Broken Sata Connector on Seagate 200 gig

[zuberal]

Hello fellow Redflag'ers!

Hope someone can help. A couple of months ago I broke my sata connector on my Seagate HD. The plastic of the connector broke right off, and all that is left is copper connectors. Obviously I can no longer connect a sata cable to it. (which attaches to the motherboard) I broke it when I was making room to add another ide drive...I was pulling it off normally too.

The lovely part about it is that it's from a Compaq Presario SR2030NX - and has no warranty. (it was a replacement for another computer that has since run out of warranty) I contacted Seagate about the drive - and in the long run they told me it's OEM and I have to contact the point of purchase. Of course Best Buy won't do anything about it.

The data on the drive is still intact. All I need is the connector repaired. Does anyone know of a company or person that might be able to repair this? I already tried Seagate, and they quoted me at $1500 US to get the data off the drive. (but they claim they won't repair it) I simply cannot believe that a simple little piece of plastic would render my expensive drive unusable! In the future, I'll be sticking with IDE!

Thanks for your help

[Narci]

Hello fellow Redflag'ers!

Hope someone can help. A couple of months ago I broke my sata connector on my Seagate HD. The plastic of the connector broke right off, and all that is left is copper connectors. Obviously I can no longer connect a sata cable to it. (which attaches to the motherboard) I broke it when I was making room to add another ide drive...I was pulling it off normally too.

The lovely part about it is that it's from a Compaq Presario SR2030NX - and has no warranty. (it was a replacement for another computer that has since run out of warranty) I contacted Seagate about the drive - and in the long run they told me it's OEM and I have to contact the point of purchase. Of course Best Buy won't do anything about it.

The data on the drive is still intact. All I need is the connector repaired. Does anyone know of a company or person that might be able to repair this? I already tried Seagate, and they quoted me at $1500 US to get the data off the drive. (but they claim they won't repair it) I simply cannot believe that a simple little piece of plastic would render my expensive drive unusable! In the future, I'll be sticking with IDE!

Thanks for your help

I think what seagate would do is transplat the platters into a new drive case. That's why it cost so much. Beaisde, data recovery always cost alot.

No way you can glue the plastic piece off enought to grab the data off it?

IDE is no different..one bent pin can fall out and cause the same problem.

Have you tried best buy or are you assuming they won't help?

[zuberal]

Thanks for your reply. The plastic piece disappeared actually. I'm in the process of cleaning up the area and hoping I'll come across it. It looked like it was smaller than the traditional L shape though.

Ya, I tried Best Buy - they told me to take a hike. lol I'm thinking I may give HP a try, however I have a feeling they may tell me return to POP as well.

[TenzoR]

maybe you can swap the controller board with another seagate of the same drive/same firmware ... I'm not sure how plausible that is with newer sata drives but ppl have done it for IDE drives

[Ojam]

can you tape or glue the cable right to the drive so that it keeps contact long enough to get the data off?

[zuberal]

Thanks for your suggestions!

Hmmm...I found the L shaped connector on the floor. How lucky! Looks like I "could" glue it. I was thinking super glue, but then we all know what kind of mess that might make...and if a big gets on the connector, I doubt very much there will be much talking between the cable and drive. lol

Can anyone suggest an electronics safe type of epoxy or glue? It looks like I could macgyver this and perform an operation with the right glue and tools.

Alternatively I could just push the L shaped connector right into the cable, and then push it onto the connector on the drive, and hope for the best!?

[zuberal]

I'm a bad one for not waiting! I slipped the broken L shape piece and stuck it into the Sata cable, then connected it to the drive! It worked!

It's pretty loose though - but at least I can get my 30 gigs of data off. It would be nice to still glue it though, or find a perm solution so I don't lose a 200 gig drive.

Any help with the type of electronic safe glue would come in handy!

Thanks everyone!