Hard drive performance and data throughput

I am using my macbook pro for work primarily and part of that entails creating/restoring images of other macs. I've had the best luck with SuperDuper however the process is still VERY slow. For instance at this moment with no other applications open other than S.D. and firefox the copy speed is under 5MB/s from my MBP to an iMAC via fire wire.
I am looking for suggestions to increase the performance/IO in the hopes to speed up the process. When purchasing this system the 7200rpm drive was not an option (15") which is unfortunate. I realize that both hard drives in the operation will cause the variable in speed but I want the sending drive as fast as possible.
My thoughts right now are to purchase a 7200rpm external drive to store backup images and also send from. This would cut out any possible IO on the drive that my mac is performing to run the operating system. Another thought was to upgrade my mac to a 7200rpm drive and use the current 5400rpm drive as the storage for images...in the hopes that it would still provide an increase in restoration speed since it wouldn't be running OSX on it.
Any thoughts or ideas? Experiences? My MBP has the 5400rpm I believe and 2GB of ram.
Thanks

I'll try and explain a bit better. I'm not restoring
the same image to different types of macs. I create
images of OTHER macs using my macbook pro to perform
the process as well as store the backup image.
Thanks for the clarification. I do that too, but when I do I use my Mac Pro to clone a Mac via Target Disk Mode to an external FireWire 800 drive.
it helps but its a usb2 enclosure with a somewhat
older hard drive that is only 30Gb. I am looking at
purchasing a firewire 800 external drive but I will
see how this other unit works for now since we
already have it.
Part of your throughput problem may be the overhead issues with USB 2. FireWire uses its own chipset so is more independent of the CPU, and FireWire can sustain high-speed transfers at a higher level. USB is CPU-bound and is more vulnerable to CPU demands from other apps or background processes or other USB devices. So even though USB 2 has a higher theoretical peak (480Mbps), FireWire (400Mbps) actually does better in the real world.
About USB 2 vs. FireWire 400 performance
I'm not sure if FireWire 800 would help because your slowest drive in the chain may not be fast enough to take advantage.

Similar Messages

Can I sync from iPad to a Mac as hard drive crashed and data lost

My iMac hard drive crashed and the data cannot be recovered. Can I sync the iTunes data on my iPad or iPhone back onto the new hard drive?

You should be able to recover data that is in the backup. That does not included some items like music. See the following for what is in the backup:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4079
First in iTunes preferences check the box for prevent automatic syncing when a device is connected.
They connect your iPod to the computer and transfer iTunes purchases to the computer. See:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1848
Then right click on the iPad listed under Devices in the left hand side and click on "Back Up". After backup is complete I think you will have to restore the iPad from backup to complete the process of using your iPad to the "new" computer.

How do I move my current hard drive OS and data to a new drive for internal installation?

I want to replace my Macbook Pro 500GB Hard Drive with a 2TB Hard Drive. How do I make this new drive bootable and a replica of my current drive programs and data? I also want to upgrade the OS. Is it best to mirror the drive and then upgrade the OS, or can I put the new OS on the new drive and then clone the old drive onto it?

For starters I would do this one step at a time. It is far easier to check out where the problems are when they develop that way.
My first step would be to backup everything that you have now as a first step. Just in case of problems later.
Next, I would suggest to place the new 2TB disk drive in an enclosure and format it to Mac OS Extended and GUID partition mapping first.
Once that is done you can create a bootable clone on the 2TB disk drive using either CCC or SuperDuper.
Then test to be sure the 2TB is bootable.
Then move the 2TN disk drive into the Mac.
Once you have done that and it boots them you can upgrade the operating system.

