IMac hard drive fail - what steps to prevent in future?

I am working on an extensive video editing project on FCP7 on a 2011 iMac with 3.4GHz i7 and 8GB RAM running OSX Lion 10.7.5. I am editing very large pro res video files for a feature-length documentary. All media is stored on external hard drives.
Several times before, my iMac would freeze and not reboot. All times before, resetting the PRAM seemed to solve the problem.
Today, while exporting a 30min sequence, the spinning beachball got stuck. I noticed that Time Machine was running at the time, and I attempted to stop Time Machine in Preferences (it was not yet in process of transferring data--I tried stopping time machine before in a similar manner, and it seemed to speed up my computer). Now the entire computer froze. I manually turned off, and tried to reboot. This time, after holding down Command (⌘), Option, P, and R, nothing happened. I turned off and tried again, and this time the new computer setup screen appeared, and I am attempting to restore from time machine.
How do I know why my iMac HD failed this time, and how do I move forward from here?
Is my iMac HD compromised, or is it some type of software/OS problem?
How do I prevent future crashes/fails?
Should not run any other programs while editing in FCP7? Should I not run Time Machine while editing?
Thank you in advance, and please pray for my time machine full recovery

First, EVERY hard drive will fail. It's just a question of when. There's not much you can do to prevent the physical failure of the drive that I know of, besides making sure the computer runs as cool as possible. IMac's tend to run hot and that's probably gonna have some effect on the life expectancy of the drive.
As far as the problems that can happen which are not related to the physical failure of the drive.
Make sure you keep at least 20% free on your startup drive.
As Mark said, having a bootable clone is a really good idea. Here's a user tip all about cloning your startup drive.
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-2494
I highly recommend Disk Warrior. It's saved my life a few times.
http://alsoft.com/

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IMac hard drive failing; external TM will restore but won't then back up

It appears my early 2009 (OS X 10.9.5) hard drive is failing as it crashed 6 months ago, in November and again this week. SMART Utility says it has re-allocated 6 bad sectors and there has been 1 re-allocated event. Each Time I have successfully restored from an external hard drive with TM on it. Prior to the November fail, CCC reported an odd (unknown to me system file) corrupt file but, instead of replacing the file as perhaps I should, I decided to re-boot which it wouldn't do and hence the November TM restore.
However, despite restoring successfully the external TM will no longer make back ups. I have tried repairing it but it is greyed out and Verify says 'unable to complete.' Eventually I did get the greyed out button to work but Repair reported:
Verifying volume “Time Machine”
Checking file system
Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
Checking extents overflow file.
Checking catalog file.
Keys out of order
Invalid extent entry
Incorrect block count for file iNode785919y8
(It should be 13 instead of 4194317)Invalid extent entry
Missing thread record (id = 82)
Incorrect size for file iNode78591999
(It should be 4096 instead of 274877907467)
Invalid extent entry
File record has hard link chain flag (id = 78591999)
File has incorrect number of links (id = 78591999)
(It should be 1 instead of 17)
Missing thread record (id = 18)
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
Incorrect block count for file iNo$e78592002
(It should be 4194317 instead of 13)
Missing thread record (id = 82)
Invalid extent entry
Incorrect size for file iN/de7x592003
(It should be 4096 instead of 274877907467)
Invalid extent entry
File record has hard link chain flag (id = 78592067)
File has incorrect number of links (id = 78592067)
(It should be 1 instead of 17)
Missing thread record (id = 4194322)
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
File record has hard link chain flag (id = 78592004)
File has incorrect number of links (id = 78592004)
(It should be 1 instead of 17)
Missing thread record (id = 18)
Incorrect size for file iNode78592005
(It should be 0 instead of 64)I
nvalid extent entry
Invalid extent entryIncorrect size for file iNode78592006
(It should be 0 instead of 4194304)
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
Missing thread record (id = 4194322)
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
File record has hard link chain flag (id = 82786312)
File has incorrect number of links (id = 82786312)
(It should be 1 instead of 17)
Missing thread record (id = 18)
Incorrect block count for file )Nod%78592009
(It should be 65 instead of 1)
Invalid extent entry
Invalid extent entry
Incorrect block count for file iNode78592010
(It should be 0 instead of 4194304)
Invalid extent entry
Incorrect size for file iNode78592011
(It should be 0 instead of 274877906944)
Invalid catalog record type
The volume Time Machine could not be verified completely.
Error: This disk needs to be repaired. Click Repair Disk.
Whilst pondering this, the hard drive crashed again this week. Bizarrely I was able to restore from the very same external TM that will not let me do further back ups nor be repaired.
I wonder if there are any further checks I can do to establish if my iMac hard drive is failing? I will then decide whether to replace the hard drive - I see I can fit a WD 6TB with the jumpers set to reduce the speed to 3GB/s - or buy a new iMac.
I wonder also whether there is anything I can do to preserve my TM back ups. I realise I am being guided to re-format this external drive, but can I do that and then add back the actual existing back ups (which I would transfer to another disk before re-formatting) rather than start again from no history newly formatted?

