a direct consequence of using software to manipulate firmware, then I don't know what is. But then again, using a partition manipulation software utility such as Acronis Disk Director or PartitionMagic will not or should not be expected to have this kind of consequences, but that's just logic or even common sense if you will, since it's not designed to perform such operation then it will not do it. So what I'm saying here is that it's not using "software" per say that don't have any consequence for a "firmware" of any device actually and not just HDDs, but it's using exactly that kind of software application - partition manipulation software utility, better known as "Logical volume management software" - that will not have or should be expected to have consequences/affect on the firmware since it's not their primary application or aim of use. Since computer software as such can and will have consequences for or affect on the firmware of a device if designed so (as explained above), then there is a potential risk that the software you use or misuse may lead to an unintentional affect or consequence on the firmware, even when the software is not originally designed to do such thing. This may happen out of several reasons, but there are at least there reasons that come to my mind. At first, this may happen because the software includes functionalities which the operator is not aware in combination with the operator not being educated enough for the use of that software, the second would be that the particular functionality in question which triggers the potential disaster is not documented in the documentation of the software, and the third would be that the software has a bug in it which the software designers were unaware of. It's most probable that it's exactly this third scenario that took place with those bad firmwares of the Seagate Barracuda disk drives. It's not the use or misuse of computer software, it's the bugs in these that are the most common reason for failure of the software, the firmware, and in some cases (like this Seagate Barracuda case) even the hardware, in modern day computer world. Common computer user, and even the ones who brag to be advanced users or experts in the field, don't always seem to grasp the complexity of a computer system. Just to illustrate it: modern day PC computers are pure super computers of the past two decades, and this gap is reducing as the technological advancements move forward. And yes, it's in accordance with, not the Murphy's but the Moore's law! Murphy's law is just a joke! "Moore's law is a violation of Murphy's law. Everything gets better and better." So people don't seem to grasp the power and the complexity of a PC computer which is by far the most common type of computer today, so common that it's synonymous with "computer". And when you have one of these babies at your hands, things are not going to be either black or white, so there is plenty of reasons to fear that the use of a Logical volume management software can directly or in-directly affect the firmware of a HDD. In the end, I don't think that one should be somehow afraid of this little monster. Users should be encouraged to widely use and experiment a lot with their computers. I'm sure that those of us who have had this problem with Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 disk drives, and who have solved the problem by following the instructions in this thread have felt great satisfaction for succeeding with this pursuit. That's how you learn things - by experimenting and experience - you experiment a lot, and those times when you fail or destroy something you learn from it and you take that with you as a great experience for the future. Any experiment comes with risks, so you should always be prepared for the worst, so having a reserve plan is not a question of if. The great lesson from this particular problem should be backup! Ease of use of computer software I don't agree with you Jaclaz on that a well designed software should have an "aggressive" interface as you put it. But I can somewhat agree on that it should be at least somewhat "smart" to warn you or inform you that the action you are about to take is risky or can disable other options and so on. I also like confirmation dialogs, that's should be an important feature of any well designed software, but it shouldn't be over-used of course. But these things may just be a matter of personal opinions and preference, but I have a strong feeling that (probably as a result of the reports I've read in the past) an simple and clean interface is to prefer and can scientifically be easier to prove to be more effective and easier to use. Usability of any tool or software interface in this case is first and far most defined by the level of complexity, and secondly by the ergonomic factors which don't apply much to computer software as to other designed objects. These aspects of computer software are subject of study actually in the field of HCI (Human-Computer-Interaction). There are plenty of studies on this subject you can read. As a last thing I want to say the following. The introduction of the graphical user interface is by far the biggest achievement on this matter, and no one can argue that command line interfaces are easier to use than the their graphical user interface counterparts. Command line may be faster, and thus more effective to use in some situations than the graphical ones, but they can never compete with graphical user interfaces when it comes to ease of use. Why do I even have to point this out to you??! Just look through this thread and you can read that several users who find the command line instructions of this tutorial difficult suggest that someone makes a small software application with a graphical interface that would perform the needed commands "behind the scene" so to speak without the user having to worry about using the correct command and in the correct way. If that's not at least a good indication if not a prove that users prefer simple and clean user interfaces, then I don't know what is.
