latest news about Dolphin data lab data recovery tools, data recovery training courses, data recovery solutions.

Dolphin Notice of National Day Holiday October 1-8 2025

Please be kindly informed that Dolphin Data Lab Headquarter will be closed for Chinese National Day from October 1st to October 8th, 2025. Our office will re-open for business on Thursday, October 9th 2025.

During the holiday period, we will continue to check and answer emails but orders of Dolphin hdd repair tools and data recovery tools will be arranged to ship after the holiday period. Remote technical support service will not be available during this time either.

For more information about Dolphin Data Lab’s products and services, please email to sales[@]dolphindatalab.com or add Dolphin teams ID with the same email.

Happy Birthday China!

Dolphin Data Lab Overseas Team

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WD SMR Drive Selective Head Image Steps

For many WD SMR patient drives, the weak heads or bad sectors data recovery cases are very common and selective head image is very necessary and used a lot.

To run selective head image for WD SMR drives, users can follow the steps below:

01: Unlock the SA by writing unlock rom or swap the original PCB with firmware unlock PCB;
02: Disable 411 in kernel mode and restart firmware;
03: Backup T2Data and module 190;
04: Set up disk image task, select Head Map and select 190 or T2 data to set up head map;
05: After head map is set up, users can select good heads to image first and then weak heads.

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WD SMR Drive Module 190 Backup Tips

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To recover lost data from Western Digital SMR hard drives, one of the most important steps is to backup the module 190 successfully.

For WD SMR drives’ data recovery cases, it is very common the module 190 backup may fail due to its large size, bad sectors or weak heads, etc. At this situation, users can follow the instructions below to increase the success rate of module 190 backup. Besides, users need to be very careful of the right steps to backup module 190.

WD SMR drives have MCU lock, users need to remove the MCU lock by the following methods:

01: Remove MCU lock by writing unlock ROM;
02: Remove MCU lock by firmware unlock PCB.

WD SMR Drives Module 190 Backup Steps:

01: Remove MCU lock;
02: Enter DFL-WD firmware repair software and disable 411;
03: Re-enter the WD software and backup the module 190 and other important firmware modules; When users are reading the module 190, users have the following modes to read the module 190 successfully:

Mode 1: Read 190 of copy 0 by ABA fully;
Mode 2: Read 190 of copy 1 by ABA fully;
Mode 3: Read 190 valid data only of copy 0 by ABA fully;
Mode 4: Read 190 valid data only of copy 1 by ABA fully;
Mode 5: Read 190 fully by ID;
Mode 6: Read 190 valid data only by ID.

Users can select different modes to read the module 190 successfully according to the hard drive diagnosis. If users have deleted or formatted data data to recover, it’s better to backup the 190 fully. But if there’re read errors during reading 190, users can try valid data only backup.

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WD SMR Formatted HDD 1.5T Data Recovered From 0.03GB Patient HDD by Module 190 Auto Repair

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To recover lost data from WD SMR formatted HDD, the PC users need to stop the power immediately and stop working on it any further, specially stop writing any new data on the formatted hdd. As for data recovery engineers, they need to bypass the firmware read(disable 411) firstly, backup the important firmware modules, specially the module 190.

HDD Firmware Repair Tools and Data Recovery Tools Required To recover lost data from formatted WD SMR HDDs:

DFL-WD HDD Firmware Repair Tool
DFL-DDP Data Recovery Equipment

Steps to recover lost data from WD SMR Formatted HDD:

01: MCU unlock by writing unlock ROM with HDD ROM chip pin reader or swap with firmware unlock PCB;
02: Enter secured firmware operations mode to avoid the dynamic translator corruption;
03: Backup the dynamic translator module 190 and repair 190 automatically to get a good copy of T2Data;
04: Accelerate the firmware loading process;
05: Test firmware modules and repair found corrupted modules;
06: Load T2Data to RAM(Auto mode) to access the data area fully.

The following are some example videos or related videos to recover lost data from WD SMR formatted HDDs:

WD SMR HDD Palmer 800066 800069 Format Data Recovery
WD SMR HDD 1.5T Data Recovered From 0.03GB Patient HDD by Module 190 Auto Repair

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DFL WD HDD Firmware Repair Highlight Functions and Solutions

The following are the DFL WD HDD Firmware Repair Highlight Functions and Solutions for a higher success rate of Western Digital hdd data recovery cases.

01: Support unlock firmware area for many new WD SMR HDDs;
02: Easy firmware module test and repair;
03: Shift modules to new empty tracks, change module location to fix SA bad sector issue;
04: Very easy common slow fix repair for new and old wd drives;
05: Easy head map editing in RAM;
06: Easy smartware unlock;
07: Repair weak heads by adjusting heads’ working temperature;
08: Easy head adaptive parameters swap to get head swap more successful;
09: Easy rom regeneration for old wd drives before smr drives;
10: Easy firmware failure bypassing to repair busy undetected drives;

Read full list of highlight feature by the following video demo:

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DFL Seagate HDD Firmware Repair Highlight Functions and Solutions

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The following are the DFL Seagate HDD Firmware Repair Highlight Functions and Solutions for a higher success rate of Seagate hdd data recovery cases.