Omdineen wrote:
It boots up to where its just my background and the Finder bar but then crashes, so I can't click anything. Anything from here or am I just screwed?
There are a few remaining options.
If you have another Mac with a FireWire port, try FireWire Target Disk Mode: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1661
You need a FireWire cable to connect the two Macs. This will allow you to mount your failing HD on a working Mac and copy files that way.
Try Safe Mode - read about it first:
Safe Mode or "Safe Boot" is a troubleshooting mode that bypasses all third party system extensions and loads only required system components.
Starting up in Safe Mode
This assumes the Finder is crashing due to a third party system extension or optional system component that Safe Mode will prevent from loading. You should still be able to copy files directly to an external device, but file sharing will be disabled.
Lastly boot from the DVD again, repair the disk again, reinstall OS X, and keep your fingers crossed. You're squeezing the last drops of life from the thing.

Hard drive failing, what files besides photos/music/etc should I back up before replacing the drive?

I bought my MacBook 5,2 Intel Core 2 Duo 2.13 GHz 2GB 800 MHz DDR2 SDRAM in 2009, never had any problems with it until now. For a few months now, my macbook will freeze up (usually if I'm doing a lot such as posting a youtube video on facebook, or running a game,etc) and make a clicking sound, to which I can't do anything except hard restart it. It only did it once in a while until now it's happening more frequently at very annoying times. I never thought to look it up because I'm an idiot but now that I did I learned that my hard drive is imminently going to fail. I know I dropped it once, from my bed to hardwood, with no immediate damage but I'm sure that could've done something, other than that I take very good care of it.
So I'm in the process of backing up my stuff, which I figure isn't a lot so I'm probably going to use a USB drive & CDs..but my question is: Is there anything important that I need to back up besides my files (pictures, music, documents)? Like any program files etc? And when I do replace the hard drive, which I may do myself following DIY on here, what will remain on my computer? Will my applications all be there? I've only downloaded a few programs that could be redownloaded anyways (frostwire, tinyumbrella, etc) and my Pages/office are on disk. Sorry if these questions are stupid, this is my first personal computer and I've honestly never had to back anything up before/replace hard drives. I appreciate any help to any of these questions and I can further detail anything needed

Omdineen wrote:
It boots up to where its just my background and the Finder bar but then crashes, so I can't click anything. Anything from here or am I just screwed?
There are a few remaining options.
If you have another Mac with a FireWire port, try FireWire Target Disk Mode: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1661
You need a FireWire cable to connect the two Macs. This will allow you to mount your failing HD on a working Mac and copy files that way.
Try Safe Mode - read about it first:
Safe Mode or "Safe Boot" is a troubleshooting mode that bypasses all third party system extensions and loads only required system components.
Starting up in Safe Mode
This assumes the Finder is crashing due to a third party system extension or optional system component that Safe Mode will prevent from loading. You should still be able to copy files directly to an external device, but file sharing will be disabled.
Lastly boot from the DVD again, repair the disk again, reinstall OS X, and keep your fingers crossed. You're squeezing the last drops of life from the thing.

Why Did My iMac Hard Drive FAIL?

