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My question

Is there any way of debugging bad (as in no longer recognized) hard-drives? Ideally an open-source tool that can interact with the device to capture/interpret SATA communication and issue error codes such as "platters stuck", "head failure", etc.

The problem

One of my NAS hard-drives, a Seagate ST2000DL003, started beeping/chirping and clicking repeatedly. After a reboot the storage manager no longer recognized the HDD. The sound is similar to this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9i5yixsJbk .

My attempts

I suspected that one of the read/write heads got damaged and was touching its platter because the platters are spinning-up but the read/write heads are making noises when being actioned. With no backup of that drive (shame on me, I know), not willing to pay for professional support (too expensive with no guarantees of recovery) and having another similar drive at hand, I attempted a fix by swapping parts.

  1. Swapping PCBs - did not work: The bad drive (with the PCB from the good one) keeps making the same repeated noises and isn't recognized. The good drive (with the PCB from the bad one) spins-up and makes no noises but isn't recognized either. Note: the two hard-drive PCBs have identical codes: 100617465 REV B .

  2. Swapping read/write heads - inconclusive: I've ignored all warnings and followed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iiEKZhDapo . After removing the head assembly from the bad drive, I discovered that there is no visible damage to the read/write heads (see the attached image) and no visible scratches on the platters. I didn't continue with the head assembly swap, assuming there is no mechanical issue with the drive but rather a firmware issue.

ST2000DL003 head assembly with no visible damage to read/write heads

My pointers rely only on youtube videos (which is not always a good source of information). So, before disassembling a functional hard-drive I would like to narrow down the causes of the problem I'm dealing with.

DISCLAIMER

Opening a hard-drive case WILL void its warranty and CAN lead to total data loss. Such operation should only be performed by data recovery professionals. Having said that, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNJqTPutrJ4 suggests DIY HDD disassembly to be a less risky procedure.

Game Instance
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  • "Swapping read/write heads" the warnings are not for fun. You need a clean room to do that. – DavidPostill Oct 07 '18 at 19:27
  • The problem is even the professionals won’t touch it now. – Appleoddity Oct 07 '18 at 19:31
  • With you're limited knowledge you might actually do more harm than good, but if you are willing to risk it, I would advise swap the platters an put it in a working donor drive. Unless the problem is with the platters you might be able to access the data. Again, you might do more harm then good! – Albin Oct 07 '18 at 20:53
  • @DavidPostill: I've edited the question and added a disclaimer. However, a debugging tool would be useful and would prevent unnecessary HDD disassembly. – Game Instance Oct 07 '18 at 20:56
  • @Albin: Thanks for the advice. I admit my limited knowledge and that this is a hail Mary attempt. I would rather swap the heads as they seem less prone to accidental destruction while handling. Also, the heads are kept in place only by a screw. – Game Instance Oct 07 '18 at 21:01
  • The problem is you've now probably made the problem worse. @DavidPostill is correct that opening a hard drive is generally a clean room (or at least a whole lot cleaner than most of us have) operation as even if everything went as expected, dust can cause new problems. So now you might have two drives with problems. – blihp Oct 07 '18 at 21:06
  • As for your question of, *"Does anyone know an open-source tool ..."*, modern drives use [S.M.A.R.T.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.). Your duplicate would be [How can I read my hard drive’s SMART status in Windows 7?](https://superuser.com/q/29240/173513), [Reading SMART Data to determine possible drive failure?](https://superuser.com/q/426103/173513), [Short S.M.A.R.T test completes successfully with gnome-disk, but smartctl reports a read failure](https://superuser.com/q/1228339/173513) and friends. – jww Oct 07 '18 at 21:42
  • Thanks @jww for pointing out S.M.A.R.T. ! However, wouldn't that imply a HDD that's recognized by the system? – Game Instance Oct 07 '18 at 22:04
  • Don't know if this helps: https://www.malwaretech.com/2015/04/hard-disk-firmware-hacking-part-1.html Damage to the platters may not be visible to the human eye because data densities are so high. – cybernard Oct 08 '18 at 01:19
  • @cybernard: Thanks for that useful tip on hacking HDD firmware! What I'm looking for is a software tool that intercepts and interprets SATA packages (if one exists). – Game Instance Oct 08 '18 at 20:19
  • Are there tools that exist? They do exist but they are extremely expensive. Pretty much only professional recovery services purchase them. Questions seeking Software recommendations are out of scope. – Ramhound Oct 08 '18 at 20:41
  • @Ramhound: Thanks for the input. I guess the answer is no then. There are no open source tools for HDD debugging. – Game Instance Oct 08 '18 at 20:50
  • Do you want to write your own program? The Linux OS has a libata, and a smartctl for which all the source is available free. I don't know if these libraries operate at a low enough level to help you, but they certainly operate at a lower level than most free tools. However, you may have to do extensive programming to get it to do what you want. At best they might get you closer to what you want. Also http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/smartmontools/wiki – cybernard Oct 08 '18 at 21:34
  • http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/SCSI-Generic-HOWTO/pexample.html I compiled this software in linux and ran it with /dev/sg1 Does the drive respond to even this minimal command? Where 1 is the drive number, and you will have to change it. – cybernard Oct 08 '18 at 21:49
  • @cybernard: +1 on smartmontools . I will definitely look into that. Hopefully it will help me at get better grasp on what going on. Thanks! – Game Instance Oct 08 '18 at 21:51
  • Sorry my link was a dud. https://www.smartmontools.org/ or https://sourceforge.net/projects/smartmontools/ – cybernard Oct 08 '18 at 22:00
  • @cybernard: No problem about the link, I found the sourceforge page eventually. On the other hand, I've put back the heads in the drive and now the system recognizes it. I've compiled and run the piece of code you suggested. That's the only good piece of news because the beeping and clicking still happens for a number of times before it stops (spins-down). There's one weird thing happening though, the product ID is different now ST_M13FQBL instead of ST2000DL003. Same thing happened with the S/N. Also, the disk capacity is 3.86 GB instead of 2 TB and none of that is unreadable. – Game Instance Oct 09 '18 at 22:21
  • https://msfn.org/board/topic/129551-unlocking-terminal-of-seagate-es2-in-bsyled000000cc-state/ Review this. Googling further http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=11403 and https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/606709-hard-disk-name-suddenly-change-to-st_m13fqbl-ata/ apparently **HD doctor** can fix it if you follow the direction provided in the youtube video. Also google ST_M13FQBL lots of results. – cybernard Oct 09 '18 at 23:27
  • I just got a quote from a data rescue company today. Prices may go as high as 5k USD for a previously opened hard drive. Consequently, I'll keep looking for alternatives. Anyway, thanks for the help! I really appreciate it. – Game Instance Oct 10 '18 at 23:24

0 Answers0