A Sad Look at Steve's Hard Drive Recovery Queue
A Seagate Rosewood drive arrives with a scratched label, bent casing, black particles on the platters, and a misaligned platter ring. Someone opened it at home. Steve shows what that did to any chance of a full recovery.
The Damage Inventory
The external label was visibly scratched and damaged; in data recovery, that is a reliable indicator that someone pried the case open. Inside, it was worse:
- Stripped screws from multiple failed removal attempts
- Bent aluminum casing from forcing it open without removing all fasteners
- Black particles on the platters from metal shavings generated during prying
- Misaligned platter ring from incorrectly removing the 4PL screw
- Head stack assembly shifted out of position
Steve compares the damaged drive to a healthy donor of the same model. On the donor, the platters spin freely and the heads park cleanly. On the opened drive, the platters bind and wobble from the misaligned ring. The heads will never track properly again.
How Prying Creates Contamination
When someone uses a flathead screwdriver or prying tool on the case edge, it shaves aluminum from the casing. Those metal particles fall onto the platters. At 5,400+ RPM, any particle caught between the head slider and the platter surface causes a head crash: the magnetic coating gets gouged and data in that area is gone.
The 4PL (four-point location) screw holds the platter ring in its precise, balanced position. Removing it without knowing what it does lets the ring shift, which means the data tracks no longer align with where the heads expect them to be. Even on a clean bench with professional tools, this misalignment cannot be corrected after the fact.
Before vs. After DIY
This drive had a standard mechanical failure before it was opened. Those are routine recoveries. After it was opened, it became unrecoverable. The video is 9 minutes of Steve showing the difference between a drive that could have been saved and one that cannot.
If You Are Thinking About Opening Your Hard Drive: Don't.
Send it in with the screws still in it. A drive with a standard mechanical failure has good recovery odds. A drive that has been pried open at home has almost none.