  16. What?... what do you mean by serial port?... you mean the legacy serial port (SR232) or serial ATA port (S-ATA)? Actually it doesn't matter which one you mean, I don't think that's the way you're suppose to do it. You can't connect neither the SR232 nor the S-ATA directly to the RX and TX on the HDD, especially not the S-ATA. You have to connect the RX and TX of the HDD to a standard SR232 serial port on the PC, so that's correct, but you can't connect them "directly" they still have to pass through a TTL to/from SR232 adapter. I don't see you mentioning that you have this one, you just state that you connected it directly and that won't work. You may even damage your disk drive that way permanently. You need to have the SR232 to/from TTL adapter which is a crucial part of this whole assembly. When exactly do you connect S-ATA power?... before running the HyperTerminal?... I have not done this yet on my drive but as I understand it you will have to connect the TX and RX from the HDD to a SR232-TTL adapter first and then enter HyperTerminal and press CTRL+Z, before connecting the S-ATA (Molex 12V) power connector to the HDD. The problem is that you are not doing this the right way, I'm afraid. And if I'm not mistaken, you were supposed to un-screw one or two of the Torx 6 (T6) screws to release the PCB from the HDA housing and put an isolating material like plastic in-between in order to disconnect the disk motor from the PCB, before even connecting the TX and RX from the HDD to the RS232-TTL adapter and entering HyperTerminal, and pressing CTRL+Z. Then after pressing CTRL+Z, and getting the F3 T> prompt, and writing /2 to enter the Level 2, you would write Z and press Enter to slow down the motor. Then with the S-ATA power connected you would remove the plastic (or other) isolator between the PCB and HDA to make contact with the motor and screw the PCB back in place, and then speed up the motor by writing U and pressing Enter. Also, did you make sure you have powered the SR232-TTL adaptor? You have to power this one as well, preferably with a CR2032 battery. It won't work otherwise. I'm not 100% sure about the whole procedure... yet... and I have not done this yet on my own disk drive. If I understand it correctly you need to write Z at Level2 "to slow down the motor" even thou the motor isn't actually running yet since the S-ATA (Molex 12V) power connector isn't connected yet. The purpose of this step or instruction I think is to preparing the HDD motor for a slow or easy start, so that when you do connect the S-ATA (Molex 12V) power connector to power the motor it won't start at a high speed. Then after connecting the power to it, you speed it up with the U command. Could anyone verify this? Am I giving out false information?... I would have use of it as well, so don't hasitate to verify these claims or correct me if I'm wrong. Thanks in advance!
  17. The 9QM04FVK is the system disk on this PC system, and according to Seagate's serial check utility it's not one of the affected drives even thou it does have the SD15 firmware. What this means is that on this disk drive resides the SD15 which is the bad firmware, but this drive has probably not gone through the bad testing process which in turn means that the bug in the SD15 firmware won't ever be exhibited thanks to the correct testing process. But this still doesn't change the fact that the bad firmware resides on this drive. Since 9QM04FVK is the system disk, I am still able to load Windows with no problem. The 9QM5MAAN is the faulty disk here, and it's used only for storage, not for Windows. I have been using the 9QM04FVK as system disk for a long time now, and I'm sure it's OK. I have never had any difficulties with it ever, it works perfectly, and I think the Seagate serial check confirms that. But since I have had this bad experience with the 9QM5MAAN I am afraid that the system disk will give up on me as well. I must say that I didn't purchase these two disks at the same time, or even from the same store, so that would explain why one works perfectly and one is faulty. The probability for both of them working perfectly would seem very high if I had purchased them both from the same store. So I'm sure they both didn't came with the same shipment from the manufacturer, where one came from the healthy production line, while the other didn't have the same luck.
