Strange external hard drive connection, needs data recovery.

JosephLeo

JosephLeo

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Hey there guys, I have a weird one right now.

I need to recover some data off of a clients portable external hard drive. The thing is I'm having a problem plugging the damn thing into something.

The connection is a little flatter than a mini-USB connection and has what appears to be 5 gold contacts...so this can't be a usb connection. At first I thought that the hard drive just had an adapter attached to it so I opened up the external hdd casing and took it out, only to find out that the hard drive's circuit board has the thing soldered on!

So any advice on how to get this thing plugged in? The cable my client gave me doesn't seem to be working (Not being detected, and no light is going on) and I have no idea what the cable is called.

The hard drive in question is a Western Digital - WD10TMVV-11BG7S0 - 1TB 2.5" "Serial ATA" hard drive.

Thanks guys.
 
Sounds like micro-usb to me...

mini-micro-usb-connector.jpg


Edit: Further research seems to support this hypothesis:

http://forum.hddguru.com/wd10tmvv-t16204.html
 
Last edited:
Ahh, so it is a USB format.
Okay, problem solved! Thank you ATTech +1 rep.

(Monoprice should have them...right? If not I'll just get one elsewhere)
 
as you mentioned opening up the drive....
That soldered on connection is a pain in the backside! They've built the usb controller into the pcb so data recovery becomes a lot harder as you can longer just pop it into another ext hdd casing.

I guess it helps them combat counterfeiting of WD products but it has really screwed over a few folks i know.
 
You should never do data recovery from USB. Take the drive out and connect it to a motherboard and image it. Then do your data recovery from the imaged drive.
 
vdub12 said:
You should never do data recovery from USB. Take the drive out and connect it to a motherboard and image it. Then do your data recovery from the imaged drive.
Click to expand...

I'm quite aware of that ;)

But like DarDar said, it's simply not possible. Although there are two sets of pins on the board as well, one set has 12 pins and the other has two. I suspect that the 12 pin can be used somehow, but not sure how it's laid out.
 
DarDar said:
Thats the problem with the WD Passport drives. Any of the newer ones have something like this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pitdroidtech/4025280761/
The one i opened was slightly different but of the same design.

It means the sata connector is not available to us :(
Click to expand...

JosephLeo said:
I'm quite aware of that ;)

But like DarDar said, it's simply not possible. Although there are two sets of pins on the board as well, one set has 12 pins and the other has two. I suspect that the 12 pin can be used somehow, but not sure how it's laid out.
Click to expand...

WOW that sucks. What the hell was WD thinking. Apparently they do not care if you get data back from a disaster.
 
vdub12 said:
WOW that sucks. What the hell was WD thinking. Apparently they do not care if you get data back from a disaster.
Click to expand...

Well, let's look at it this way.

Everyone wants to fit more and more gigs in smaller and smaller spaces. So, why not cut a couple of mm's off when they can just have the usb hard wired into the hard drive? It's a great marketing move since they can say "The smallest gigabyte you've ever seen" or whatever.

I'm more than sure however if the data is important enough and it's the board's fault then someone can either replace the board or move the platters, someone can probably even solder a new micro-USB head on there as well if that's the fault, maybe even turn it into a bigger USB slot.

But yeah, I should have that wire in by Dec. 30th....*ugh* I'll have to explain to my client that this might take a while longer than originally quoted due to the holidays...I'll give 'em a 50% discount, that always makes people happy.
 
vdub12 said:
You should never do data recovery from USB. Take the drive out and connect it to a motherboard and image it. Then do your data recovery from the imaged drive.
Click to expand...

I'm afraid to admit it but I didn't know that, I get both IDE and SATA drives desktop and laptop, I have a external usb device that does both IDE and SATA, one for 3.5 and one for 2.5 and I would have to say 90% of the time I put their drive in one of them and do what I need the finish up with it in there system, back, image, scan for virus/malware/spyware. I know the SATA plugs are the same on 3.5 and 2.5 but the ribbon on IDE is not the same so how else could I do it.
 
italian said:
I'm afraid to admit it but I didn't know that, I get both IDE and SATA drives desktop and laptop, I have a external usb device that does both IDE and SATA, one for 3.5 and one for 2.5 and I would have to say 90% of the time I put their drive in one of them and do what I need the finish up with it in there system, back, image, scan for virus/malware/spyware. I know the SATA plugs are the same on 3.5 and 2.5 but the ribbon on IDE is not the same so how else could I do it.
Click to expand...


You can get a 3.5 to 2.5 ide ribbon cable for a couple of £s on Ebay, I use one myself for slaving laptop ide drives to my bench machine.http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IDE-2-5-Laptop-Hard-Drive-3-5-Adaptor-Cable-Lead-/390220934972?pt=UK_Computing_CablesConnectors_RL&hash=item5adafaef3c
 
Last edited:
JosephLeo said:
But yeah, I should have that wire in by Dec. 30th....*ugh* I'll have to explain to my client that this might take a while longer than originally quoted due to the holidays...I'll give 'em a 50% discount, that always makes people happy.
Click to expand...


If there is a phone shop nearby i would try there. This cable is used a lot in most of the recent phones. Any of the new blackberrys have it and i know my brothers HTC wildfire and my nokia have it. in fact they even have it in our local €2 shop (dollar store equivalent). Might cost a bit more than monoprice etc but should still be less than the cost of discounting your service?
 
i hope i dont run into too many of these hard drives... not only is it a pain to recover i bet (as we see) but transfer speed has to be a lot slower. I havnt looked into it yet

I as well (like some said) have a micro-USB to USB cable that was provided with my phones. I will make sure i keep one handy at all times :)
 
italian said:
I'm afraid to admit it but I didn't know that, I get both IDE and SATA drives desktop and laptop, I have a external usb device that does both IDE and SATA, one for 3.5 and one for 2.5 and I would have to say 90% of the time I put their drive in one of them and do what I need the finish up with it in there system, back, image, scan for virus/malware/spyware. I know the SATA plugs are the same on 3.5 and 2.5 but the ribbon on IDE is not the same so how else could I do it.
Click to expand...
Data recovery != Data backup.

There are plenty of adapters that will convert 2.5 IDE to 3.5 IDE or Sata or USB, etc.
 
I did some research last night and read a few people has success replacing the PCB with a SATA drive.
 
DarDar said:
Cool - was this with the WD passports? any links?
Click to expand...

Here is one link.

However, this link claims you need to change the head assembly with the PCB.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:C0QPapxpxfkJ:www.forum.salvationdata.com/viewtopic.php%3Ff%3D29%26t%3D871+WD3200BMVV&cd=8&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

I had to use Google cache because the site has blocked access to the post.

Personally I would try and find the same style WD notebook drive within a few weeks of manufacture as the passport drive and cross your fingers. I don't know on that drive if the rom needs to be swapped to the new PCB or if it even can in this case.

You can also send in an email to podnuts (my hard drive died) and ask Scott Moulton what he would do with a drive like that.
 
vdub12 said:
You should never do data recovery from USB. Take the drive out and connect it to a motherboard and image it. Then do your data recovery from the imaged drive.
Click to expand...

I was wondering if you could tell me why? I am just asking. I use USB 3.0 external drive adapters, and I thought they were the cats meow, but if, in the end, they will bite me, I need to know why.

Thank you, and have a great day.
 
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