Samsung Internal Drives

[Statler]

Hi,

I am currently trying to get access to my HDD that is not being detected in my BIOS.

My system before problems.

120gig SSD (OCZ) as bootable drive.

1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 (HD103SJ) internal storage.

The problem point:

I flashed my BIOS from F6 to F8M (Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P MoBo)

Neither drive is detected after flash.

Tried both drives on another PC. BIOS does not detect them. 

I used OCZ software to discover the SSD drive is seen as an IDE device but apears corrupt even though the BIOS Settings are set to AHCI device. 

I believe the firmware on the SSD drive is corrupt. This leads me to believe the same has happened to the HDD also.

I would rather like to access this drive as it has pictures and video of my daughters on it for the first 3 years of their lives.

Please could someone help me retreive them.

Incidently i have a second (HD103SJ) that i reinstalled everything on and pc works fine now so problem is purely to retrieve data or make drive accessable so i may retrieve the data.

Thank you,

Jorgen

[MapleTree]

Hello,

If the drives that you are referring to are Samsung SSD drives, those are actually still supported by Samsung. Seagate has taken over their regular drive division, but Samsung still supports the SSD drives. Here is a link to Samsung support.

http://www.samsung.com/us/support/contact

If you have any other questions, please let us know.

[Statler]

Thank you for getting back to me. The SSD is OCZ which i have sent back hoping they can get the firmware sorted out.

The HDD is the issue i would like some support with here. I just mentioned the SSD for inference purposes.

cheers,

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

You should go IDE to flash drives buddy, also if you have an Agility there was a FW bug with those, OCZ's site has details so if you have had it longer than 3 mths it's probably on the bad FW still.

In future if you do this sort of thing, disconnect your drives for MB flashing and only have one in at a time for drive flashing,

Sorry I can't add much more than that as it is possible both got damaged while you did the bios flash, lets hope not

[Statler]

I will definately remove all drives before flashing a BIOS again. (I dont do it often). There's a learning curve!

Where can i get the firmware for the Samsung HD103SJ HDD please?

the OCZ is a vertex 3. I used their very useful software to check it out. They have a small linux kernel that i loaded from USB. very neat. it detected the drive. but couldnt update the firmware its winging its way back to them in the hope they can repair it)

Cheers,

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

Not sure if the Vertex had any problems tbh, the Agility did though, the FW for the Samsung should be here if the support pages are restored yet but it's a bit of a slog as Samsung didn't issue a user friendly one for it, the one they issued was more like a game toolkit for developers sadly, I'll see if I can find it for you.

I can't seem to find it right now, here's the closest thing http://www.seagate.com/support/internal-hard-drives/desktop-hard-drives/spinpoint-s-series/ if you have time to dig about maybe it will be in here somewhere in one of the links.

Check with this https://apps1.seagate.com/downloads/request.html

[Statler]

That may explain the difficulty I have had in locating the FW for the HDD.

I found out the file was called F3.exe I believe but other than that I do not want to download a copy of it from a 3rd party vendor due to possible security issues.

Hopefully Samsung will create a user friendly one. Otherwise I am fairly knowledgable with pc's, programming etc and if anyone has a copy of the developers kit i would have a look into using it.

thank you for the support. it is very much appreciated.

[Statler]

I set up the iso on a USB HDD that i ISO'd to boot from.

I booted to USB after removing all other drives other than the HDD.

It started the update told me the time it started the process and then finished quite quickly. a couple of seconds. there was no confirmation.

the drive is still not visible

If i were to send the drive to a data retrieval company do you think they could access the drive?

[Cantbecanit]

It can't flash a dead drive so yours can't be dead if the FW was seen to load in, I know there isn't a confirmation it's been successful message as Samsung users have posted before about it.

Lets do the chain of events when booting

1 - Does it list in the post screen when you boot the PC

2 - Is it seen in My Computer on the desktop

3 - Is it seen in Disk Management

Number 2 would seem an automatic no tbh so I'll assume numbers 1 & 3 being a yes

Right click on the drive pane in disk management and format it quick and assign it a drive letter, for it not to be seen at all this would indicate it is dead, if not seen at stage number 1 then only a bad cable/connection or dead drive can cause that.

[Statler]

Thank you for getting back to me

To answer your questions.

It does not appear in the POST screen when you boot the pc from either a warm boot or from switched off.

The AHCI does not detect it either.

the HDD does not appear in windows explorer (My computer), nor does it appear in the Disk manager.

In addition i have tried replacing the cables; power lead (modular power supply) and SATA cable used for the DVD drive to ensure it is not a break in a cable. different socket on Mobo and on power supply. and to ensure there are not settings in the BIOS I have ensured i cleared the CMOS and loaded optimised defaults inbetween each try.

I hope this helps...

Cheers,

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

With that info Jorgen I would say it's spun it's last byte tbh, there's nothing more you can do really apart from a PCB swap, and even then it may not work, PM Fzakbar with a picture of the PCB and he may spot something on it and be able to advise where to go next.

[Statler]

thank you for the info. I guessed it was a goner. but wanted to be sure.