  18. NO , what I was trying to say is that YOU used IMPROPERLY Partition Magic (or Acronis) and thus messed up your partition: not a fault of the programs but of the use that was made of them AND not your fault as most people think that using such programs is easy (IT IS NOT, and can lead to partitioning corruption), and you were misled by the apparent easyness of use of them BUT the problem with the hard disk firmware is COMPLETELY UNRELATED to messing with partitions: not a fault of the programs AND not your fault BUT ONLY and EXCLUSIVELY by Seagate's fault by having a badly written firmware/test procedure/test machine in factory I was trying to reassure you that Partition Magic, Acronis and your misuse of them are absolutely NOT guilty of having damaged the hard disk, what you did at software level carries NO CONSEQUENCES whatever at firmware one. You are COMPLETELY innocent! jaclaz Well, thanks for clearing that out for me. I wouldn't either expect this kind of manipulations on software layer to have any impact on the firmware. But then I'm pretty sure that software is able to communicate with the firmware, and then the firmware can communicate with the hardware. So anything is possible, even the impossible. The possible is already done, it's the impossible that's interesting. I have only positive thoughts about the Acronis Disk Director, so I don't think it could have destroyed anything. If it can't fix something it won't destroy it either. It's the PartitionMagic that's the bad guy here. Magic???... haha, yeah, sure!! If you want to put it that way. If you by easiness of use mean the message I was getting when starting PartitionMagic for the first time, then I'm sure a smart software shouldn't behave this way prompting the user to take action on this matter if it's something critical by which the partition table may be destroyed. Instead of that, the software should let the more advanced user be able to perform these tasks by starting the operation manually once they enter the software. Or perhaps if the advanced user wants to be prompted with this kind of thing when starting the software like this, then he should be able to set that up in the settings, where the default setting is NOT to prompt these questions. That's the way I would have designed it at least. From my experience I know that the less settings and things you mess with in a software the least are the chances you destroy or mess up something badly, and some software are too intrusive (don't know a better word for it) by both having too many options available as default and asking too many questions and things like that. I'm sure it's appreciated by advanced users or users familiar with the particular software, but for a novice it's just too much.
  19. to which I may add: the problem was not due to the programs, but to the way they were used, but still it has no relation to the firmware problem that is originated by Seagate. A single PC is enough, as you can power the interface with a couple batteries or even, as well as the HD from the same Power Supply of the PC on which you are running Hyperterminal. Easier would be to borrow a PC, possibly a laptop, with XP (and Hyperterminal) to perform the reviviving. jaclaz I must admit, that's an interesting rhetorical device (metaphor or analogy?)! As I understand it you actually suggest that my firmware problem could be caused by the partition manipulation utilities like Acronis and PartitionMagic, rather then by the firmware bug originating from Seagate? I am not sure, but I sure have my doubts, but in that case I think that using the above mentioned utilities only speeded up the time before failure (MTBF=191 days???). So the CR2032 battery is for powering the SR232-TTL module/adaptor? I didn't completely understand the powering instructions, like when to power on, when to power off, and what to power by what power source. I understand that I can chose to either power the SR232-TTL module from the PSU of the PC, OR from the CR2032 battery. But when do I power the HDD with the 12V Molex connector? And what was that warning about practicing the step of removing the PCB before even attempting to do it? I don't get this part at all. Is he suggesting to interface with the drive BEFORE even powering it on? What is there to practice? Experimenting with sending different commands perhaps? Or is he talking about connecting the power to the PCB and then just being careful with putting it back to the HDA housing with the power connected? Why is it important to be careful? What do I have to avoid? Is he saying that I shouldn't power on the HDD with the PCB connected to the HDA? He was also saying something about seeing the LED errors in the terminal. Is that what the warning is about? That I can connect the drive with the PCB attached in order to see those LED errors in the terminal repeating, but if I do connect the HDD with the PCB attached that the LED errors would eventually stop repeating and the HDD would be permanently blocked? Then why do it? Just to see the LED errors?... What's a "Seagate side"? Does he mean to inverse the connection where RX from first device goes to TX on the other and TX of the first goes to RX? If that's what he means, then I understand it, but I'm curious if he means something else as well. Like I said, I don't understand this very good. I am hoping to understand it by the time I get all the parts. When I check the two of my ST3500320AS disk drives against Seagates serial check utility, it says that the system disk isn't affected and doesn't need any actions just like it says for your disk drive. I'm not sure whether or not I should upgrade the firmware on that drive anyway. I think there were some users at the Seagate forum reporting that their drives got locked even thou they were listed as not affected. Here you can see a screenshot: http://img4.imageshack.us/img4/2992/serialcheck2.jpg Does anyone here know if we should uppgrade the SD15 firmware even for the drives that are listed as not affected?
