Disk Utility killed my external hard drive

I was having a problem with not being able to erase files from my external WD 2T MY passport HDD, and so I decided to use disk utility. Now the drive won't mount. When I run disk utility now, this is what I get. Please help. I have many files on there which I need. I can live with buying a new drive, but I can't recover the files if the drive won't mount.

Thanks for all the comments. It looks like my drive is heading to the big round up in the sky. But I am able to copy the files off of it to other drives . So I went out and bought a new drive which I am using. My new question, which is related, I use this for my Time Machine files. Is there a way to migrate those files to the new drive, or do I just start over from zero? Thanks

Similar Messages

  • Can I Use Disk Utility from an External Hard Drive?

    I would like to use Disk Utility to verify and/or repair my hard drive. I am too lazy to run this from my install disk. Can I merely copy the application to my external hard drive and launch it from there? Would this work successfully? Could it damage anything? Thanks!

    Hi! You can't repair a disk that you are booted from so you could run the repair disk function IF you are booted from another volume such as a bootable internal or external drive or the install disc. You'll have to clone your boot drive and repair from the clone after booting to it. Tom

  • Can I move old video footage from Disk Utility to an external hard drive, to free up space?

    I have a lot of old videos of my students located on Disk Utility.
    I need to free up memory, so am wondering if I can move these videos to an external hard drive.
    From time to time, I need to access these old videos, either to show to a new choreographer or to pull out  a clip for a grant proposal, so I don't want to totally lose access to them.
    Thanks so very much!!!

    What's the file extension of the DVD in question located in Disk Utility? That's why I was asking for a screenshot. Is that .cdr? Can you do a File>Save As? If it's .cdr can you try dragging it to the external. Doesn't have to go to Disk Utility. Can just be to a folder there. As you drag it does it show with a + inside a green circle? That will mean it's copying it, but leaving the original in place. If it can be moved successfully, you can then remove the original from Disk Utility.
    Or just copy (drag) it to your Desktop, then move it over to a folder on the external.
    Message was edited by: WZZZ

  • Using Mac Disk Utility to format external hard drive

    Now that I’ve got the LaCie d2 Quadra and am ready to use it, I’m looking for a little guide to using the Mac Disk Utility to format it.
    Can anybody point me in the right direction?
    many thanks
    BAC
    iMac 27'/5750/SD
    2.8GHZ QUAD-CORE INTEL CORE I5
    8GB 1333MHZ DDR3 SDRAM - 2X4GB
    1TB SERIAL ATA DRIVE+256GB SSD
    ATI RADEON HD 5750 1GB GDDR5
    8X DOUBLE-LAYER SUPERDRIVE
    Message was edited by: BAC

    Roger and captfred are correct, you will still need to reset both the _Partition Map Scheme_ to GUID Partition Table and the Format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
    1. Connect the External HD and open Disk Utility in your Utilities Folder.
    2. Highlight the External HD in the list of drives and select the Partition tab.
    3. Under Volume Scheme select _1 Partition_ and click on the Options... button.
    4. Select GUID Partition Table in the drop down window and click OK.
    5. Set the Format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled), name it and click the Apply button.

  • HT3275 My time machine backup hangs up when partly completed. It seems to back up 7.4 MB out of 159.8 MB, and then keeps on turning but nothing seems to be happening. I tried troubleshooting it by doing a disk utility on the external hard drive used for T

    My Time Machine seems to be hanging up (stopping) beforew completion. I'm running Mountain Lion (OS X 10.8.2) on my iMac G5, and I already trouble-shot the external drive used for Time Machine by using Repair on Disk Utilities. So--what gives?

    IMac G5 with Mountain Lion.. amazing.. I am pretty sure support for early Intel stopped at ML and support for G5 long before that.
    Load the widget and see if you get error message that the TM is ejecting the drive.. before the backup is complete.. that is one of those nice.. features.. Apple has made available in recent updates.. sometimes called bugs.
    A1 in here http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html
    Also look at the other info.. C12 C17 are common issues.

  • How to recover after performing an 'Erase' and then 'Partition' within Disk Utility of an External USB drive?

    Hi - I accidently ran an 'Erase' and then 'Partition' within Disk Utility of an External USB drive (meant to run it against another drive that was plugged in).  Does anyone have any suggestions on if it is possible to recover from this?  It has all my family photos on it and my backup is a few months old :-(
    I tried running Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery but it found what looks like basic mac folder structure (probably from the first erase).  I think what messed me up was that I rain the repartition which formats the drive a 2nd time!  Any help is truly appreciated!
    thank you,
    -Steve

    Hello RalphR_MI,
    Take a look at this page, which lists several articles.  Please let me know if any of these help you restore your backup.
    Also, take a look at this article, as well as this one. 
    I hope this helps.  I'm not sure of a few things, so I'm sorry for sending you so much, but I'm confident it will give you something new to try.
    Please let me know if this helps.  Good luck!
    ↙-----------How do I give Kudos?| How do I mark a post as Solved? ----------------↓

  • HT1782 disk utility wont fix my hard drive please help!!! it has assignments on it

    hey i usually use disk utility to fix my hard drive problems of been invisible, but lately, doing disk utility and repairing the disk doesn't seem to work anymore? do you guys have any other suggestions, its a seagate go flex hard drive

    You need to boot to recovery mode to repair the boot drive (partition containing the operating system). Hold cmd+r on boot up, or hold the alt key and select recovery when you are given the options of what partition to boot to.