Hard Drive Failure and Data Recovery

I am pretty sure I am SOL - but thought I'd try one last "Hail Mary" before throwing in the towel - to see if anyone here might have a solution I haven't thought of or am not aware of:
My wife's Macbook wouldn't boot today - instead she was greeted by the dreaded blinking question mark.
Macbook (2006) 4 gb ram - OSX 10.6.6 120GB internal HD (the internal HD is the problem).
I shut it down and attached a USB external HD that has a copy of OSX on it and it booted fine - but the internal HD would not mount. I tried both Drive Genius and Disk Warrior - neither program sees the damaged hard drive. I then launched Disk Utility - it sees the damaged HD as an UNINITIALIZED disk - and the only options are to initialize it - all the repair options are grayed out.
So I went poking around on the net looking for hard drive problems that the leading disk recovery programs can not fix and stumbled on to a thread discussing invalid sibling links - which is apparently the Achilles Heal of the OSX HFS file system - and can render the data on a HD inaccessible.
The thread went on to discuss a possible fix by running a series of fsck_hfs commands from the terminal window - or if the HD will mount - via single user mode or verbose login. Other options included attaching the problem Mac to another Mac via Target Disk Mode and many had success being able to see and repair the drive that way.
If anyone is interested in the details of this fix you can sift through this thread on Mac OSX Hints:
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20070204093925888
Unfortunately for me - nothing is working. The only way I can get Disk Utility to see the damaged drive is if I boot from the external USB HD. And As I mentioned above - Disk Utility only sees it as an uninitialized drive.
If I attach the Macbook to my MacPro in Target Disk Mode - the Macbook starts up in TDM but of course the HD never mounts on my MacPro and neither Disk Utility, Drive Genius or Disk Warrior are able to see the damaged macbook drive - in TDM none of these programs even show that the physical drive exists.
So, short of re-initializing the drive and thus loosing all the data - anyone out there in cyber space have any suggestions?
Thanks!

Just an update and a new question - I decided to go ahead a reformat the drive - but Disk Utility is giving me the following error message:
Disk Erase Failed with Error:
POSIX reports: The operation couldn't be completed.
Cannot allocate memory.
So, does this sound like a hardware problem as oppossed to just a corrupted file system?
Thanks!

Help! hard drive failure and data recovery

I am a happy PC-traitor who has been using my Macbook successfully for over a year now. I love the Mac.
Until now.
Last night, while downloading torrents onto my computer, it froze. I restarted. A blinking folder with a question mark was displayed. I tried resetting the PRAM. Disk Utility does not see my hard drive, so I cannot attempt to repair it.
In short, I think it's dead.
Disk recovery is so incredibly expensive! Can I stick the hard drive into an external housing and access the data via Firewire? Can I freeze it overnight? I'm desperate! I can't afford a data recovery service. Help!

If she's dead, she's dead. Could be a loose cable. If you boot from a DVD and DU can;t see the HD, that's usually a really bad sign.
If you are comfortable removing it, you can try something like
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer%20Technology/U2NV2SPATA/
which will allow you to mount just about any HD via USB.
You can try stuff like
http://www.macintosh-data-recovery.com/download-mac-data-recovery.php
http://subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?mainpage=product_info&productsid=1
http://prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php
And then there's DiskWarrior and TechTool.
Some of these may see HD's that won't mount and allow you to recover data.
Others may chime in with more detailed experiences.
hth
Jeff

Safari fails to open after recent hard drive replacement and data transfer from time machine

The hard drive was replaced by apple under replacement scheme due to seagate failures. It was reloaded with latest ios, but safari would not open, reported failure.
I had re -installed my backed up info from time machine. i did go into back ups and copied previous safari app, and dropped it on my desk top. It opened ok. Is there an easy way to get this app onto the system and delete the faulty safari file.
Hope this makes sense.

guess what, all fixed, the safari app installed by apple on new hard drive was 5 something, but 6.02 was needed, i installed 6.02 but it told me i needed OSX10.8.2 which cost me £13.99 but it now works.
happy days

HT201250 Circle and cross through iTunes icon afte the seagate hard drive replaced and restored data from time machine backup.

Circle and cross through iTunes icon: had the seagate hard drive replaced and restored data from time machine backup. Why does the iTunes icon have a circle and cross through it? As though incomplete? tried everything and still Circle and cross through iTunes icon.

No it isn't something you'd find on the computer, it has to be custom installed from the 10.6 installer disc or Software Update if it wasn't before. It allows you to use older PowerPC applications on your Mac. On the other hand double check the version of iTunes you have does not require 10.7 minimum either.

