Repairing hard Disk Drives

[Raptor]

I occasionally read about people replacing broken parts of a hard drive in order to have it (fully?) function again. I've got some questions regarding doing such things.

1. What parts of a HDD can be (easily) replaced?

2. Do the parts need to come out of an exact same HDD?

3. What tools would you need?

4. How can you determine if the HDD it self is failing or an electronic part of the HDD?

5. Does anyone know of any good websites where they describe how to repair HDDsand/or give information on whatever involves repairing HDDs?

Much obliged -

Raptor

[Computer_Commando]

1.  None.
2.  Not necessarily.
3.  Class 1000 Clean Room facility.
4.  Very specialized testing equipment.
5.  No one repairs them.  Recovery services can remove the discs (platters) and install into another drive to recover the data stored on the discs.  The cost of repair is 10 times the cost of replacement.  Anyone attempting to repair is performing a "science experiment" for the sake of education.  Why don't you rip one apart and see for yourself?

[Raptor]

Well, that pretty much clears things up. Cheers.

I'll go take on apart and have a good look at it.