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.

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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

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/

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.

Replacement iMac hard drive not an option for "restore from backup"

Got my iMac back from Apple today with a new hard drive following a hardware failure. Unfortunately, I cannot restore from Time Machine as the internal drive is not listed as a choice for "Destination". My Firewire drives are visible but the internal drive is not. It wasn't visible at the initial attempt to restore when the drive was under factor fresh OS installation, it wasn't visible after partitioning the drive, and it wasn't visible after repartioning into a single partition. Any advice or ideas/explanations?

In your "Applications" -> "Utilities" folder you'll find a utility named "Migration Assistant".
Migration Assistant was originally created for Mac owners who buy a new Mac and want to migrate all their data over to the new machine. But it turns out this is exactly what you do when you do a full restore from a Time Machine backup to a new/empty disk.
As a result, Migration Assistant was updated since they came out with Time Machine so that one of the options is "From a Time Machine Backup or other disk".
Choose that option and it should let you do your backup (it'll ask you what you want to restore... user accounts & folders, apps, etc.) You probably just want to have it restore everything.
When you get a new disk you really don't want to run Time Machine interactively to pick the restore. The interactive mode was really designed to help you search for subsets of files to restore (when you're missing just one or two things). You'll be missing a LOT if you try to do a restore that way.
There are some caveats... since you probably already created a user account without doing a restore first, you probably already created an account with the same name that you had before. Migration Assistant wont let you do a full restore overwriting an existing account. You can get around this by creating a temporary account (and flag it as an 'administrative' account), then delete all other accounts on the fresh hard drive. Now when you do the Migration you will have no conflicting accounts and all will go as expected. You can then delete the temporary admin account when you're done.
Time Machine should figure out that the backup does belong to your current machine BUT that the disk being backed up is NOT the original disk. This will cause it to not trust that it can tell what data has changed since the last backup and forces something called a "deep traversal". A deep traversal means it will do a comparison of every file in the backup with the corresponding file on computer to determine if it's the same -- and this takes about as long as an original Time Machine backup (as if you deleted the whole thing and started a new backup) except you wont lose your backup history. Expect the first backup to take many hours to complete. After that initial "deep traversal" you'll get normal backup performance on all subsequent backups.

Old iMac hard drive to external enclosure

The logic board on my old iMac (20" core duo...2006 model) but the hard drive is ok. I'd like to put it into an external enclosure but can't get it to fit.
1/ there's an external chip/connector on the side, half way down that blocks it fitting into the enclosure. I've never seen this on a hard drive before. What is this and what can I do to it (ie, remove it, ignore it etc)
2/ When it connects, it soon disconnects itself (a mater of seconds). Does this have anything to do with the chip on the side?
Basically, how can I get this done?
Any help appreciated.

Hi John,
It's a 2.5" drive. I would go with a firewire enclosure so you can boot from it. http://www.macsales sells a good one.

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.

Hard drive wiped out - can i restore songs from my ipod back to my computer

My computer hard drive is completly wiped out and my itunes back up with all my music is gone.
Is there a way to take what is on my ipod and transfer back to my new computer?

Check out the instructions/suggestions here.
Music from iPod to computer.
There's also another method. I've successfully tested this across several different Windows PCs.
Open iTunes and select edit/preferences/advanced/general. Put a check mark in the box marked "copy files to iTunes music folder when adding to library" and also "keep iTunes music folder organized", then click 'ok'.
Connect the iPod whilst holding down the shift/ctrl keys to prevent any auto sync, and if you see the dialogue window asking if you want to sync to this itunes library, click 'no'.
Then go to file/add folder, open 'my computer', select your iPod and click 'ok'.
The music files should transfer to your iTunes.
If this doesn't work (and it may not because officially it's not supposed to), there's Yamipod. This is a free program that transfers music and playlists etc from iPod back to the computer. However, it does not transfer playcounts/ratings etc.
The above methods will depend on what version of iTunes you are running.
I can't vouch that any of them will work with iTunes version 7.

My phone has frozen on a zoom position I have tried resetting and restoring the phone will restore but by putting my back up files on goes back to zoom on the screen

My phone has stuck on a zoom position meaning I cannot use any of the functions. I have tried resetting but the problem reoccurs. I tried restore but although it would go back to normal as soon as I put on the back up files it goes back to the problem.
How can I get into the settings?

Double Tap the Screen with 3 Fingers...
Then go to Settings > General > Accessibility and make sure Zoom is turned Off.

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.

Imac hard drive shows up in disc utility but repair greyed o

my imac will not start up without discs, and when it does and i try to use disc utility the drive shows up and i can select it but the repair and verify buttons are greyed out. same thing happens when i start it up in target mode. i did do nvram reset as well as power management reset.
I have a genius bar appt for saturday but as it is an hour a way i'd like to try and solve myself.

