just read that if the board has the dip switch's its the non backlit machine

well the case says m5126 , but board has dip switch's !!! - darn

is there a way to tell if the screen is backlit - should I open it up

the hard drives - 1 works ( the one in the backlit) the other does not

they both spin up, and they both have some brown grease/goo on the side of them

I opened them both up to have a look - the goo seems to be mostly on the outside. what the hell is that stuff - I see no sealing gasket...is that goo the remains of the seal?

I took off the control board of the non working drive and found loads of that goo between the pcb and the body of the drive, along with a thin layer of grey foam - the foam was rotton and goo'ed to bits - so cleaned it all out - still no sign of life from that drive

both drives appear identical so thinking of swapping control boards to see if that will make it work. on the non working drive I tried it with the cover off - platter spins up, head lock solenoid opend but head just sits there - no movement. I powered down and moved head to a different position, powered up - plater spins up, lock opens and head shoots back to previous position. I checked for 'goo' on the arms coils (between the magnets) but it all seems ok. movement seems ok,

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if that still does not work does anyone have any info on what to do - and what to do about that brown goo -

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cheers again folks