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The Solution for Seagate 7200.11 HDDs


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Hi Everyone. After a short hiatus, I'm back to report on my progress.

After having gone through the procedure to un-brick my Seagate drive, here are the results.

I used a hot-swappable sort of enclosure to connect the drive to the computer. The computer could "see" the drive and the 5 partitions. It took a long time for the computer to "see" these partitions. Of the 5 partitions only one is readable and I was able to copy out my data to another external drive. Needless to say, the transfer rate was painfully slow, like 170 to 500 Kb/sec. I took about 3 days to finally transfer 90 Gb out.

The other 4 partitions could not be accessed, giving an error message as follows:

"Location is not available.

X O:\ is not accessible.

The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error."

I think the above error message or the inability of the computer to access the other partitions is due to firmware problems.

Does anyone have any idea how to solve this problem?

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Hi Everyone. After a short hiatus, I'm back to report on my progress.

After having gone through the procedure to un-brick my Seagate drive, here are the results.

I used a hot-swappable sort of enclosure to connect the drive to the computer. The computer could "see" the drive and the 5 partitions. It took a long time for the computer to "see" these partitions. Of the 5 partitions only one is readable and I was able to copy out my data to another external drive. Needless to say, the transfer rate was painfully slow, like 170 to 500 Kb/sec. I took about 3 days to finally transfer 90 Gb out.

Good :), that's already a form of success.

The other 4 partitions could not be accessed, giving an error message as follows:

"Location is not available.

X O:\ is not accessible.

The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error."

Those is usually the behaviour of a "slow" disk (i.e. a disk that is going to fail soon), sometimes after the unbricking only a part of the disk is accessible, but that means that we are once again fundamentally "outside the scope" of this thread, i.e. your disk bricked itself for reasons different from the original firmware issue and only by pure coincidence the procedure, which is basically a "general reset" revived it.

Now tha tis not anymore bricked the issue becomes data recovery.

I think the above error message or the inability of the computer to access the other partitions is due to firmware problems.

No.

Firmware has nothing to do with partitions, they are simply on a completely different "level", firmware is the lowest possible "physical" layer, on top of it there is the PC/OS "Physical layer" and on top of it there is the "logical layer" (to which volumes/partitions/filesystems belong).

What may happen is that there is a "limit" to the accessible sectors (but this is improbable that it is connected to firmware and more likely to be connected to hardware :ph34r: ).

Does anyone have any idea how to solve this problem?

NO.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com./jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/questions-with-yes-or-no-answers.html

(at least not in the DIY "club", professionals may)

The only thing that you can try doing is to image the disk (using any of the variously mentioned "suitable" tools, such as DMDE, DATARESCUEDD, etc.) and perform data recovery on the image (NOT on the original disk).

It is possible that this way you can recover more data than what you have till now, if you need help start a NEW thread, as that would go largely outside the scope of this one.

jaclaz

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello everyone!

From the beginning, please excuse my bad english - I'm not native English speaker. I have an Seagate ST9320320AS (320Gb, 5400.5 Momentus series, FW 0303) hdd with LBA 0 error. The hard drive is recognized by BIOS, but can not be accessed. I tried all the methods shown here, but it didn't work for me.

I used a cable 42. After typing the command F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22, I got the following error message : "F3 T>m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22

Error 1008 DETSEC 0000500E Process Defect List Error

R/W Sense 00000002, R/W Error 841C0087, List Offset 00000000, File Error 0000000

1

F3 T> "

Is it the harddrive completely defective, or this procedure shown here does not apply to this series?

Please provide me some help!

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5400.5 Momentus series, FW 0303) hdd with LBA 0 error.

....

I tried all the methods shown here, but it didn't work for me.

....

Is it the harddrive completely defective, or this procedure shown here does not apply to this series?

Really? :unsure:

Guess why the README FIRST:

(yes the one that you should read BEFORE posting here, that is linked to in big red bold letters on first post and is reminded on the top of each and every page has this to say on the matter:

If you have been pointed to this, it means that you failed to read here before posting there yet another time one of those SAME questions/problems.

The intended Target:

The scope of a thread about problems of Seagate 7200.11 drives is to try and solve two specific problems:

  1. BSY - or "busy" state
  2. LBA0 - or drive detected by BIOS with size 0

that are caused on a specific model (the 7200.11) by a specific firmware bug:

  • bricking when drive is booted AND Event Log counter is at entry 320, or a multiple of it (i.e. satisfies the expression: ELaddress=320 + x*256 )

Please note how the 7200.11 is also marketed as Maxtor (Seagate and Maxtor are the "same" company nowadays), and also "branded" as HP, IBM and probably a number of other OEM brands.

....

The non-targets:

  • ANY other problem regarding this specific hard disk model (Seagate 7200.11)
  • ANY problem regarding ANY hard disk BUT this specific one (Seagate 7200.11)
  • ANYTHING NOT listed as "target"

Is it the harddrive completely defective, or this procedure shown here does not apply to this series?

Who knows?

But surely the second you said.

jaclaz

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I read README FIRST. Even if the tutorial was made to 7200.11, I said it would not hurt to see if it works for 5400.5 (I had nothing to lose if something went wrong). I tried and I saw that the engine responds to commands, except " F3 T> m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22". That sounds to me like the heads are not moving, so I am going open the harddisk to see if the HDD heads are moving or not

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I read README FIRST. Even if the tutorial was made to 7200.11, I said it would not hurt to see if it works for 5400.5 (I had nothing to lose if something went wrong). I tried and I saw that the engine responds to commands, except " F3 T> m0,2,2,0,0,0,0,22". That sounds to me like the heads are not moving, so I am going open the harddisk to see if the HDD heads are moving or not

Good :), then you failed to understand how this thread in which you posted is ONLY related to the 7200.11 model (strangely enough it's title is ."The Solution for Seagate 7200.11 HDDs" and not "Generic thread about any issue with any disk").

You dont' really want to open a disk (at all) and certainly not "to see if the heads are moving". :w00t:

In any case, once you will have opened it , unless you have a suitable CLEAN environment (and if you have one or know how to build one, probably you would not be here asking for help) and you have some previous experience in repairing disks (and again that would make improbable that you would be here), the disk has around 99.99% of probabilities to never work again once re-assembled. :ph34r:

Seriously, DON'T EVEN THINK of opening a disk (of course if not for fun, after having decided that the disk - and any data in it is of no value for you).

jaclaz

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I said it would not hurt to see if it works for 5400.5

it DOES hurt indeed

so I am going open the harddisk to see if the HDD heads are moving or not

you are totally crazy.

Say farewell to your hard drive and data inside.

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There is no data that I want to recover from this HDD; a friend of mine gave me this hdd as bricked (for "playing" whith it). That's the reason I tried to see if I can revive the harddisk using the methods shown here for 7200 and to do some experiments on it. I might be totally crazy as Smandurlo said; however, except the fact that I had the errors I specified in my post, the harddisk responded to all commands with no errors.

Indeed I do not have experience in repairing disks, but I had some free time and I said this is a good moment to start :w00t: .

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Can someone shed some light on this?

Just before the partition regeneration I tried power off & on the drive (detach the SATA cable, and re-attach it after 30s) - however the Hyperterminal program won't response after that. Pressing CTRL+Z does not bring back the session at all.

How can I go about to solve this?

Thanks

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There is no data that I want to recover from this HDD; a friend of mine gave me this hdd as bricked (for "playing" whith it). That's the reason I tried to see if I can revive the harddisk using the methods shown here for 7200 and to do some experiments on it. I might be totally crazy as Smandurlo said; however, except the fact that I had the errors I specified in my post, the harddisk responded to all commands with no errors.

Indeed I do not have experience in repairing disks, but I had some free time and I said this is a good moment to start :w00t: .

Sure, one must start somewhere :yes: .

Anyway, read here WHY exactly you started your new experience with the wrong foot :ph34r: :

http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=12166

http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?t=12166&f=1&start=0#p79321

(not that the good guys at hddguru are particularly friendly/easy with non-pro's, but from time to time you can get some useful info from there).

Can someone shed some light on this?

Just before the partition regeneration I tried power off & on the drive (detach the SATA cable, and re-attach it after 30s) - however the Hyperterminal program won't response after that. Pressing CTRL+Z does not bring back the session at all.

How can I go about to solve this?

Thanks

Sometimes things simply "hang". :huh:

Start again from scratch, including re-booting the PC (it could also depend on the OS you are running).

Then, after having powered off the drive (possibly for sixty seconds and not thirty), see the recommended guide:

http://www.mapleleafmountain.com/seagatebrick.html

At this point, many say you need to disconnect the SATA power cable from the drive and wait one minute. Yes, count to sixty. Then plug the SATA power cable back into the drive. There is a bit of debate about this step in the forums but that is what I did and it worked fine in my case. *IF and only if* you choose not to disconnect drive power temporarily, you need to at least change back to the test level prompt (type F3 1>/T (enter)) at this point before continuing.

Now back in HyperTerminal, you'll need to hit CTRL-Z to get a fresh prompt

but you can also try NOT powering it of BUT remember to change level or try closing the hyperterminal window a start a new session.

jaclaz

Edited by jaclaz
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There is no data that I want to recover from this HDD; a friend of mine gave me this hdd as bricked (for "playing" whith it). That's the reason I tried to see if I can revive the harddisk using the methods shown here for 7200 and to do some experiments on it. I might be totally crazy as Smandurlo said; however, except the fact that I had the errors I specified in my post, the harddisk responded to all commands with no errors.

Indeed I do not have experience in repairing disks, but I had some free time and I said this is a good moment to start :w00t: .

Sure, one must start somewhere :yes: .

Anyway, read here WHY exactly you started your new experience with the wrong foot :ph34r: :

http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=12166

http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?t=12166&f=1&start=0#p79321

(not that the good guys at hddguru are particularly friendly/easy with non-pro's, but from time to time you can get some useful info from there).

Can someone shed some light on this?

Just before the partition regeneration I tried power off & on the drive (detach the SATA cable, and re-attach it after 30s) - however the Hyperterminal program won't response after that. Pressing CTRL+Z does not bring back the session at all.

How can I go about to solve this?

Thanks

Sometimes things simply "hang". :huh:

Start again from scratch, including re-booting the PC (it could also depend on the OS you are running).

Then, after having powered off the drive (possibly for sixty seconds and not thirty), see the recommended guide:

http://www.mapleleafmountain.com/seagatebrick.html

At this point, many say you need to disconnect the SATA power cable from the drive and wait one minute. Yes, count to sixty. Then plug the SATA power cable back into the drive. There is a bit of debate about this step in the forums but that is what I did and it worked fine in my case. *IF and only if* you choose not to disconnect drive power temporarily, you need to at least change back to the test level prompt (type F3 1>/T (enter)) at this point before continuing.

Now back in HyperTerminal, you'll need to hit CTRL-Z to get a fresh prompt

but you can also try NOT powering it of BUT remember to change level or try closing the hyperterminal window a start a new session.

jaclaz

jaclaz - many thanks for your prompt reply. Just managed to bring the HDD back to life!

I have in fact spent around 5hrs today on this and the HyperTerminal just didn't response after power off/on. The solution to this was:

1. Power off / on the HDD (removing SATA cable, and re-attach SATA cable)

2. If the Hyperterminal is not responding, close down the program

3. Remove the cable from PC

4. Reconnect the cable to PC

5. Launch Hylerterminal and connect to the device

6. Press CTRL+Z

7. Proceed with the last step, e.g. F3 T>m0,2,2,,,,,22 (enter)

I have kept the HDD with power since step 1.

Also thanks Phaenius @ post 4341 - I have basically repeat the procedure outlined in that post.

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jaclaz - many thanks for your prompt reply. Just managed to bring the HDD back to life!

...

Also thanks Phaenius @ post 4341 - I have basically repeat the procedure outlined in that post.

Good, another happy bunny :).

jaclaz

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I want to thank everyone who has contributed their technical skills to this topic, and report my success with the techniques shared here. :thumbup

I have a 500GB 7200.11, firmware SD36, with a 2008 manufacture date. It was in a LaCie external enclosure that my father used to back up his iMac and store some large files. No issues whatsoever until one day, quite spontaneously, the disk was no longer recognized by his mac. Nor was it recognized by my PC in computer management or any other place.

Fortunately, there was no "mission critical" data on the disk, but there were still some files on there he did not want to lose. I started researching the issue and stumbled across this thread. The symptoms the disk exhibited were just like those discussed here, so I elected to give it a shot.

For simplicity's sake, I purchased a 7200.11 unbricking "kit" off eBay for $20.00, which included a Torx 6 tool and a pre-wired Silicon Labs CP201X USB Virtual COM Port adapter. I also downloaded a copy of PuTTy terminal software since I am on Win7 which does not have Hyperterminal. Then I read, and RE-READ, the guides posted here as to how to do this procedure with the drive. I also spent some time tinkering with PuTTy as it is slightly different than Hyperterminal.

Anyhow, after getting the drive hooked up to the power supply and COM port adapter (and, taking Carter in Canada's advice and taping everything in place so as to avoid accidental movement of the components), I fired up PuTTy and then the drive. I held my breath, hit control-z, and SLOWLY worked through the spin down/spin up commands, the "card pull," the screwing down of the powered board (yikes), and then the final repartitiion commands. All went completely smoothly on the first try. The repartition, surprisingly, took only about a half-second even though others have reported it takes up to a couple minutes.

I then powered everything down, hooked up the drive via a USB to SATA converter and... IT WAS IMMEDIATELY RECOGNIZED by my machine. Of course, being formatted in HFS+ for the Mac, I still did not know whether the data was intact. I rushed over to my dad's place, plugged in the drive via the same converter and ALL DATA WAS INTACT. I did a quick transfer off the disk.

Data was saved, and mission successful. The 7200.11 now has a date with a sledgehammer and the garbage can.

For me, this experience was intellectually stimulating and without a great deal of pressure because the files on the disk were not that big of a deal. So if the project would have failed, it would not have been disastrous. But it has reaffirmed to me that one backup, even two backups, is not enough. I have gone out and picked up a few new backup drives for my own data (and my dad's) and will make sure that a single drive failure never again causes this level of inconvenience.

Again, thank you all who contributed, and particularly those who shared this technique in the first place. Seagate's technical service department (whom I called first) assured me that my disk's SD36 firmware was not affected by the BSY bug. They could do nothing for me, except recommend a data recovery service. Well, it appears pretty clearly to me that the BSY bug was the exact problem, and now, thanks to the folks on this board, it was sufficiently resolved to allow me access to the data.

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