Jump to content

The Solution for Seagate 7200.11 HDDs


Recommended Posts

Quick recap:
1) if it is "LBA0", it is bricked
2) if it is "BUSY", it is bricked
3) if the BIOS sees it, possibly with its full capacity, then it is NOT bricked (anymore)

The state in which it is is definitely "NOT bricked", but this doesn't mean that there is not some other issue (hopefully a small corruption that can be sometimes - but not alwasy - fixed ).

See an example of success:

 

and one of failure:

In case, start a NEW thread asking for help to attempt recovering the partition(s) on the disk.

jaclaz

Edited by jaclaz
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Thanks for your answer, Jaclaz. BTW, it's somewhat funny to communicate in English... since we're both from Italy :rolleyes:

For the record, I ran TestDisk to check if the partition was corrupted, but there was definitely something wrong. After I chose the drive in the selection page, it took a LOT of time to open the next one (Partition Table). Then I checked one option after another, getting always the same answer: bad partition. Doing a QuickSearch caused the app to freeze after a few sectors (327680). Doesn't seem like a good sign to me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 months later...
  • 4 weeks later...

Hello,

My Seagate STAY2000102 (2TB) suddenly stopped working. On restart, I get a screen that says "ST_M13FQBL 04181241 S.M.A.R.T. Capable and Status BAD". Disk management shows the disk as 0 Disk 1 Unknown 3.86 GB Not Initialized. Please let me know if this hard drive could be rescued. If the exact same issue has been discussed already, please direct me to the page. Due to vision issue, I have to limit my reading, so I couldn't go through the pages on this topic.

Thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, NQ1 said:

Hello,

My Seagate STAY2000102 (2TB) suddenly stopped working. On restart, I get a screen that says "ST_M13FQBL 04181241 S.M.A.R.T. Capable and Status BAD". Disk management shows the disk as 0 Disk 1 Unknown 3.86 GB Not Initialized. Please let me know if this hard drive could be rescued. If the exact same issue has been discussed already, please direct me to the page. Due to vision issue, I have to limit my reading, so I couldn't go through the pages on this topic.

Thanks.

The answer is yes and no (and no :w00t: ),  the disk detected as 3.86 GB can be the common symptom of different issues.

So:

1) Yes (if it is one of the fixable ones)
2) No (if it is not one of the fixable ones)
3) and No, nothing that you can do yourself, besides the serial connection some specialized tools are needed and it is NOT an easy to do procedure, you have to ask a professional

Here is an example of a recovery:

but more often than not the issue is due to head(s) gone bad, which implies going to a reliable data recovery firm (with the appropriate tools and knowledge to perform platter/heads swap and recalibration).

A software only data recovery should be in the hundreds of dollars, if a platters/heads swap is needed you are likely crossing the border to thousands. :(

jaclaz

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Remembered one thing, My Seagate hard drive failed about 2 weeks after upgrading windows 10 to the 1903 version. That reminded me that in 2015, I lost 2 old hard drives shortly after upgrading to windows 10, all 3 made clicking noises before they died. Is it possible that windows upgrades did this? quick search online shows other people having similar problem.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, NQ1 said:

Remembered one thing, My Seagate hard drive failed about 2 weeks after upgrading windows 10 to the 1903 version. That reminded me that in 2015, I lost 2 old hard drives shortly after upgrading to windows 10, all 3 made clicking noises before they died. Is it possible that windows upgrades did this? quick search online shows other people having similar problem.

No, meaning that there is no "direct" link between an upgrade/update and a hard disk failing.

What may happen, in the case of a "huge" update/upgrade, could be that the hard disk works continuously for some time and heats up, but the same happens if you cause *any* "sustained" hard disk activity, like - say - a whole disk defrag (if the filesystem is seriously fragmented) or creating a whole disk or volume backup/image.

Not to say that definitely it in your cases they were coincidences, but they actually were coincidences. ;)

If the machine is the same where another 2 hard disk failed in 2015, you may want to check the temperatures the hard disks reach[1], as often there is a correlation between hard disk failures and their (high) operating temperatures, but again it is little more than a statistical correlation, hard disks largely tend to fail "suddenly" for "unknown" and "random" reasons (in 99.99% of the cases noone spends the huge amount of money needed to examone a failed disk, and even if the disk is actually examined to attempt to recover data, rarely the actual cause is investigated and a definite reason why found).

jaclaz

[1] in some cases adding a fan bringing some "fresh" air to the drives bays is a good idea

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

I am trying to fix a dead Seagate 7200.11 drive using Nokia CA-42 cable. The drive shows up as busy in MHDD, so I suspect the firmware bug is the issue.

Unfortunately, following the guides has not worked,, because the cable is different. It is not recognized by a computer without a phone connected. Using a VU all the cables show close to 0v. Further, the front end of the cable is covered and upon removing the covering material, no markings which pin is which.

