WDMyBook3TB SATA-USB Board (Help PLEASE)

So a couple months back my MyBook had failed. After some later diagnostics, I found that the power supply and the hard drive were still functional, only leaving the SATA-to-USB daughter-board as the failure point. I have kept the drive as there is still some footage I would really really like to recover.

Why don’t you just plug the drive straight into a sata port on your computer?

That’s the thing. When doing that, Windows sees it as an empty drive. After further inquiry, I found that the SATA-to-USB daughter-board encrypts the data as well. The boards for this product are specified as a certain product code (xxxx-xxxx-xxx-xxxxx-xxxx), but after that there is another input called form. The form of my board is AE. (There are other forms like AA, AB, AC, AD, etc…). Here is where you come in with knowledge and help.

Are those encryption-keys the same with every type of form?      Because if so, then I should be able to buy the same board, same product key and form, and get my data back no problem.

-OR-

Are those encryption-keys different for every single board?     Because if so, then that **bleep**. I lost my data (and I ain’t spending $1000 to get it back) and I get an extra 3TB in my system.

See if this helps expalain things  http://community.wd.com/t5/Off-Topic-Discussions/Bridge-Boards/td-p/353839 Check out the posts by fzabkar he is the only one who understands the boards. You can also try sending him a PM.

Joe

I have the exact problem, I’m on the lookout for defective units of this sort. To try a working board on my drive. I dont want to purchase a drive as well since it will be expensive for me(no to mention it’s hard to find the exact model nowadays).

The bridge boards are not uniquely matched to a particular drive. However, you must use a compatible PCB with the same bridge IC, and the firmware version probably needs to match. It would be safest to use a PCB from a product of the same capacity.

The bridge firmware looks for a “key sector” near the end of the drive, just beyond the SmartWare VCD. This key enables the firmware to decrypt the data. Therefore you must not overwrite this sector. When the drive is inside its enclosure, the bridge firmware hides this reserved area from the user, but when the drive is outside its enclosure, this area is exposed.