01: Easy switch from quick firmware repair solutions(DFL-DDP data recovery equipment) and professional firmware repair solutions(DFL-Seagate firmware repair software);
02: Support unlock rom generation for many new seagate hdd families and models and unlock the firmware area successfully;
03: Read full list of highlight feature by the following video demo:

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New Seagate and WD HDD Unlock ROM Generation Success Sharing

ST2000lm009 2023 unlock rom generation success;
WD20SDRW 2022 unlock rom generation success;

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Windows 11 Driver is Available for HDD ROM Chip Pin Reader

The latest Windows 11 driver for the HDD ROM chip pin reader is available worldwide for all Dolphin users who are using the following two products:

Hard Drive ROM Chip Clip Programmer Smart
Chip-on HDD Flash Programmer Smart

The HDD rom chip pin reader helps users to read ROM from ROM chip directly while the ROM is still on the PCB without soldering the ROM chip off. For traditional flash program, users need to solder the rom chip off the PCB, put the ROM chip to the chip holder and then users can read and write the ROM to chip.

With this innovative pin reader, users can simply connect the reading pins to the ROM chip pins and then users can read and write the ROM at high speed. Users don’t need to solder the ROM chip at all. Users can save a lot of time on soldering and at the same time, users can protect the chip maximally.

HDD rom chip pin reader is one mini and USB flash programmer, users just simply connect the programmer console to pc by USB without connecting external power supply cable and users can use some shortcut keys to read and write rom simply.

What are included in this HDD rom chip pin reader when users receive the package?

01: USB cable;
02: Programmer hardware console;
03: Pin reader/Reading pins (Innovative reading solution), two pieces for two sizes of ROM chips;
04: Chip holders, two pieces, one for small sized ROM chip and the other for bigger sized ROM chip. This one is usually not used, few chips may need to be read by chip holder.

Dolphin users can request this new driver for Windows 11 from your sales representative or email to support[at]dolphindatalab.com to get it.

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Data Recovery Tools Request from Nigeria

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Dolphin Data Lab has shipped all the data recovery hardware tools to data recovery engineers, IT specialists, digital forensic investigators worldwide by DHL express, Fedex, EMS, etc and many users in Africa are also using Dolphin data recovery tools with good success rate.

The following is one new client from Nigeria asking for hdd firmware repair tools purchase from Dolphin Data Lab:

‘Dear Dolphin Data Lab Sales Team,
I am interested in purchasing the DFL Hard Drive Refurbishing Suite (DFL-SRP USB3.0 All-In-One) and would like to request a detailed quote for a configuration that supports all available hard drive brands, including Seagate, Western Digital, Hitachi/IBM, Samsung, and Toshiba/Fujitsu, for both desktop and laptop drives. I understand this suite can refurbish three drives simultaneously (2 SATA, 1 IDE) and up to four additional drives with the included gift power controller board.
Could you please provide the following details:
Confirmation that purchasing the All-In-One suite includes support for all listed brands (Seagate, WD, Hitachi/IBM, Samsung, Toshiba/Fujitsu) without requiring additional purchases for brand-specific modules.
Whether the suite includes or requires a subscription feature (e.g., for software updates, technical support, or firmware resources) and, if so, the details of the subscription model, including costs and duration.
The total cost for the suite with support for all listed brands, including hardware, software, cables, adapters, firmware resources, and manuals.
Shipping costs and estimated delivery time to Kaduna, Nigeria, via DHL Express or other methods.
Information on whether additional power controller boards can be included for refurbishing more drives simultaneously, and their cost.
Confirmation of the two-year free software updates and support, and clarification on post-warranty update/support fees (e.g., $200/year for updates and $200/year for support, as mentioned online).
I am located in Kaduna, Nigeria. Please let me know if any additional information is required for the purchase process (e.g., specific documentation for international shipping). Kindly provide a proforma invoice with payment options (bank transfer or PayPal) and any other relevant details.
Thank you for your assistance, and I look forward to your prompt response.
Best regards,

Kaduna, Nigeria’

Each client will have one sales manager to give the best sales and technique support. Users can check the email for detailed reply, sometimes the spam box needs to be checked too.

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ST4000NM0035 HDD Firmware Repair and Data Recovery Steps

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This is one successful ST4000NM0035 HDD Firmware Repair and Data Recovery case study for one Dolphin user in India.

Patient HDD ID:

Model : ST4000NM0035 03X4440 LENOVO
Serial : ZC187T35
Firmware : LJ87
Capacity : 7814037168 (3726.02GB)
0Bytes
Sector size : 0Bytes
Heads number : 7

FW version : MFAND29B1.LXN1.BW0B61.LJ87
FW package P/N : 100826175

Patient HDD Failure:

The data area was not accessed
MFT was damaged

HDD Repair Tools and Data Recovery Tools used in this case study:

DFL-Seagate hdd repair tool
DFL-DDP data recovery hardware tool

ST4000NM0035 HDD Firmware Repair and Data Recovery Steps:

01: ST4000NM0035 ROM backup and Unlock rom generation;
(This hdd requires one different method to generate the unlock rom, Dolphin users can select mode 2)
02: Write unlock rom and send unlock key to unlock the ST4000NM0035 patient HDD successfully;
03: Backup important Sys files;
04: Fix the translator issue: clear V4 and smart and then regenerate translator;
05: Fix the common slow issue;
06: Enter DFL-DDP data recovery software and scan lost partitions reversely for NTFS;
07: Easily found and recovered all lost data.

Users can watch Dolphin data recovery video channel here to see how Dolphin data recovery tools recover different storage medias at high success rate.

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