Old Freecom Drive draws too much power.

845H

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Got an old issue that I finally want to deal with after failing to resolve it at the time.

Got an old Freecom XS 500gb USB 2.0 Hdd which stopped working a year or 2 back. Basically it would try to draw too much power so anything I tired to plug the bugger into would turn off. A mate I got to have a look at it said that not much could be done with it as Freecom had a proprietary usb connection so couldn't be replaced. Because it was out of warranty Freecom were not much help.

Is there any 3rd party hdd recovery service place I can send it to? Got old important stuff I need to dig up off the drive so really desperate now.

Cheers
 
Ok, so had a mate look at this and he's said the following:

Basically it looks to me like there is a short on the logic board of the hard drive and its causing the USB to short out. It'll make any computer switch itself off to stop any serious damage. I inspected the board and cant find anything obvious that jumps out at me, which means it could be a chip thats fried.

Also, upon having a quick search around the internet it seems there are differing opinions on whether or not the board can be directly swapped out for another. A few are saying there is drive specific information on one of the chips so you'd need special equipment to even consider changing it.

Is there anyone on these forums who might be able to help me out or advise? I'm getting pretty desperate now and most hdd recovery services I've been checking want £x00's which I really cant afford at the moment :(

http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gadgets/freecom-mobile-drive-xxs-coolest-storage-gadget-ever-49298581/4/

Its this one in case you're wondering :s
 
It's probably a surface mount ceramic or even electrolytic capacitor that's gone out of spec, trying to find out the values will be a nightmare, though if you are handy with a multimeter you can at least check if any have gone as a dead short.

Yes the drive firmware will contain information regarding the heads and spindle motor as they may use different parts, also it will have bad sector's allocated in the firmware from the factory. So really hit or miss, as the boards can also be many revisions.
 
Ok, thanks for replying. What are my options in regards to get it fired back up, bearing in mind I'm a total n008 when it comes to hdd/electronics, meaning I wont be able to perform any repair myself :s
 
You have 3 options, see if you know anyone handy with a multimeter or a local electronics repair shop, try and find another hard drive of the same type and size, try the board you may be lucky or send it off for data recovery.
 
I tried buying the same hdd before (about a year after I bought my original one) and it didnt match the board on my one at all. And I couldn't give it back, luckily my mate bought it off me so I didnt lose out.

I'll try and find someone handy with a multimeter, I can't afford the data recovery. I checked some rates and its gonna cost me hundreds which I can't afford :(
 

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