  • Disk utility can't repair disk (1 partition) on external hard drive

    I've search here some to try to find the answer to my scenario, but I really don't understand how Disk Utility got involved in my external hard drive to begin with, so here's my question.
    I have a 2TB Western Digital My Book Studio FW800 external that has 5 partitions, connected to my 2011 iMac. I had help doing the partitions and don't really remember the reasoning, but one is just for my SuperDuper! backup, one is Miscellaneous, one for movie clips off my camcorder, one for misc scanned photo's and one for my genealogy research.
    I back up using Time Machine to a Time Capsule and also to this WD hard drive with SuperDuper!
    Recently I'm getting a pop up message that "Mac OS X can't repair the disk "Genealogy"'.  And it needs to be reformatted.  It's become a read only disk.  When I look in Disk Utility it shows all the partitions as "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)" EXCEPT for the one in question.  I also noticed that there are a lot of files with "date created" being the same date in 1969!  These files may be letters I've written or photo's I added to that partition within the last few years.
    I think I have to completely reformat the entire external hard drive to repair this, but I want to make sure.  Because it's going to be a major hassle backing it all up to another external (having to get one first) and then figuring out how to make the files that have turned "read only" in that one partition, back to their original state!
    Does this sound right, that I have to reformat the entire external hard drive?  And how do I get the read-only files back to their original state.
    Thanks, Sandy

    I don't back them up.  There isn't much on them, besides the one I save video files too, but those are 2-3 min snippets of school events, that are just uploaded to youtube without any editing (like titles, fade ins, etc.) through iMovie. All those vid's are on original tapes I have.
    The partition that is giving me problems, I do have most of that on my iMac's hard drive, just not as organized.  I guess it's just seeming overwhelming to re-created those files into the same file structure on my iMac, but I think it could be done.
    I'm still not sure why my brother had me do the partitions like this.  In the past I had just two partitions, one for the back up and the other for random stuff that I didn't want to take up space on my iMac. 

  • Problems creating a disk image on an external hard drive

    Hiya,
    I've been trying to create a disk image on my dad's external hard drive to hold my back-ups all day with no luck. I've managed small ones, e.g. a few MB, but when trying to create images 20 or 40 GB in size (which is what I need), it isn't working.
    When I've tried creating them in Disk Utility with the place to save them to as the external HD, it says "Unable to create... Illegal seek" which doesn't explain much to me! I have been successful in creating a large disk image on my own HD, but when I try to move it to the external HD, it says "Sorry the operation could not be completed because an unexpected error occured (Error code -1309)."
    Extra info:
    - I am saving my back-ups in a disk image, as they must be password protected, so that's why I'm not just copying them over.
    - There's plenty of space avaliable on the external HD, so it would seem that isn't the problem.
    - The HD is a Freecom Classic SL, connected via USB cable.
    Any ideas anyone?
    Thanks alot,
    Charity

    Found the answer. It was formatted for Windows.

  • Disk Utility Not Formatting External USB Drive

    Hello,
    I recently upgraded to Leopard.  Around this same time, my company purchased two, 1 Terabyte USB External drives for my coworker and I in the graphics/web development department.  They arrived this morning and we were very excited.
    My problem is that I cannot get Disk Utility to erase/format the new, external USB TB drive for use with my MBP.  Disk Utility fails almost immediately with the following message:
    "*Disk Erase Failed*
    Disk Erase failed with the error:
    File system formatter failed."
    The options I'm choosing for the Erase are:
    Volume Format: MAC OS EXTENDED  (i've even tried the 'journaled' version too)
    Name: TB
    As soon as I hit 'Erase' I get the error message I listed above.  The volume never mounts on my desktop and does not exist.  I can see the drive itself in the System Profiler, so my Mac sees it, it just can't format it!  I've also made sure all my permissions were repaired, so I'm just a little confused as to why this simple task keeps failing?
    Is there some additional, esoteric step that I'm missing?
    My coworker was able to get his disk to work because he did NOT have Time Machine turned on yet.  When he connected his new TB drive, Time Machine asked him to format/initialize the disk and he of course said "ok."  I had Time Machine set to use my OLD external USB drive and it's been working great. As of this writing, my coworker is a happy camper. I, however, am not.  I'm not blaming Time Machine, just noting the differences between my coworker's experience and my own. Since the volume is not currently mounted on my machine, I can't format my disk the same way as my coworker has done using Time Machine, since Time Machine doesn't see the volume.
    My fear is that the manufacturer (whom I've also contacted and am awaiting their response) will throw this back to a software problem....and the folks on the forum here will point their fingers and say 'hardware problem.'  Ah, the eternal struggle.....who to blame?
    Any help or additional troubleshooting tips are greatly appreciated.