I am majorly upset right now.
My iMac 2009, 21.5" (4GB Ram, 500GB Hard drive) computer that was practically unused since it was in storage for 2 years in my basement while I went out of town on business- suddenly had a Hard Drive Failure for no reason! Since the Warranty was expired on Apple Care, I took it in a Mac store - only to be told by the repair man that the hard drive needed a replacement. He did quick testing, and these were the results:
Ran MRI and everything passed
Reset pram and SMC
Ran storage diagnostics
Proposed Resolution: Replace hard drive
Total cost: A WHOPPING $229.00 plus tax for the hard drive plus labor costs. When I asked if I could just upgrade to a 1TB Hard drive since I was shelling out money anyways, Apple flat-out REFUSED- saying they couldn't put a warranty on a new hard drive, just the replaced one. Sounds like complete BS to me!
Further more, I would like to know how the **** this happened! A few times when the iMac was on the table and running, I lifted it up and clunked it back down a bit rough to readjust it- but it continued to work for a few more days. I doubt that would ruin a hard drive. I own a Macbook 13" that I clunk around all the time, the hard drive has never failed. Suddenly my hardly-used iMac that worked out the box when I first started using it again suddenly has a random hard drive malfunction a week in??? And now I'm out $250.00. I just feel jipped. I thought Apple products are meant to last. Apparently not. The guy said "Well it's a four year-old computer". Yeah but I only used it one year and then it was in storage! So whose to say THIS hard drive won't fail as well?
Why did this happen?

Hard Drive Warning (all makes and models)
Ironically but logical, new hard drives are far more fragile than one that has been working for several months or a couple years. So beware in your thinking that a new hard drive translates into “extremely reliable”!
Hard drives suffer from high rates of what has been termed "infant mortality". Essentially this means new drives have their highest likelihood of failing in the first few months of usage. This is because of very minor manufacturing defects or HD platter balancing, or head and armature geometry being less than perfect; and this is not immediately obvious and can quickly manifest itself once the drive is put to work.
Hard drives that survive the first few months of use without failing are likely to remain healthy for a number of years.
Generally HD are highly prone to death or corruption for a few months, then work fine for a few years, then spike in mortality starting at 3-4 years and certainly should be considered end-of-life at 5-7+ years even if still working well. Drives written to once and stored away have the highest risk of data corruption due to not being read/written to on a regular basis. Rotate older working HD into low-risk use.
The implication of this is that you should not trust a new hard drive completely (really never completely!) until it has been working perfectly for several months.
Given the second law of thermodynamics, any and all current mfg. HD will, under perfect storage conditions tend themselves to depolarization and a point will be reached, even if the HD mechanism is perfect, that the ferromagnetic read/write surface of the platter inside the HD will entropy to the point of no viable return for data extraction. HD life varies, but barring mechanical failure, 3-8 years typically.
Data redundancy (copies) makes all HD crashes inconsequential, an irrelevancy.
There are only two kinds of hard drives, those that have failed, and those that will fail, regardless of quality of manufacture.
Any Macbook or desktop should be idealized as a working platform computer system, containing all your applications, documents, and weekly-use necessary files; and all media files such as ‘big-data’ (music/PDF collections/video/pictures), unless directly needed in the near future, should be kept off the computer and on external storage USB or likewise bare hard drives.
Never consider any computer a data storage device at any time under any circumstance, rather a data creation, sending, and manipulation device. Anyone who thinks data is safe on any computer, even copied upon multiple partitions is making a mistake that will, without fail, strike.
Never backup your data exclusively upon magnetic hard drives or flash storage, nor consider same since magnetic storage degrades over time, roughly 3-8 years, even under ideal storage conditions.

500GB TC Hard Drive Failed: What Model Drive Do I Use To Replace Old One?