I read the following post in a other forum, and I believe the cable colors are the same, so this solves part of the issue:

Quote

my "genuine" nokia CA-42 cable has VID&0421_PID&0802 and is instanteously recognized by nokia pc-suite as a CA-42 cable.


i bought a few of them for only €5.90 each s&h included. they have 5 colored wires + blank & shielding:
GROUND -> BLACK pin 8
RX -> BLUE pin 6
TX -> WHITE pin 7
VCC -> RED pin 4
i didn't connect yellow ( pin 3 ), blank and shielding.
i dissected one connector completely, and verified all connections. pin 3 will have meaning for a nokia phone, but not for our purposes

i put genuine between quotes, because i believe it is a 100% cheap chinese clone cable. i thought it was a defective cable too, until i connected it to a phone and discovered that this particular cable needed power from the phone. electronically that isn't bad. the voltage of the connected equipment is now always in balance with the level of the tx and rx levelshifter, so no danger of frying these ports.

i know people who also bought CA-42 cables in order to duplicate an other cable of me ( to my central heating boiler ) who also had to power the cable from the equipment instead of the usb connector, and they bought their cable from an other source and it looked different.

if your goal now is to determine whether your cable is defective, you can either find someone with a nokia phone, or apply 3V3 to pin 4 and ground to pin 8 ( in my cable they are protruding ) and look whether your cable becomes visible in devicemanager, or return it and buy a cheap one on the internet.

https://forum.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=539928

So the cable needs an additional power source.

Question: How do I connect the cables? Put + end of the 3.3V battery to pin 4, the minus end of the battery to ground, and ALSO the ground of the HDD to the minus end of the battery?

Question 2: Is the HyperTeriminal of windows 10 sufficient to complete the task? Using the terminal with no cable connected yet I am unable to write anything on the console.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Tony111 :),

it is like from day #1 of this comedy (drama), i.e. 2009 (i.e. more than 10 years) that EVERYWHERE it is written:

DO NOT use a Nokia C-42 cable UNLESS you know what you are doing , there are a zillion versions of real and fake CA-42 cables some working, some not, EVERYONE with differently coloured cable, in ANY CASE NEVER trust colours of the cables to identify.

The answer to question #1 is (and has always been):

DO NOT use a CA-42 cable, but rather a known, documented serial adapter, if you really-really have no ways to procure one AND have a (supposed) NOKIA CA-42 cable handy you need to identify the wires properly (and even if you do that properly, it doesn't mean i will work)

Please go (several times if needed) through:

and:

The ONLY proper method to identify cables is (was) here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20100223072633/http://buffalo.nas-central.org/wiki/Use_a_Nokia_Serial_Cable_on_an_ARM9_Linkstation

if you wish to follow this road, use that method (and that method only).

 

The answer to question #2 (which is present in BOTH the Read-Me-FIrst and in the FDA's linked to above and that you should already be familiar with, please check, double check anf triple check what is in there about "loopback", is:

It depends, no way to know.

Using an XP is known to be working.

Using a 7 (and Putty) is known to be working.

Using 10 may or may not work and Putty might be needed or it might be not.

jaclaz

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, jaclaz said:

Tony111 :),

it is like from day #1 of this comedy (drama), i.e. 2009 (i.e. more than 10 years) that EVERYWHERE it is written:

DO NOT use a Nokia C-42 cable UNLESS you know what you are doing , there are a zillion versions of real and fake CA-42 cables some working, some not, EVERYONE with differently coloured cable, in ANY CASE NEVER trust colours of the cables to identify.

The answer to question #1 is (and has always been):

DO NOT use a CA-42 cable, but rather a known, documented serial adapter, if you really-really have no ways to procure one AND have a (supposed) NOKIA CA-42 cable handy you need to identify the wires properly (and even if you do that properly, it doesn't mean i will work)

Please go (several times if needed) through:

and:

The ONLY proper method to identify cables is (was) here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20100223072633/http://buffalo.nas-central.org/wiki/Use_a_Nokia_Serial_Cable_on_an_ARM9_Linkstation

if you wish to follow this road, use that method (and that method only).

 

The answer to question #2 (which is present in BOTH the Read-Me-FIrst and in the FDA's linked to above and that you should already be familiar with, please check, double check anf triple check what is in there about "loopback", is:

It depends, no way to know.

Using an XP is known to be working.

Using a 7 (and Putty) is known to be working.

Using 10 may or may not work and Putty might be needed or it might be not.

jaclaz

 

Thank you jaclaz, great info.

Since I only have access to a Nokia cable, I am willing to at least try it. To quote the guide:
 

Quote

Ground - connect this to the wire that was connected to pin 8 of the Nokia pop port

+3.3v - connect this to the wire that was connected to pin 4 of the Nokia pop port

rxd (data into Linkstation) - connect this to the wire that was connected to pin 6 of the Nokia pop port

txd (data out of Linkstation) - connect this to the wire that was connected to pin 7 of the Nokia pop port



I am using a 3.3V battery for a power source. As I understand the linkstation has a 3.3V power source built-in., which the hard-drive has not.

So do I connect the ground of the cable and the hard drive, both to the minus end of the battery?