    This is the best, and only, way to format an external hard drive, which is courtesy of Kappy.
    Extended Hard Drive Preparation
    1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder. If you need to reformat your startup volume, then you must boot from your OS X Installer Disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger or Leopard.)
    2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
    3. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (only required for Intel Macs) then click on the OK button. Set the number of partitions from the dropdown menu (use 1 partition unless you wish to make more.) Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the volume(s) mount on the Desktop.
    4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
    5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
    6. Click on the Erase button. The format process will take 30 minutes to an hour or more depending upon the drive size.
    Steps 4-6 are optional but should be used on a drive that has never been formatted before, if the format type is not Mac OS Extended, if the partition scheme has been changed, or if a different operating system (not OS X) has been installed on the drive.

  • TS1440 If disk utility cannot identify any hard drive

    if disk utility can't identify the hard drive(i changed three different),then what?

    It could be a hardware failure. If Disk Utility can't see the drive, usually the directory is so badly damaged that it doesn't show up, or it could be hardware.  I usually turn to a 3rd party utility called Disk Warrior. Its saved me a bunch of times. I have seen it bring drives back to life that I was pretty sure were gone. http://www.alsoft.com
    Can you verify that the drive is running? Can you hear it spin up?
    Its not clear to me if you are saying that you tried 3 different hard drives, is that correct? Internal or external?

  • How to migrate from my old MacBook Pro to a new one with less disk space and an external hard drive?

    I have just bought a new MacBook Pro and an external hard drive.
    Yet I have problems migrating data from my old MacBook Pro (more internal disk space with around 500 GB data) to my new one (internal disk space less than 500 GB). 
    I have connected all 3 devices but it seems the Migration Assistant does not have an option for us to select to migrate to an external hard drive.
    Any other way to do it?
    Kindly help me.  Thanks.

    For your situation, Target disk mode may be the most efficient method:
    http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1661
    Ciao.

  • Can I run apple hardware disk from a clone of the Install disk 2 on an external hard drive?

    I have just installed a new SATA cable and HDD and want to check everything is in order.  I don't have my original disks with me, but I do have copies of both disks on an external hard drive.  Can I use that to run Apple Hardware Test on my machine?

    If nothing else works, give this a try:
    1. Right click on iPhoto
    2. Click on Package contents
    3. Look for file name "Master"
    4. Right click on it and click copy
    5. On your desktop right click and paste.
    The "Master" file has all the orginal pictures and movies. You can then burn them with toast! Good luck!
    Snatch

  • Using Mac with Lightroom 5. set to read my sd card at start-up and load into lightroom. now laptop hard disk is filled. have external hard drive, and exported several lightroom files. How do I delete the old folder and whatever what may still be on the la

    Q. How to permanently delete folders and pics from laptop hard drive after exporting to external hard drive? I need laptop disk space!

    Instead of exporting, move the photos to the external HD by moving them in your operating system and then reconnecting in Lightroom.
    See these instructions: Adobe Lightroom - Find moved or missing files and folders

  • G4 disk utility does not see hard drive

    I am helping someone with a G4 Quicksilver. She is running 10.4 but only has disks for 10.1 and 10.2. When I boot with the 10.2 CD, disk utility does not see the hard drive. I was thinking of connecting her computer to my MacBookPro (Intel, 10.5) via target disk mode and then running Disk Utility. Is that crazy? She is suffering from slow startup and grey screen. I've disconnected the periferals, safe booted, reset PRAM. She really needs Disk Utility.

    with the 10.2 CD, disk utility does not see the hard drive.
    Disk Utility from 10.2 should see the hard drive (the drive name should appear in the left box). If it does not, the drive is malfunctioning or has a loose cable.
    If you attempt to Verify, it will complain that there are illegal values in reserved fields in several different record types. Using this older Disk Utility to repair a 10.4 disk may cause more problems than it solves.
    As Tom \[Texas Mac Man] says, you should only repair 10.4 and later disks with 10.4 and later Disk Utility:
    HT2648- Only use Mac OS X 10.4-compatible disk utilities with Mac OS X 10.4 volumes
    • If you boot the regular Hard Drive (no CD/DVD required) while holding down the Shift key, it will do a quick check of the Hard Drive, then boot up in "Safe Mode". This will fix any simple Disk problems.
    • 10.4.3 and later can do a Disk Utility Verify of the Boot drive, "live" (but cannot Repair "live").

Maybe you are looking for