There are many reasons you may want or need to take apart your Samsung Story drive; maybe the drive has failed and you wish to use the caddy for another disk, or maybe the caddy has failed and you intend to use the Samsung Spinpoint HDD inside in another caddy or PC – either way it may not seem at all obvious how to break the device down so I have prepared this guide.Click images for larger view
Tools
– You will need three tools for this job, a couple of different screwdrivers one normal screwdriver suitable for PC tower case screws and another small one, as well as a T5 Torx driver.Step One – Remove Outer Casing
There are four Torx screws holding the outer casing to the chassis. Use the T5 Torx driver to remove these four screws and set them aside. The first time they are unscrewed they can be a little stiff so apply some extra pressure if need be but be careful not to damage them (or you may find yourself needing to drill them out).Once the screws are remove simply lift the outer casing off the chassis.
Step Two – Remove The Plastic Cage
Take a look and you will notice that the drive is now contained within a plastic cage (or frame), this will need to be removed.At three points along the side of the chassis you can pinch the plastic cage (the upper part) and pull gently upwards which will release the cage from the rest of the chassis. You do not need to apply a great deal of pressure but even if you do there is little chance of causing damage.
Pinch along the length of the frame, lifting it slightly as you go until you can confidently remove it.
Step Three – Observe
Look to the bottom end of the and you will see the USB/SATA bridge board. DO NOT LIFT FROM THIS END – if you do you could damage the board, casing or the power and data connectors on the drive itself.Step Four – Lift Out The Hard Disk Drive
At the opposite end is where we need to lift the hard drive from the chassis.
Look at the top, on either side you will notice to black lumps of rubber holding the drive in position within the chassis.
You need to lift at these points.
Keep the drive at an angle, lift and pull away from the chassis so the the power and USB connectors on the bridge board at the other end of the drive pull away from the chassis thus avoiding damage.
Step Five – Remove The Bridge Board
Turn the drive over, exposing it’s underside and lay it flat next to the chassis.
You need now to carefully unplug the black wire will connected to the chassis.
Simply pull it back towards the opposite end of the drive and place it within the chassis.
The chassis can now be put aside and you can move on to the next step.
Step Six – Remove The Bridge Board
Pull the Bridge Board away from the drive and set it aside – move on to Step Seven
Step Seven – Remove Rubber Grommets and Screws
On either side of the drive are large black rubber (or silicone?) grommets. These can be easily pulled off without any force.Once removed you will see four small black screws upon which the grommets were positioned.
Using your small screwdriver unscrew these. As before they may be quite stiff so use some force being careful not to damage the heads as these will not be fun to drill out either.
Conclusion
You have now removed the hard disk drive from the USB enclosure in just 7 steps. Depending on your reasons for dismantling you Samsung Station Story External Hard Drive you can now reuse the hard disk in another PC or enclosure or repurpose the enclosure with another hard disk drive.The drive I was working on however is still useless. Following a power issue the USB/SATA bridge was fried. I was aiming to reutilise the standard 3.5” Samsung Spinpoint in another PC however the drive was detected within Windows and then promptly ground to a halt and died, therefore neither the enclosure or hard disk are of any use now and are headed for recycling.
Ah well, at least this guide is the ‘something good’ that came out of it!
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