  20. Hi everyone! First of all, thanks a lot for this useful information! Even if I personally may not be able to or know how to follow this procedure in the end, I'm sure it will be sueful to a lot of people out there and that alone is a good reason for appreciation. Last year I assembled a new PC which uses two Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320A disk drives, both with SD15 firmware. One is a primary drive used as system disk, and the other is a secondary storage only drive. The primary drive has serial 9QM04FVK, and the secondary has serial 9QM5MAAN. I've taken the serials off the label on the drive itself, since I can't access them both from within the PC. The most complete story of the Barracuda 7200.11 - with serial 9QM5MAAN The secondary drive has stopped working properly on 31 March 2009. I bought it on 11 September 2008, so it has served me for about 191 days (or 5 months and 12 days) since installation. I've had some trouble with this drive before, like once when one or two partitions disappeard. They were not visible in Windows Explorer, but the drive was detected in BIOS as usual and one of the partition was even visible but not the remaining two if I can remember. If I can remember those errors were a result of my own mess, because I once experienced difficulties expanding one of the partitions from 20 GB to like 25 GB in Windows Logical Disk Manager utility, it said something about not being able to expand the chosen volume/partition because the version of Windows Vista I was using doesn't support dynamic disks. I am using Vista Home Premium and it's true that it doesn't feature the "dynamic disk" thing, but that's OK, I don't need that. I have been using this Windows disk manager ever since Windows XP, at least, and I have been using it several times without an issue in my Vista to both expanded and reduce disk volumes/partitions. I did nothing unusual this time, just right-clicked on the disk volume and chose the option to expand it, and I ofcourse made sure there was disk space available and un-allocated to grab space from. But it attempted to make it a dynamic disk for some wierd reason, obviously, since it returned that error talking about "dynamic disks" and s*** which I didn't even ask for or chose to do. I think it was trying to convert a "standard" disk to a "dynamic" one. Vista Home Premium doesn't support that, so naturally it failed. But the most stupid thing about it is that I didn't even ask to convert it to a dynamic disk!!!... So I heard that Partition Magic could do the job and I downloaded a copy to try it because I was recommended to use that one instead. Well, if I knew it wasn't supported by Vista I wouldn't, but now it was too late. At start-up it said it had found some error and asked me if I should let it try to fix it. Having in mind the problems I experienced with Vistas own disk utility I though it may have found something wrong, so I said yes. The message would look something like this. It asked the same question several times, at least 8 times, and I started to feel uncomfortable but I kept saying yes on all of them. At last the PartitionMagic interface showed up. I think it was version 8. I can't remember if it was immidiately after this that the partitions disappeared or later or after a system restart. But I strongly believe that they disappeared after these "corrections". I think it was after a restart I didn't find the two partitions, only the third. When I then started PartitionMagic again it didn't show those same messages, but instead it indicated the two partitions that were now invisible to Windows Explorer as "BAD". So they were visible in PartitionMagic but not in Windows Explorer. What a stupid peace of software, first it says it can fix an errorous disk drive, and then it says the same disk or partition on it is BAD!! PARTITION MAGIC SCREWED ME OVER!!! AND THEN IT LAUGHT IN MY FACE!!! Then I researched a little bit and found out that others have had the same or similar experience and that it wasn't even officially supported by Vista. The same guy who recommended me PartitionMagic then recommended me Acronis Disk Director, and I have been using that one instead ever since, without any issues. How did I fix the missing partitions? I heard from another guy about a open-source project called Testdisk, so downloaded it, and used it to rebuild the partition tables. That solved the whole problem with missing partitions. Now to expand the partition I wanted to from the beginning I used Acronis Disk Director and expanded it sucessfully. All was working well since that, but after installing what later turned out to be a bad, too old or non-compatible driver for the newly purchased and installed SATA RAID controller card with the VIA VT6421 controller chip, I have been facing some serious issues with this very same disk drive that was connected to it. It was still visible but unaccessible in Windows Explorer. After several days of researching and experimenting I found a way