Ok select the drive model itself not the volume and check the information at the bottom to see if the SMART Status is Verified or not. If SMART is reporting an error it should say so in red letters in the Show Details section under the First Aid tab. Check screen shot for reference: http://ftp.georgetek.com/George/Disk_Util.png
George

Macbook Pro Hard Drives Failing

Hi all,
I've been having massing problems with my Macbook Pro 15" 2.53 Ghz laptop. I got one brand new with apple care in December of 2008. The hard drive was the standard 320 Gb @ 5400 RPM.
Within approximately two weeks of operation the computer failed (froze and after a hard shutdown wouldn't boot). It turned out the hard drive failed. Two weeks! So I took it back to Apple and they replaced the hard drive (took them one week so I lost a week of productivity).
One week after receiving the laptop back, the hard drive failed again! This time I believe the OS got corrupted somehow as the symptom was that it would not boot.
So back to Apple and they straight out replaced it with a new one. One week later, guess what? Failure. So back again and they replaced it.
I'm now on my 3rd laptop from Apple and this hard drive is failing. Luckily I was able to back everything up. I downloaded a utility called SMART Utility and it tells me 60 some sectors are bad on this disk.
Is anyone else having issues like this? Its absolutely ridiculous. Currently the computer is working despite the failed sectors and horrible sounds coming from the hard drive but I expect failure soon. I'll be taking this back to Apple and showing them the results of the SMART Utility, but I'm at the end of the rope here.
I've owned multiple Macbook Pros before and absolutely loved them. But now I am so disillusioned by this... To Apple's credit they have had great customer service, but now I'm at the point where I need to be able to rely on my machine.
Has anyone heard anything?

I would second Michael's comment. While hard drives do fail, the rate at which yours are failing would appear to be well beyond the statistical average. I would generally think the next level would be a problem with the MacBook itself causing the failures, but from what I can tell from your comment is that they have replaced your MacBook twice (and you're on your third?). So that would seem to rule out a problem with the MacBook itself. You mentioned that you've had other MacBooks before and it doesn't sound like you've had problems with them... so I wouldn't expect that you're doing anything unusual that would cause the problem.
You're either had a remarkable run of bad luck, or there's something going on that's out of the ordinary causing these drives to fail. I would imagine that when stores get machines, they're likely shipped from batches that are manufactured at similar times. If they had a batch of faulty drives from the manufacturer, it's possible a single store could have gotten several of them. That would still not really explain why your initially replaced drive failed as it would likely have come from a totally different batch than what would have been used in manufacturing at the time your notebook was put together. I guess it's always possible that they might put in a drive that that wasn't new.

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.

IMovie -Problem restoring events after external hard drive failed.

iMovie 09 – The external hard drive failed where I stored my 2012 events. I do not have a backup copy of these events. I bought a new external drive and named it exactly the same as the old drive. Then I uploaded archived original video clips to it recreating the events. I used the exact same event names. However when I view the projects I made from the original events, I get “this clip’s media file is not currently available”. The file path I created should be the same as the old, so why does the project not recognize the recreated events? Any suggestions what I could try?
If I were able to retrieve and copy the old events from the failed drive to the new drive, would that work?
Has anyone successfully dealt with this problem?

That's a very interesting scenario that you've described. I've been concerned about a potential situation arising where I may need to restore Events from a backup drive. However, your situation is somewhat different in that you've had to re-import the Events to a new drive from an archive.
My main video drive is a Maxtor One Touch III Turbo comprising two 500GB drives set up as a RAID 0. So, effectively it appears as one drive totalling 1TB, with data being written to both drives simultaneously (but not mirrored). However, if one drive fails, the other becomes ineffective as it contains only partial data about imported clips (the remaining data being on the failed drive).
I backup the Maxtor to a portable 1TB drive by cloning it using SuperDuper. My thinking has been that, if the Maxtor fails then a simple rename of the backup drive to the same name as the Maxtor is all that will be required for iMovie to retain the linkages between Events and Projects. I hope this is the case!
I hope you get a solution to your predicament - sorry I can't offer any useful advice!
John

My hard drive failed. I was able to restore my files from an external hard drive. I have my bookmarks saved but am not able to import them into Firefox as the only option is to import them from another browser. Any suggestions?

-My hard drive failed.
-I was able to restore my files from an external hard drive.
-My bookmarks are saved to a folder on my new hard drive.
-I am not able to import them from this folder on my hard drive into Firefox.
- the only option Firefox offers for importing bookmarks is to import them from another browser...is there another way?

In Firefox the bookmarks are saved in a database file called places.sqlite in the profile folder. If you have got this file from the external hard drive you can restore the bookmarks by copying this file to your current profile folder. For details of the location of the profile folder see either https://support.mozilla.com/kb/Profiles or http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Firefox

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

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