WH14NS40 no longer showing signs of life after flashing

[RadioactivePickle1]

Hi, I recently bought this drive that was listed as not reading discs but mechanically working. And after cleaning and testing the drive, and still not reading Blu-rays or CDs. I tried using the SDF tool flasher. Two upgrade the firmware to the latest compatible makeMKV firmware for this drive and now the drive is showing no signs of life, no power LED not ejecting discs and no spinning. But it is still showing up in windows and in the flasher, but when I try to change or downgrade the firmware, it gives me this error and in the flasher, it’s showing up as a completely different drive instead of being the WH14NS40 it’s showing up as the HL-DT-ST_BD-RE_BFSONB40. I even tried using the firmware from the downgrade enable firmware’s V2 pack. And the software it came with and that just showed a progress bar that never moved past zero. So any help with figuring out how to fix the drive or if i need to cutting my losses would be much appreciated.

[MartyMcNuts]

Hi, I recently bought this drive that was listed as not reading discs but mechanically working. And after cleaning and testing the drive, and still not reading Blu-rays or CDs. I tried using the SDF tool flasher. Two upgrade the firmware to the latest compatible makeMKV firmware for this drive and now the drive is showing no signs of life, no power LED not ejecting discs and no spinning. But it is still showing up in windows and in the flasher, but when I try to change or downgrade the firmware, it gives me this error and in the flasher, it’s showing up as a completely different drive instead of being the WH14NS40 it’s showing up as the HL-DT-ST_BD-RE_BFSONB40. I even tried using the firmware from the downgrade enable firmware’s V2 pack. And the software it came with and that just showed a progress bar that never moved past zero. So any help with figuring out how to fix the drive or if i need to cutting my losses would be much appreciated.

First of all, I hope you have made sure this drive is actually compatible for flashing? It must be manufactured from 2916+, have the MT1959 drive platform and the SVC NS50 code on the drive's label.

Now, you did the exact thing that is warned about.

You have flashed a 5.25" desktop drive with slim drive firmware!! The exact wrong thing to do!!!

Use the recover method of SDFtool Flasher but first, make sure there is no disc in the drive.

Run SDFtool Flasher and:

1. Choose the drive
2. Select recover
3. In the pop-up window select the current (wrong) firmware that's on the drive
4. In the normal firmware selection drop down box, choose WH16NS60 1.02-MK
5. Press start

[RadioactivePickle1]

Hi, thank you for your reply. The drive I am currently using is compatible with flashing. I double checked on the label and in the software before proceeding with flashing. I tried the recovery process in the software multiple times, even tried running the flasher in administrator mode and still having the same result with the drive showing no signs of life and still showing it is a slim drive. I even tried reading the current firmware on it and even that is saying it’s one of the slim drives.

[MartyMcNuts]

Hi, thank you for your reply. The drive I am currently using is compatible with flashing. I double checked on the label and in the software before proceeding with flashing. I tried the recovery process in the software multiple times, even tried running the flasher in administrator mode and still having the same result with the drive showing no signs of life and still showing it is a slim drive. I even tried reading the current firmware on it and even that is saying it’s one of the slim drives.

Of course it is showing as a slim drive... BECAUSE YOU FLASHED SLIM DRIVE FIRMWARE TO IT!!!!!


The RECOVER process works, I've done it many times myself when testing and plenty of others have used it to recover their drives. Obviously you are not doing it right. Follow the steps EXACTLY. Each window that opens says what to do in it's title bar.

What is the name of the firmweare file you have currently flashed to the drive? It had better be a MK firmware file!

[RadioactivePickle1]

The firmware that the drive is saying it has currently installed is HL-DT-ST-BD-RE_BP50NB40-NB50-1.03-NM00800-212005070917 the and the only time I got the drive the show signs of life is when I put the LG slim firmware on it, but even then it just boots for a second and spins up the disk. All other recovery/writing attempts to the drive with all different kinds of firmware show. No difference in the drives behavior. And I double check the forums to make sure I was doing the recovery process correct as well.

[MartyMcNuts]

The firmware that the drive is saying it has currently installed is HL-DT-ST-BD-RE_BP50NB40-NB50-1.03-NM00800-212005070917 the and the only time I got the drive the show signs of life is when I put the LG slim firmware on it, but even then it just boots for a second and spins up the disk. All other recovery/writing attempts to the drive with all different kinds of firmware show. No difference in the drives behavior. And I double check the forums to make sure I was doing the recovery process correct as well.

That error in your image means there is a disc in the drive. REMOVE IT before doing any flashing/recovery.

The only bit of information youu should be looking at on the forum for this issue is the first post of the SDFTool flasher thread. It tells you exactly what to do and even has a gif showing the recover process. Follow the gif, just use WH16NS60 1.02-MK instead of the BU40N firmware shown in the gif.