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[garyopa]

QUOTE(slimgrip @ Apr 15 2007, 05:46 AM)

So you can remove this EliteMT chip & leave it off or does it need to be replaced?

If you have a dead board due to power-surge or static-charge and you don't
have a backup of the "drive key", removing the shorten EliteMT chip, will allow
you to DUMP the firmware using normal MTKFLASH ways, and of course afterwards
you would need to replace the EliteMT chip with a working one, but you know have
have your "drive key", so you can flash a replacement drive, which is easier than
finding a replacement cache RAM chip from "EliteMT".

[slimgrip]

QUOTE(garyopa @ Apr 15 2007, 05:02 PM)

If you have a dead board due to power-surge or static-charge and you don't
have a backup of the "drive key", removing the shorten EliteMT chip, will allow
you to DUMP the firmware using normal MTKFLASH ways, and of course afterwards
you would need to replace the EliteMT chip with a working one, but you know have
have your "drive key", so you can flash a replacement drive, which is easier than
finding a replacement cache RAM chip from "EliteMT".

Thanks for the clarification Gary

Much appreciated

[garyopa]

QUOTE(Langoman @ Apr 16 2007, 07:41 AM)

Hi man!

Does it work on a Hitachi 78 bricked drive? During the flash my PC freezes and bricked my drive, I got no eject, no spin disc and my 360 flashes red lights when the is connected. I heard around Internet about a external programmer, what's that stuff? Can I build one or I must to buy?

Thanks for any help.

This topic is regarding Toshiba/Samsung drives.

And my posting regarding removing the "EliteMT" chip on a power-surged drive only works on
Toshiba/Samsung MS25 and MS28 drives to help in dumping the firmware to get your drive key.

In your case, most times only an "external programmer" can save a Bricked Hitachi drive.

Two things you can try for a "Bricked Hitachi" is:

#1: A company call "Chilliflash" makes a recovery chip called "Chillifix" and it takes 12 wires to
      solder, and can help in bringing your drive back into ModeB to finish the flashing.
      (Personally I had no luck using this chip, but others including Maximus had no problems with it).
      (Don't know if the company still sells it or if their latest offering works on v78 drives).

#2: Depending on the stage were the flashing failed, you might be able to get the drive back into
      ModeB, even if the tray does not eject, by manually opening the tray and making sure it does
      not auto-close on power-up by holding it until it decides to stay open.
      (Then boot directly into windows and if your drive is there continue the flashing).

[JagStone]

QUOTE(Langoman @ Apr 16 2007, 12:41 PM)

I heard around Internet about a external programmer, what's that stuff? Can I build one or I must to buy?

Being able to use an external programmer is only really useful if you've got one lying around the house anyway It's dead easy as long as you're comfortable removing the firmware EEPROM and programming it seperately from the board (and then soldering it back on) but there should be some way of doing it without having to hack around this much...can you get to vias on all the EEPROM signals on a v78 board? (I only have earlier Hitachis here, so I can't check)

If you're not happy with the above, pay someone else to do it. Way easier As long as you have a copy of the original firmware it should be dead easy to just flash back on.

Stone

[Beta-Man]

I had a very similar problem: floppy disk went unreadable on me during flash. Since I used a PCI SATA card, and reflashing with 10-second trick didn't work, I swapped it into another PC and it reflashed fine. Maybe you'd want to try another PC, if you can.