Dear Fellow Mac'ers:
Hopefully my title is pretty straightforward. My TC HD died. The router is fine.
1. What drive do I get to replace old one - Seagate Baracada ES? If so, what model?
2. How to info would be great - I'm hoping it will be easy.
3. What kind of installation do I need to do software-wise before operating again
Thanks!!!!
erniesfo

Sorry, it's been well over a year since I swapped out my drive. I believe there was an Hitachi drive in the device when I pulled it and I took it to an electronics / computer store to to get a drive that was physically the same size with more hard drive capacity. I used a Seagate drive for the replacement.
The article implies that drives from other manufacturers will work and I think recent generation TC's use another drive manufacturer. I would first pull the drive and take some measurements of dimensions...height, width and length and get some specs on the drives you are considering to compare and make sure that the new drive will fit into the allocated space.
As with any new purchase, I would suggest that you get a clear understanding of the store's return policy, just in case things don't work out as planned.
There are lots of articles on swapping out drives on a Time Capsule on the internet. Google something "what drive is used in a Time Capsule" and you'll see lots of stuff.

Hard drive failed - what can apple do for me now?

Is it work going to an Apple store for help with a macbook pro with no hard drive? It's a 2010.

Can you not just purchase one and put it in and reload the OS? There are plenty of tutorials online if you're not confident at present.

HT2265 Apple Imac Hard drive failed--Apple TV question?

My Mac recently crashed and since it is more than 6 years old .. Apple said it is "Vintage". We had pics on the Mac from last 6 months that were not backed up. However we do have a 1st Generation Apple TV that I have synced pics to. Are those pics available even though the Mac is not working? If so how do I share those pics from Apple TV back to a new IMac? Anyone have a good solution for picture storage if this was to happen again? maybe Picasso? THANKS!

Welcome to the Apple Community.
You can't copy any content on the Apple TV back to a computer, unless you are prepared to disassemble the Apple TV.

What's happening with my iMac hard drive?

I was on Disk Utility the other day, and a message was displayed on my screen. It said... "This drive has a hardware problem and cannot be repaired. Back up as much data as possible and replace the disk. See an authorised Apple dealer for more information." This message was referring to my 1TB ST31000528AS internal iMac hard drive. What is causing this problem? Does this have something to do with the fact that BOOTCAMP was installed on my computer? What should I do?
Thanks in advance.

Contact Apple or your local AASP > Apple - Support - iMac - Service FAQ

I have a 27" imac (intel) my hard drive failed and I installed a new one. This is my first time dealing with this so I am having trouble re-installing the OS. Install disc spits out and ? mark with folder appears what am I missing?

Like the title says. My 1 TB drive failed and unfortunately my computer isn't covered on the replacement program even though my hard drive is the one they are claiming to replace. So that is not a solution just to get that out of the way. So I replaced the hard drive. What I am having trouble with is re-installing my OS. I have 10.6. When I load it and restart it just spits it out and I get the question mark folder. What am I doing wrong is there a step I'm missing? I did do a back up to my Time Machine before the crash. Can I plug it into it and reload format? I'm new to this so any help would be appreciated.
Thanks!

Well, let's hope that nothing was jiggled out of place when you were installing the new hard drive. Your optical drive may just be out of alignment or the disc you have is "dirty." Get a lint-free cloth and some rubbing alcohol, then clean the disc as thoroughly as you can starting from the center and working outward in a concentric circlular motion. See if that helps. In particular clean the inner portion well.
If this does not help, then you have a problem. You have opened the computer yourself. That action voids all support from Apple. If you take the computer in for service the store may refuse to service the computer. This is not related to your now expired warranty.

Bought hpg61189 in uk. hard drive failed and us hp denied to configuration. what would be next step?

bought hpg61189 in uk. hard drive failed and US HP denied warranty due to UK configuration. UK HP very difficult to contact - quite a shell game. Any suggestions?
This question was solved.
View Solution.

Well, here is a place to download your own install disks (there is some work in making them but):
http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Display-and-Video/bd-p/Display
If that isn't your operating system just look on the right and click on it.
Reminder: Please select the "Accept as Solution" button on the post that best answers your question. Also, you may click on the white star in the "Kudos" button for any helpful post to give that person a quick thanks. These feedback tools help keep our community active, so you receive better answers faster.

My 5 year old iMac's hard drive is at the point of failing. I'm trying to save al files on it, but it wont allow backup via Time Machine to an external hard drive. How can I keep from losing all the files and programs if the hard drive fails?

