Can This HD SATA Connection Be Fixed ?

Greetings Geeks -

I have been battling an army of gremlins (and myself) affecting my computer. I had given up, and went ahead and ordered new parts to construct a new rig. Well, of course, in the meantime, I got the stupid thing working. It went like this:

then :confused after the system would not recognize the HD. Then :mad after I realized the SATA connection on the drive was damaged. Then:cry

So, I turn to you Geeks for help......

The SATA connection on the drive was damaged. Specifically, the plastic bridge underneath the pins somehow broke off. Here is a link to an image of the damage:

http://s28.photobucket.com/user/hippydog/media/HardDrive_zps792eb12d.jpg.html?sort=3&o=0

I did try to attach the cable anyway, but the pins had been bent and I had to straighten them. Of course the cable won't seat firmly, so I can't be sure how well the connection is. I for a long time to get the system to recognize the drive, no luck.

So, is the damage fixable? Can the drive be sent away for repair? I have never ever had a drive damaged in this way, and I have been building computers for 20 years. I am extremely careful when installing, handling, and removing parts. Maybe the plastic was overly brittle? Any help is appreciated.

Thanks!

Oh yeah, can anyone recommend a good HD for a great price?! :-D:

 

Can the drive be sent away for repair

Instead, find a similiar drive ; ebay, tech shop, repair shop- and swap out the circuit board. This will let you retrieve any data you want from the drive or continue to use it. If its just a broke pin connection you will have two good drives just one at any time with the good circuit board. Remember the heads ribbon cable is even more fragile.

 

I had no idea. However, upon further research, it seems results can be hit or miss with modern drives as the control board stores additional information unique to any particular drive. So, I still might see if I can find a sister drive (a dead one, not a new one) somewhere and give it a go.

Thank you for the information.

 

Know the feeling there. Plugged in a drive once while power was still on. Sparks everywhere. Drive still good. Power supply not so much. Bought a comp at pawn shop next day and went back to "play". So a 2nd comp to experminent with is always fun and a learning tool also. Wish you well.

 

In my opinion you will find it extremely difficult to repair this drive to its former state. Under no circumstances open the case of the drive (removing the circuit board is not the same). It might be just possible to buy bits to make a SATA connector, remove the old, unsupported connector (by desoldering, if soldering is the only process involved. The plastic may be in one piece or glued in which case I think you're stuffed).

You are correct to say that increasingly, drive PCBs are coded to match the actual disk somehow. I have read this somewhere (Hardware Secrets tutorial ??), you need a virtually identical defunct disk to get a new PCB from (there wouldn't be much sense in taking the PCB from a working HDD)

The best I can come up with, however, is first to salvage everything on your broken HDD, by backing up the disk onto another disk, and recovering/restoring it to a third disk (I think this is the way it's done), or by making a clone of your original HD onto a similar one (with guaranteed reliability, such as, but not necessarily, a brand new one) In the latter case you can simply swap the original HD with the new cloned one and you are ready to go. Either way, it will involve getting a different disk.

You might salvage the original HD, for use as is as a backup, or for new stuff, by finding, for example on ebay or another place, a SATA-SATA adapter (SATA-PATA exist so I don't see why SATA-SATA ones are not possible) and glueing (with araldite, [or other epoxy resin], superglue, or strong glue 'suitable for the purpose' ] this to the broken interface, anchoring it away from the damaged part in such a way the electrical contact is maintained. This drive can be connected externally by a second adapter to a USB adapter, but I think the dimensions might not enable it to fit inside a computer ?

To me, this sounds like the simplest and most workable solution, but you have a better idea of the details of the case of course.

Always keep a back-up !

Dumb_Question
14.September.2014