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I mean can you apply the builder partially or wrong

Yes. If you don't follow the instructions exactly and get hyperterminal working at the right moment, you might miss the "disk appears to be already built" prompt and not be able to press the Enter key at the correct moment to make it format the disk properly.

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Anything I can try before I send the drive back?

Triple and quadruple-check every single possible known failure mode listed here. For example, I don't recall you saying anything about the serial boot up messages related to the CS4231A chip. How do we know it's good?
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Tony Fabris