around to access the partitions on it. It turned out that inactivating UAC in Vista allowed me to access the partitions on the drive without any issues, and once UAC was active again it got unaccessible again. Weird! Also, when UAC was inactive and I logged on to my user account, I was getting a warning message saying something about the Recycle-bin on one of the partitions being damaged and asked me if I wanted to empty it. Once I chose to empty it I think I got rid of that message for good. But it's interesting, you will never be confronted with a message like that for a very long time, perhaps never ever if you're lucky. I let the UAC be off temporarily and was planning to backup the files from this disk drive and then re-format it, but it got totally unaccessible before I could do that. At the moment it hapened i was just viewing a PDF file in Adobe Acrobat Pro and I noticed a slow performance almost hanging the software, so I shut down Acrobat. Then I re-opened it again with no problem and countinued to read my PDF document. Later I noticed the partitions on that drive were missing, AGAIN! I re-started the PC in order for the BIOS to recognize it again, but that didn't happen. I was still able to log on to Windows thou since the system disk seemed OK. I was confused and didn't know what to do. Then I remembered reading about the firmware problems with Seagate Barracuda 7200.11. I started to read more about it and found out that the problem affected other models in this disk drive family and not only the 1 Terrabyte or 1.5 Terrabyte models like I thought it did. Jeeezzz!! :/ I checked the serials above against Seagates serial check utility and it showed that the system disk was not affected but the storage drive was among the affected ones. It was too late for me to upgrade the firmware on it since it was already locked in the BSY state. I have concluded that this is the case with my drive, because when it's connected the HDD LED stays lit all the time and BIOS doesn't recognize it. The BIOS does seem to be able to feel the presence of the drive on that IDE channel but it lists it as "None" on that second line at POST where it should say "ST3500320AS". It doesn't halt the system start time mutch, but it does take a bit longer for the BIOS than usual, like 10 seconds more than usual to go through the POST. I could have just read those first reports on Barracuda 7200.11 more throughly and found out that my disk drive was one of the affected models, I could almost feel this coming. But I chose to stick with the motto "don't fix it if it's not broken" and now I have to deal with it the hard way. I've learned that prevention is just as important if not even more important than fixing problems. About this thread I have read the WHOLE thread of 19 pages at Seagate forum started by user Inviste. And I have read very much of the second thread here at MSFN forum which picks up where the first thread at Seagate forum left off. Since the Mods there have closed the thread it took me a while to find the solution that Fatlip was on to. I believe that this is it, rigth? Is it the official one? Or did he post the solution at some other place first, like at HDD Guru? I won't even bother commenting on Seagates behaviour towards their customers, and the Mods deleting and editing and finally closing the thread at the forum over there on their website. I see that this one is not started by Fatlip, but it's a good one. It could have been written better thou, and by that I don't mean the somewhat bad english, I mean the disposition of the text, the linking to the adapters and other parts needed for this project. I find it all a bit confusing. I appreciate the effort and all that, and thank you Gradius2 for that! I'm just being honest. If you would like to get any suggestions on how it could be improved, I'll be glad to help out. When or if I manage to bring my disk back to life, I'll understand better how this tutorial could be improved. I think Fatlip has suggested that he or his friend would be filming the whole procedure, but I haven't seen it yet. That could be a way to deal with it, but I personally prefer textual tutorials with lots of graphics and pictures for guidance. Pictures is something I've been missing in this tutorial, I see that Gradius2 has added more pictures when he got his parts delivered, but I'm still missing the step by step kind of instructions accompanied with i.e. screenshots of the actual terminal window. About this firmware problem I've chatted with Thomas M. at Seagate tech support about this problem few days ago and he told me to call Seagate company i365 at their facility in UK and make some arrangements, he said they would help me. He said they won't help with free data recovery, but with free firmware update on their expense, I would only pay the postage fee. I don't know exactly what he meant, but it sounded like he was saying that the guys there would unlock the drive if it's already in locked in the BSY state and then upgrade the