Is there a data retrieval firm you can reccommed or some other similar way to get a folder off the hdd as it has a lot of sentimental photos and vids of my daughters etc for the first 3 years of their lives on it. only copy (/facepalm)

I will PM Fzakbar in the AM when there is some natural light for the marco lens to work.

cheers,

Jorgen

[Statler]

PM sent as suggested

[fzabkar]

Statler, if the drive spins up, then it is highly unlikely to be a PCB problem. :-(

BTW, I can no longer respond to PMs since the last Lithium forum software update. Something broke at my end (again) and this time I can't fix it. I'm facing the same problem at WD's forum. Sorry, but this was the last straw for me. It's frustrating because I can read my messages, I just can't reply to them. BTW, I almost didn't find this thread. The URL you sent me was for a photo.

[Cantbecanit]

Jorgen, as it's kinda nothing to lose time, fit it into a usb enclosure and see if it recognises when connected, if you can get it to show don't format it if it asks, instead get hold of a data recovery program trial, if this gets the files back then get the full version so you can recover the lot, if nothing else works I'm afraid you just learned the lesson of at least 2 copies of everything the hard way, it can be recovered professionally but it's uber expensive to get it done I'm afraid, like 600 euros expensive, so a 20 euros enclosure and another 25 euros recovery program purchase might just be the saviour.

[Statler]

In the back of my mind I knew the most likely result from the onset. I want to exhaust my options before considering spending out on money though hence the asking

The idea of a usb device is a good one. I shall try that. Is there a recovery program you can advise? the last one i really remember having anything to do with was called Tiramsu and was first out in 1990's.

I can also use the usb dock as a method of  backing up my files (facepalm) I shoulda known better really.

Cheers,

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

Seagate do one, and I've used one called PowerDataRecovery which I find most excellent.

[Statler]

So the latest:

I got a docking station for sata devices.

I had an old broken 500gig hdd from ages ago that it could recover with help of PowerDataRecovery (Thank you)

when putting the HD103SJ it didnt detect the device and i noticed that it didnt seem to spin up either. The other drive is noisey and easy to tell but not this one.

could this mean its still possible to be the PCB or is it just further proof that its kaput? 

Is it worth replacing the pcb?

Cheers,

Jorgen.

[Cantbecanit]

I'm not sure tbh, you could throw good money after bad tbh, if it's working sometimes and not others it could be the pcb, or it could be a tired psu connection, they generally aren't noisy drives, also swap the ports and sata leads about to rule them out, normally a dead HDD makes the clacking sound, have a look at the drive connectors as well, make sure they aren't broken, and they are easy to break.

[Statler]

The docking station i put the hdd in has its own Power supply and the setup reckognised a different hdd so i am ruling out that option for the moment. The drive connectors on the hdd look fine to me but i am no expert on it.

Where may i get hold of a replacement PCB?

Is there any specialist tools needed other than the tool to undo the screws? (I have this tool by chance)

Thank you,

Jorgen

[Statler]

Ok,

I have nothing to loose at this stage so i undid the screws and found the pcb lifts away. I have taken a host of photos.

http://s33.photobucket.com/albums/d79/jogic/

How would i source a new PCB please?

Thank you for your patience and your time. It is greatly appreciated.

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

Before we go there get hold of ESTools if you haven't already and make a dos disk of it, disconnect everything other than the CD rom and this drive in your PC and run ESTool, if you can't find it use Seatools Dos, if the program doesn't find the drive then it's a case of google and the model number with replacement PCB in the search, if it does try re-setting the options the programs give, but at least then we can tell if it's really dead or simply unreadable,

Did you say you have two of these drives? as you are confident to undo a PCB a simple swap over may enable you to at least recover data from it.

[Statler]

Ok so here is the update... It confuses me even more now...

My SSD arrived today so i unstalled win 7 on it. This freed up the second hdd (same as corrupt hdd)

I swapped the PCB's and these are the results... (from placing in the docking bay) and using fdisk to identify physical drives. (Disk management utility) in win 7

With working hdd and its PCB woked fine.

With broken HDD and its PCB didnt spin up

With Working hdd and broken HDD's PCB. Spin up but not detect physical disk.

with Broken HDD and working PCB. didnt spin up and didnt detect.

I guess this tells me the physical drive is broken as well as the PCB? are there any other conclusions?

thank you,

Jorgen

[Cantbecanit]

Well on the upside you didn't waste cash on another PCB, all I can say is try a re-flash and if that doesn't cure it it's toast, and rma it for another drive if it's still covered, sorry mate I know how it feels.

[Filipe]

hey

my disk is doing the same thing

simply stoped working, does not star , no noise nothing

its not time of samsung or seagate say somehting about it?

I have 2 disks, with 3/5 years, that are not treathed well ...moving from computer to computer  without special packages or nothing and they all work.

This one, since i buy it  NEVER, came out of computer, and the computer never was moved to anyplace, it has 1 year and 1

month.

Still in warranty, but with this example of things:

http://forums.seagate.com/t5/Barracuda-XT-Barracuda-Barracuda/Samsung-HDD-Problem/m-p/157127/highlig...

And with important data in it ,i simple afraid of sending it.

I prefer to have the disk dead at home with the hope of someday acess to the information, than sending it and it all goes missing.

Any sugestions ?

Sending it to a recover company, brokes the warranty?