ML failed Hard drive failure - restored TM to External, Now what?

If I'm reposting, please point me to a thread, I'll try it. Just didn't see exactly what I thought I need, and I'm new to the Mac beyond just using it.
Tried to install ML on an iMac 2008 running Lion. It failed saying the hard drive failed. It took several restarts, but finally got to where I could do a restore from time machine - which is what I thought I wanted to do. But because the internal drive is "marked" to have failed, I could only restore to an external. I am now running from that 2TB external. I ran DU to try to check the internal. Even during the install, DU said the disk was fine. After the restore there was once that Verify Disk failed, Repair Disk seemed to have worked, but still didn't dare trying to reinstall ML or boot from it. I erased it, hoping to get the OS and all my data from the external to the internal.
Can I just copy it? What is my next step?
Thanks,
Rick

Sounds like the drive has failed or is failing. You'll probably need to replace it.
You can try to clone the system back after erasing the drive with SuperDuper or CarbonCopy Cloner

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How do I replace a failed hard drive and restore with time machine

My hard drive died on my 2009 MacBook Pro. I regularly backed up my data using Time Machine. How do I format the drive and restore fom my USB TimeMachine drive.

If you haven't made a Lion or Mt Lion install USB thumb drive or used the Recovery Disk assistant to make a USB thumb of the Recovery HD then you will need to boot the system from the original OS Install disk that came with the system or a Snow Leopard disk you bought to upgrade to Snow Leopard. