Live or Let Die: Six Micron SSDs

[Tripredacus]

I have been sent six Micron SSDs to see if there is any way to save them. They are not covered under warranty and *should* have no data to recover. I have started with one of them, everything seems ok except that anything accessing the disk is very slow, and a partition cannot be created.

It appears in Device Manager!
It is MICRON_M 510DC_MTFSSAK480 SCSI Disk Device

OH, perhaps important information ahead: this disk is in a SATA to USB 3.0 enclosure, connected to USB 3.0 port.
Disk Management shows it ok, but there is a red mark on it. Actual size 480 GB seems to be an odd one to me...

Crystal Disk Info seems to think everything is fine. Notice the power on count. These disks are not "used" ... and should be "new" but they were found during an acquisition with no asset information.

This takes a long time, entire minutes to complete commands such as list disk and sel disk 1 and detail disk, however "clean" seemed to go through quite quickly. Alas, here there is an error trying to create a partition.

Here are the things found in Event Viewer:

The IO operation at logical block address 0x0 for Disk 1 (PDO name: \Device\00000064) was retried.
VDS fails to write boot code on a disk during clean operation. Error code: 800701E3@02070008
The IO operation at logical block address 0x0 for Disk 1 (PDO name: \Device\00000064) failed due to a hardware error.

Then I have this from TestDisk running, on partition type "None" and Analyse mode. Seems to be taking its time.

If there is any particular tool I can run to get an actual error out of these things, it would be nice. I still have some other things I can try, but being very slow means I have time to post a thread and perhaps go home and take a nap.

[TigTex]

Maybe that device is password protected? I've seen before when someone attempts to do a secure erase and it fails. The disk gets locked until the proper password is set and security is once again disabled. Sometimes the password is <blank> or just "password"

I would try to use hdparm on a linux distribution (example: hdparm -I /dev/sdb ) and see if the security option is enabled because the SMART status is OK

[jaclaz]

@Trip

Read here first thing:

https://www.micron.com/about/blog/2017/march/how-to-securely-erase-micron-sata-ssds

Depending on the model, PSID wipe could be available.

Anway, you need the Micron Storage Executive Software, any *generic* tool either won't do anything or - in the case of hdparm - may (accidentally) damage the thingies.

And don't, just don't attempt *anything* through a USB bridge, if the thingy (as it likely has) has a SATA connection you MUST connect it directly via SATA.

jaclaz

[Tripredacus]

I will use the other five connected directly, but the Micron Storage Executive had no issue with the first disk being on a USB adapter.

After noticing Testdisk was still trying to do something after about 20 hours, I decided to kill that and install the Micron software. It does actually use an image (a crossed out eye) to signify that TCG is enabled, but the software does not make it obvious. It was only after getting the debug info for the disk, and the log file says "TCG Status= Activated" was I able to find Micron's guide showing that image. And the PSID Revert worked fine. Afterwards I had to remove readonly attribute from the disk using Diskpart because Disk Management and Diskpart showed an error about the disk being write protected. Then I was able to format the disk fine.

The Micron PDF is here. Page 20 shows the picture of what the icon looks like.

[jaclaz]

Good.

Only for the record the idea is "generic", a USB bridge uses (obviously) the USB protocol to communicate, and a number of factors (including the actual protocol, the drivers used, the actual OS features, the specific USB bridge chipset AND firmware and also *whatnot* ) may make a particular command either to NOT "pass through" or to "pass through" but in a slighly modified way (which may lead - you can never know - to either "nothing" or to a "destructive" result).

As an example, a number of "mass production tools" for USB sticks require the use of a specific, dedicated driver (which doesn't work as a "normal" USB mass storage driver) to access some settings in the controller of the stick.

As well some of the USB "direct" hard disks (i.e. with the USB bridge/interface directly on the hard disk PCB) cannot be in some cases analyzed/fully accessed/reset via that and you need to "pin out" the SATA connection (when possible):

https://blog.acelaboratory.com/if-you-are-planning-to-work-usb-external-hard-drives.html

https://blog.acelaboratory.com/pc-3000-hdd-how-to-solder-a-sata-adapter-to-the-usb-western-digital-drive.html

https://blog.acelaboratory.com/soldering-of-sata-connector-to-samsung-spinpoint-usb-pcb.html

So, again generally speaking, don't,  just don't fiddle with this kind of stuff via USB if you  have a more direct SATA access.

jaclaz