Mac OS x - External hard drive panic!! Please help.
JonDoe
Posts: 31,598 Forum Member
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Oh god! This could be bad.
I'm using a MacBook with OSX 10.4.11
I've just foolishly unplugged my USB hard drive and got the scary 'device removal' message.
I've tried plugging it back in and my computer can't find it. I've tried turning it off and on again. I've tried shutting the computer down and everything obvious but it's still not appearing.
The hard drive is the backup of every bit of work I've ever done, can someone please give me some suggestions of how to find it please?
Thank you in advance.
I'm using a MacBook with OSX 10.4.11
I've just foolishly unplugged my USB hard drive and got the scary 'device removal' message.
I've tried plugging it back in and my computer can't find it. I've tried turning it off and on again. I've tried shutting the computer down and everything obvious but it's still not appearing.
The hard drive is the backup of every bit of work I've ever done, can someone please give me some suggestions of how to find it please?
Thank you in advance.
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I've just tried my other hard drive (the same model) with the same USB cable and it appears straight away.
I think I'm f**ked.
Or alternatively go to the apple menu > About this mac and click More info... and check under USB for any detected devices.
Willith, I tried the About this Mac thing and it can see the drive, it just won't mount. I've tried repairing it with Disk Utility on it and it's telling me this:
Verify and Repair disk “BRICK_ONE”
** /dev/disk2s1
** Phase 1 - Read FAT
Unable to read FAT (Input/output error)
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
1 non HFS volume checked
1 volume could not be repaired because of an error
Lesson learned jagger2k, I'll back it all up if I manage to get it back.
I'm ashamed to say that was my backup......So not really backup.
There's about ten years worth of design/illustration/animation on there. I have bits of it elsewhere but that's the only place I have everything all together - Development work, layered files etc.
I've worked with macs and pc's for a long time and believe me i've seen my fair share of accidents.. What you're describing leads me to two conclusions..
#1) The amount of people that say they unplugged something and it blew up, if i was paid a pound for every time i'd heard it, i'd be a rich man by now.. In order for me to get this error fixed and your data back, i need to know you're not fibbin to cover your own back at being daft and accidental... Trust me, no-one here will judge you any different if you change your story, mainly because we've all done somethin monumentously stupid ourselves and tried to cover it up... most of the time its how we learnt what not to do with a PC :P hehe...
If you're telling the truth and you did just unplug the device without stopping it, then sorry for questioning you, but having been trying to diagnose similar faults only to discover that someone tried to feed the drive coffee cuz it was thirsty, i like to know all the hard facts first
#2) Basing on the facts given, your HDD caddy that houses the drive has failed/fried when it was removed from the mac. As the mac's USB ports are all powered, a simple choice of removing something while the port is powered could spark and knock it out. You said you had another HDD caddy there thats the same?? open them both up and exchange the drives and try the proven working one with the duff drive, if you still get the same response, then it looks like your drive is blown, time to get it to the data recovery people sharpish and be prepared to pay upwards of £1000 to get your info back.
If it does work, then all you need to do is get another caddy shell and all is good
Hope i can help, if you need any more advice, just PM me and i'll get back to you asap..
Jonno
i'd read that again... he's stated he has bits of it elsewhere, i'd probably guess that he brought it to backup then ended up using it as a main drive.
Though these are compatible with both windows and Mac OS for reading and writing to, it is not as reliable as much newer drive formats such as NTFS and HFS+.
Whilst NTFS and HFS+ support journaling (where error in data can easily be fixed) FAT32 drives need to be scanned using a utility like scandisk in windows and and any errors found must be corrected.
Presumably you never formatted your drive but pliugged it in and used it straight away. there is a reason why it came preformatted as FAT32 - Simply because most OS's support it. But it is old (back from windows 98 i believe).
NTFS is a format developed by microsoft and only windows has good read/write support. Mac OS can only read NTFS drives but not write to them.
HFS+ was developed by apple (correct me if im wrong). It has read/write support in Mac OS. Windows cannot even read this format but with third party software such as MacDrive 6 (google it) you can safely read and write to it in windows.
You need to decide whats the best format for you to use - a decision mainly based on what OS you primarily use.
For your situation now, the next best thing i can suggest is try running scan disc on it from windows. Seeing as it was a format long used by Microsoft you will get the best support through that and third party utilities on windows me thinks.
Hope this helps you i understand what you are going through! Your data should be retrievable!
No, never.
The only PC I have is rubbish. I've tried plugging the hard drive in that and it took twenty minutes to tell me 'Drive E isn't ready'.
no, it's his original data. he is confusing his terms.
where did it tell you 'its not ready'?
i would burn a UltimateBootCD, and see what is actually on this HD. It could be dead.
Honestly, that's all I did. I came in to charge my phone up and unplugged the drive without thinking. Realised my mistake immediately, plugged it straight back in and it didn't mount. Panicked a bit and then posted in here. No liquid was involved.
Oh god, I don't like the sound of that.
Thanks for the advice Jonno but I really can't start taking things to bits, I'll only make it worse. I don't have the first clue where to start. I can't even find the screw holes on it.
It just didn't work. Spluttered for ages then said it couldn't open the drive/something/something technical. Then ten minutes later it said Drive E wasn't ready. It's a shit old laptop that hardly works.
I can't open that link.