Computer hard drive fried, all data lost, how can I get my music library off my ipod touch and saved agian to another computer? no downloaded songs, all were cd's I put on it

computer hard drive fried, all data lost, how can I get my music library off and onto another computer? no downloads, just cd's I loaded on to it

Syncing to a "New" Computer or replacing a "crashed" Hard Drive: Apple Support Communities

Hello, My computer crashed, I removed the hard drive and installed it into a hard drive enclosure and now I am trying to get my Thunderbird data off of it

Hello,
Thank you for taking a look at my problem. My Windows computer crashed so I removed the hard drive and installed it into a hard drive enclosure and connected it to my new Windows computer with a USB cord. I installed Mozilla Thunderbird on my new computer and read the different tutorials on this website for extracting data from the external hard drive and installing it on my new computer however I cannot seem to be able to find the files that I need and quite frankly I do not know how to move them once I do find them. I even tried MozBackup but it could not find the files either. I searched for profiles.ini in the hard drive and the only hit I got was a profiles.ini file that was 111 bytes in size. I assumed that this was not what I was looking for but I did save a copy on my desktop. If someone has experience with moving files from a hard drive to a new computer I would be grateful for the help.
Thanks,
AN

lets get with the program. Mozbackup is useless in this situation because it looks for your profile in the location Thunderbird says it is.
You biggest hurdle is probably setting windows to show system and hidden files. The %appdata% folders are hidden by windows.

Help, just got a new hard drive installed and now my videos say, "a necessary data reference could not be found"

Help, just got a new hard drive installed and now my videos in iPhoto say, "a necessary data reference could not be found"

Not sure what happened but I was able to click on the movie, go to File then Reveal in Finder, then drag it to my desktop and then drag it back into iPhoto and it worked.

Imac hard drive died and was replaced by apple. Data lost but is remains on ipads. Computer address is different so can't sync without erasing ipad data (which I need back on repaired imac). How do I do this?

How do I transfer data from and Ipad/iphone to an imac with a different address then initally setup with? Our hard drive died and was replaced free of charge by Apple, our data was lost on the hard drive but exists on our small devices.

Since Apple replaced the hard drive does that mean you have AppleCare? If so, call them. If not, you must have paid pretty good to get it replaced and so I would think you have some possible right to ask a followup question at the store that did it.

HT1386 Ever since I had to replace my PC hard drive, my outlook contacts and calendar no longer sync. It acts like it's syncing, but it isn't. I now have two hard drives - c and g, but I'm pretty sure the Outlook data is still on c. Any other ideas?

Hello - I just had to replace the hard drive on my pc, and now my Outlook calendar and contacts won't sync to my iphone 5s. I ended up getting two hard drives (C and G), so I'm afraid that might have something to do with it - although I'm pretty sure Outlook files still live in the normal place on C. Itunes sync acts as if it's working, but nothing changes on my phone. Any ideas? Thanks!!

"2MEM/1/4: DIMM3/J14"
Replace the memory in the DIMM 3 slot.
If you are running Mac OS X 10.5 you can use this program to test your G5's memory:
http://www.kelleycomputing.net/Rember/
It will subject your RAM to a more thorough test than Apple Hardware Test.

Can anyone help me to transfer everything I have on my Ipad on to a new computer. my hard drive crashed and a new one was installed and I do not want to loose all my apps or music. Please help

Hi everyone,
I am looking for help and maybe someone can help me please. My hard drive crashed and dell installed a new one. I have two iphones and an ipad with all my apps, music, amd photos. Can anyone indicate me what to do so I do not lose everything when I plug in my phone. Thanks

Naturally you should have a recent backup of your "crashed" hard drive. If you don't, well, hopefully you've learned a lesson but that doesn't solve your current problem.
If all your apps and media were purchased from the iTunes App Store, don't worry about them. Redownload all your apps and media, then allow iTunes to sync with and wipe your iOS devices - which will also put all the apps and media on them. You'll lose your settings, and any data which resided only on the iOS devices, and of course you'll need to organize your iOS folders and home screens and whatnot. But you won't really lose much, and without a backup this is your best choice.
If you have media from sources other than the iTunes App Store, look at Senuti or similar applications designed to copy media from iOS devices to computers. Use that first, then sync as I described in my second paragraph above. (I mention Senuti because it's popular. There are other options which work just as well, and some are even free.)

