NASA purchased thousands of computers containing 10GB and 20GB Quantum
AS series hard drives, some of which are prone to failure due to head problems.
When ESS received the first few cases, we admittedly did not have a solution.
Head replacement did not allow us to access the data, but curiously changed
the symptoms of the drive operation. We immediately ordered 40 similar drives
from 3 companies that stock older model drives. We then got to work to figure
out the problem. Within a few days we discovered that the heads in these
drives can fail prematurely, causing damage to track -1, sometimes called
on-disk firmware or modules. Not only did the heads have to be replaced
in such models, but extensive firmware repair was needed. Within a couple
of days we had written three programs to quick-fix these drives after the
heads had been replaced.
On a routine basis, ESS Data Recovery recovers data from two of NASA's
locations, Johnson Space Center in Houston and Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
ESS has extensively developed their recovery ability of Maxtor and Quantum
hard drives as a result. Head failure and firmware problems are commonly
associated with certain older models, such as Quantum Fireball AS and Maxtor
Poker family.