EDIT: I moved to XP machine, and got the Nokia CA-42 working with external power supply connected between the "VCC" and ground pin. Loop-back was successful. I am still wondering whether it is appropriate to connect the HDD ground and the ground from the cable to - of the same DIFFERENT power source than is powering the computer/USB/HDD.

Edited by Tony111
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, the READ-ME-FIRST:

has a part dedicated to grounding that more or less says:

Quote

GROUNDING:

Since, as seen above the actual 0's and 1's are obtained by a difference of voltage relative to 0V, it is VITAL, to ensure that TTL level communication works as expected, to have the same 0 V level on ALL equipment involved.

This is obtained by connecting ALL the 0 V or "Ground" or "GRN" or "GND" of ALL devices involved together (normally and by convention a black wire is used).

Repetita juvant:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases:_R

ANYTHING marked "GND", "GRN", "GROUND" or "-" (minus), or having a black wire, should be connected together. (it would be a smart thing to make sure that you DO NOT use a black wire for Tx or RX AND that using a CA-42 or similar adapter the BLACK wire is actually a ground)

I will repeat myself, you NEED a (black) wire connecting:

the Hard Disk Drive "Ground" pin

the converter "Ground" or 0V pin or connector or wire

the (standard PC) Power Supply black wire OR if a battery is used, the - (minus) side/pin of it OR if a separate Power Supply is used, it's black wire or 0V pin or 0v/-(minus) connector or anyway wire marked 0v/-(minus) or connected to anything marked 0v/-(minus)/GRN/GND/GROUND

I interpret that (and in particular the words ALL and ANYTHING) to be meaning what they mean, typically ALL and ANYTHING.

Particularly the bolded part above should be of interest to you.

Do you still have any doubt? :dubbio:

The general idea is that of making an equipotential connection, see again the above READ-ME-FIRST in the part about TTL levels, particularly:

Quote

TTL sends a "0" "low" when between 0.35 V and 0.8 V and a 1 "high" when between 2.0 V and 3.3 V

The above is called "positive logic" (0=low;1=high)

Each circuit/board may use a narrower (or wider) interval for the "high" level, but the "low" level is so narrow by design that having the SAME 0 V level on ALL equipment connected is VITAL. (see below "GROUNDING")

jaclaz

Edited by jaclaz
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, jaclaz said:

Well, the READ-ME-FIRST:

has a part dedicated to grounding that more or less says:

I interpret that (and in particular the words ALL and ANYTHING) to be meaning what they mean, typically ALL and ANYTHING.

Particularly the bolded part above should be of interest to you.

Do you still have any doubt? :dubbio:

The general idea is that of making an equipotential connction, see again the above READ-ME-FIRST in the part about TTL levels, particularly:

jaclaz

 


Hard drive is working now! Thanks again to jaclaz and all others who figured the evil bug out.

Not sure how it took a decade before it hit... I believe the machine has been used quite often. Backing up everything now and most likely trashing the drive.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Tony111 said:

 


Hard drive is working now! Thanks again to jaclaz and all others who figured the evil bug out.

Not sure how it took a decade before it hit... I believe the machine has been used quite often. Backing up everything now and most likely trashing the drive.

It is essentially "voodoo" or "black magic" :w00t: :ph34r:, IF it is the original bug it may depend on the number of power ons the drive had (and how many other events were written to the event log in each session):

Quote

Root Cause

This condition was introduced by a firmware issue that sets the drive event log to an invalid location causing the drive to become inaccessible.

The firmware issue is that the end boundary of the event log circular buffer (320) was set incorrectly. During Event Log initialization, the boundary condition that defines the end of the Event Log is off by one. During power up, if the Event Log counter is at entry 320, or a multiple of (320 + x*256), and if a particular data pattern (dependent on the type of tester used during the drive manufacturing test process) had been present in the reserved-area system tracks when the drive's reserved-area file system was created during manufacturing, firmware will increment the Event Log pointer past the end of the event log data structure. This error is detected and results in an "Assert Failure", which causes the drive to hang as a failsafe measure. When the drive enters failsafe further update s to the counter become impossible and the condition will remain through subsequent power cycles. The problem only arises if a power cycle initialization occurs when the Event Log is at 320 or some multiple of 256 thereafter. Once a drive is in this state, there is no path to resolve/recover existing failed drives without Seagate technical intervention. For a drive to be susceptible to this issue, it must have both the firmware that contains the issue and have been tested through the specific manufacturing process.

See:

So, it is possible that you were a lucky one that for some reason never hit the 320+n*256 value in the circular log in all these years.

Then you suddenly became unlucky and disaster hit you :(.

But soon enough you were lucky again and managed to recover the disk/data :thumbup

All is well that ends well. :) 

jaclaz

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

If the "m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22" doesn't enable the drive so the new firmware will load, is there a way to load over serial connection?  I have two ST37505228AS with problems.  I was able to run "m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22" on both with no change.  Over a USB SATA adapter I can see the partitions but as soon as I try todo anything with the drive, the USB driver crashes.  SATA still doesn't work. I don't care about the data if there is something more I can try.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...