MacBook Pro -- external hard drive corruption -- AND hanging computer?

Since purchasing a 17" MacBook Pro, I've had serious problems with directory corruption on three of my external firewire hard drives (80 and 100 G FireLite Pocket drives and a 400 G Lacie drive). About 2 weeks ago, the 80 G drive (with most of my critical files) disappeared from the desktop. Disk Utilities returned with a message that it was repairable. Tech Tools supposedly fixed it, but the drive icon shortly disappeared from the desktop. This time, Disk Utilities "repaired" it, but it was the kiss of death. After this, plugging in the drive caused the computer to hang indefinitely. I could no longer run any repair or data rescue software. Once this problem occurs, I can switch firewire cables and computers, and the computers still crash/hang. A techy at work managed to rescue the files and replace them on the disk (this required other hardware, a PC, and some software he downloaded(?)). Two weeks later, the problem happened again. However, this time, it was the 80 G and my 400 G backup drive. Now, all of my originals and backups (for the past 2 years, since I did my last CD/DVD backups) are (hopefully) temporarily unavailable. My 100 G drive started to do the same thing. However, I purchased and downloaded a copy of Disk Warrior, which seems to have rescued this disk.
I've had these drive for between 3 and 5 years, with little or absolutely no trouble. Then, after getting the MacBook Pro, I'm encountering really serious problems.
Is the MacBook Pro at fault? (I've returned to my PowerBook G4 until this issue is resolve).
What causes such severe disk directory damage that causes my computer to hang?
How can I recover my files (critically important to my work, some of which is on a tight deadline) without having to run to the vastly overworked/underpaid techy in my place of employment)?
My conversation with an Apple Tech was much less than satisfying. In fact, he seemed to portray a state of denial about the MacBook Pro having any problems, even though the web is full of complaints. What's up Apple? Are you beginning to backslide yet again?

Welcome To Discussions JeffBloom!
I'm sorry to hear that you are having problems with your MBP, but you have posted your inquiry, in the Discussions Forum, that is intended for discourse about the use of Apple Discussions.
You will get more focused attention to your issue, if you select a more appropriate location from this page Discussions Forum Home.
For example,
From the Forum Home Page, select the Category MacBook Pro.
Then choose an appropriate MBP Forum, such as Using your MacBook Pro.
On Forum pages, there is an option to Post New Topic.
Good Luck!
ali b

My hard drive fried and had to be replaced. I'm trying to install CS4 from my original discs but keep getting this error message - "One or more of the required components of Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design Standard failed to install correctly". A customer s

My hard drive fried and had to be replaced. I'm trying to install CS4 from my original discs but keep getting this error message - "One or more of the required components of Adobe Creative Suite 4 Design Standard failed to install correctly". A customer service rep gave me a link to download off the Adobe site, but when I try to open the file to run it, I get this error message - "A problem occurred extracting the archive".
Can anyone help?

Yep. Nothing happens at all. Windows tries to execute the uninstaller, but I don't get any other screen and all activity stops for the MSI. I monitored it in Process Monitor and the MSI executable appears, but is quickly ended, like it couldn't find anything or something.
It's as if windows has a blank entry in Programs and Features, because it used to show the size of the Adobe application in the "Size" column. Now it's just blank. Link to screenshot below:
http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/5006/screenshotcaf.jpg
Note the install date. That's when I was able to successfully reinstall it. Now I can't even do that. I should also mention I tried Revo Uninstaller. It deleted one small registry key, but nothing changed.
By the way, is the CS cleaner supposed to ask for a disc in the drive when you run it? It refused to run unless I had one in it, so I used my install dvd.

Hard drive performance and data throughput

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for