I'm concerned that my iMac, purchased 5 years ago, is about the crash and I can't back up my files and programs to an external hard drive via Time Machine because the computer freezes after only a couple hundred MB and gets nowhere near the required amount.
How can I save these files and programs if the computer hard drive fails or has to be replaced without the backup being able to be done? I need to do something quickly, but I'm not sure what I can or should be doing.

Get an external hard drive, some good ones that I like are the OWC, http://www.macsales.com Mercury Elite Pro drives...they are very good and reasonably priced.
Get the drive, connect via USB or FireWire, then use Disk Utility to format the new drive as Mac OS X Extended (Journaled), and then use Disk Utility to Restore the current drive to the new drive. Restore actually clones the drive so you will have a bootable backup on the external drive.
After you have formatted and named the external drive, click Restore in the main Disk Utility window, drag the name of the old hard drive to the Source box, and drag the name of the new external drive to the Destination box. DU will make an exact clone of the internal drive on the external drive.
That clone will be a complete backup of the operating system and all of your data.
You can test it by restarting the iMac and hold the Option key. That will give you a grey screen showing all bootable drives. Just click the external drive, then click the upward pointing arrow under it and the iMac will boot from that drive.

What drive should, I use to replace my iMac hard drive?

My mid 2007 24-inch iMac has a 500Gb hard drive that is always running out of disk space, so I want to replace it with a 1TB hard drive.
What make/model is recommended? I do not want somthing that is going to overheat oe fail after a few months.

Any 3.5" SATA drive will work, I'd recommend visiting www.macsales.com, they specialize in Macs and help steer you to one that is best suited for your iMac. Also rather than changing the drive why not buy an external HD to store data on. If you needs are typical of most users your music, photos and movies are taking a lot of HD space. Apple makes it easy to move those libraries to an EHD, they even explain how in these articles:
iTunes: How to move the library to an EHD
iPhoto: How to move the Library to an EHD
iMovie: How to move the Library to an EHD

When I bought my computer I also bought Works hard drive failed had Apple repair it but no Works what can I do?

When I originally bought my iMac I also bought Works, then my hard drive failed and I had apple replace it but when I got my computer back no Works what are my oppitions or am I SOL?

Where did you purchase iWorks from? If it was on a disk use the disk to reisntall iWorks. If you purchased it from the App Store you should be able to log into the App Store with the same Apple ID that you used to purchase the iMac and original iWorks and download it again but for free.
If you have any problem downloading contact the App Store Support personnel via this link at the App Store:
OT

Hard drive failed on original Macbook. No OSX discs came with it. Now what?

I had my hard drive fail on my original Macbook and I didn't get any OSX discs when it came from Apple all those years ago. So do I try and find Tiger, the original OS, or look to upgrade to Leopard? I can't find any answers on what really to do here and I need to get it up and running because it's the first week of school and I don't have a computer (thank goodness for my iphone).
I've looked on Amazon for OSX and found some Leopard. I have 2.0Ghz with 2GB RAM in my Macbook now and will be getting a new hard drive Friday. The Leopards on there run for about $275 new. I was hoping it wouldn't be that much, but I might now have any other options.

bentaulbee wrote:
I can do a clean install on a new hard drive with the Snow Leopard Upgrade version?
I did a bit of research and found out that you can not without a previous install of Leopard. I did, however, find that the Mac Box Set has a full install DVD AND contains iLife and iWork. It can be found [here|http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC209Z/A].

Hard drive failing on Macbook 13" OS 10.7.3 Need to xfer all files to an iMAC 21.5. How to do this?

Hard drive failing on Macbook 13" OS 10.7.3 Need to xfer all files to an iMAC 21.5. How to do this?

Can you boot the MacBook into FireWire Target Disk mode? That turns it (temporarily) into an expensive hard drive. You can then move files.
Another way would be to use an external hard drive, attach it to the MacBook and user software such as Bombich's Carbon Copy Cloner to copy the hard drive (assuming you have sufficient space on the iMac.)
Best of luck. Please keep your data backed up in the future to avoid this. It'll make your life easier.

IMac hard drive fail - what steps to prevent in future?

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