firmware. What do you guys know about this? About this recovery method The hardware Do I need to have access to two computers at the same time? If I understand it correctly I need to supply the HDD with power from the PSU of one PC (12V Molex connector) and I need another PC to interface with the HDD. Is that correct? I have replaced the Nokia CA-53 data cable that followed with my Nokia N73 with a new one because the old one didn't work properly after some time of use (glitchy Pop-Port connector). Could I use that old CA-53 cable for this purpose? I see some users mentioning the use of a CA-42, but could I use CA-53 as well? Does that one also include the RS232/TTL transceiver in it like the CA-42? My PC doesn't have any Serial Port, only USB ports. Do I have to use strictly a USB-RS232-TTL adapter or can I use a USB-RS232 adapter cable in combination with a RS232-TTL adapter? Since I was unable to find the most important thing - the TTL adapter - in local stores, I visited two online stores in Sweden - Electrokit, and ELFA - the second one being one of northern Europe's leading supplier of electronics. Here are my findings. I have posted them all so that other users from Sweden can find the stuff faster. I think Electrokit is the best equiped online store in Sweden for this kind of small scale electronics projects, otherwise for larger projects ELFA is probably the best store to go with. @ Electrokit Arduino USB extension (USB to TTL??) LilyPad USB link(USB to TTL??) RS232/TTL nivåomvandlare (level shifter, "Spark Fun" branded) USB-seriell omvandlare FT232RL USB-RS232 omvandlare för PC Kopplingstråd Mät och test kablage Kontakt PCB 2.54mm 4-pol Kontakt med kabel 4-pol 20 cm CR2032 batteri lithium 3V Batterihållare CR2016/2025/2032 plast @ ELFA The website is utilizing Javascripts for the product web pages, so I can't directlink to these. You need to visit their website for international customers at https://www1.elfa.se/elfa~ex_en/b2b/start.do and make a search for the stock number below to see the products. 73-206-58 FT232BL USB - Serial interface LQFP32 73-206-59 FT232RL USB - Serial interface SSOP28 73-206-60 FT232RQ USB - Serial interface QFN32 73-206-73 TTL-232R USB-TTL cable 5V I/O 73-206-74 TTL-232R-3V3 USB-TTL cable 3.3V I/O 25-164-09 USB-RS232 adaptor DB9m ELFA also has mounting wires, jumpers or similar testing or lab kind of products, button-cell batteries and sockets and even batteries for PCB mounting. So they basically have all the stuff found at Electrokit, but they don't seem to have any RS232 to TTL adapter modules like the one from Sprk Fun, they seem to have only kits which you have to build on your own. I would really appreciate some help with finding the parts. At least one of the online stores above (ELFA or Electrokit) should have most of the stuff, but I'm not absolutely sure what to look for and I rather not do any soldering work, especially not on the drive itself so I would prefer any method that doesn't involve soldering. So I'll appreciated any help finding the parts I need. The terminal software Do I have to use HyperTerminal or could I use some other terminal software? if I could use others as well, do you have any suggestions of which one? I am running Windows Vista. The HyperTerminal software that Microsoft licensed from Hilgraeve Software for Windows 2000 through XP is not included anymore in Windows Vista. I have visited the Hilgraeve website, but there it says that "HyperTerminal Private Edition version 7.0 is available for Windows Vista" but it also says that it's a "free 30 day trial". So it's not mutch of a free software after all, is it?! Have you guys been using the trial version for this project? I'm not so willing to use a trial version of a software for such an important and crucial operations. I can't imagine that you all have Windows XP with this software included, at least someone must have met this difficulty with Vista and perhaps used another software. Any free or free and open-source suggestions are welcome. I know there are plenty open-source projects of this type out there, but none that I've used before and have any knowledge from. This is surely something that could be mentioned in the tutorial, what other alternative software could be used instead of HyperTerminal, instead of just stating that you could use your favorite terminal software besides the HyperTerminal. The device driver What about the device driver for the USB-RS232 adaptor? Does Windows have any such drivers built in to it, or do I have to build my own, or find one on the Internet? Will this be an issue? I won't go into the details about the instructions for using the terminal software right now, this reply of mine has already gone wild and become a more lenghty one then I oricinally planned. So I'll just put a period here so you can catch up on what I've already written. Thanks in adance! And I want to specially thank Fatlip and Gradius2 for their efforts on this problem!
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