I bricked my LG WH14NS40 1.03N (2018) drive... Here's my story, what I tried, with source code. Any help is appreciated!

[OneDay]

JB8 motherboard shows a May 2015 date

Both my LG WH16NS40 and LG WH16NS60 main boards have JB8 2015.05.08 printed on it. So the board is correct. Have you tried files from Downgrade Enabled Firmware V.2 folder? If you want I can work on your board if you want to send it to me.

[NightWolve]

JB8 motherboard shows a May 2015 date

Both my LG WH16NS40 and LG WH16NS60 main boards have JB8 2015.05.08 printed on it. So the board is correct. Have you tried files from Downgrade Enabled Firmware V.2 folder? If you want I can work on your board if you want to send it to me.

Here's how I screwed up again (another funny story!):

* I found a HL BH40N PC drive on 4/3/2026 for $45 used (so $50 +tax)! LAST ONE that seller had in his stock
https://www.ebay.com/itm/236252119406

* Not knowing the value, not knowing it has the SAME JB8 2015.05.08 chip which you can see in the photos, I innocently shared it in a gamer discord I hang out at! Basically just blogging my experience, trying to shop for a replacement drive...

* The astronomical odds worked against me yet again. Little did I know there happened to be one guy in the chat that knew about the JB8 chip, knew about your forum, knew about all the fan firmware mods to make them UHD friendly! So he bought it before I could realize the full potential for a fix on my unit! I turned it away because my mindset was just buying a full replacement, keeping the old unit around until SDFTool gets more advanced to solve cases like this years in the future...

* So NOW I realize what I missed out on (took me some to catch up), buying another unit to ALSO fix mine and wind up with potentially 2 UHD flashed units in the present!

- So my chip inside the WH14NS40 is flashed to the final/official BU40N 1.05N desktop firmware, right?
- If I had bought that BH40N PC drive, which has the SAME chip, and took my chip out, put it in that unit, it should fire right up, begin working again, because it'd be connected to a BU40N laser and eject mechanism, right??
- If the chip is in a working state again, in the right unit, I'd be allowed another flash attempt with everything, DosFlasher included, because it won't be in emergency mode anymore, the flash I/O should be fully working again. I could then wrongly flash it to the WH14NS40 firmware, take it out, put it back in my WH14NS40 unit, and in theory kill 2 birds with one stone.
- Upgrade them both to UHD, resell the one, get my money back plus spare change, and move on!

Alas, I stupidly gave the deal away and now you can only find an old BH40N for $65 that's the 2011/JB7 chipset outside ebay and another eBay seller sold their last one for higher at $90, so... CAN'T WIN!!!

Yeah, maybe I'll send you my chip... If you're sure, as for now I'm trying the yahoo auction sites, but there's no BH40N models there, it's just about a total replacement. I'm not optimistic since I have to register with buyee and play with sniping/auctions... I just didn't know those BH40N PC drives had the SAME chip when I gave the deal away... : (

EDIT: Never mind, I screwed up again. That plan wouldn't have worked! It would've just been a replacement drive for $50. My eyes mixed up BU40N versus BH40N!!! That's the difference between slim and standard 5.25" drives.... My chip is locked into the slim firmware AND encrypted now AND it protects itself, not letting you flash downwards, only with the same wrong version using the hack I shared earlier... CAN'T WIN!

UPDATE: The person who bought that BH40N was tricked by a scammer with old/BH40N/JB8 photos, it was a BH30N/JB7 from 2011 all along, no dice, he lost:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/236252119406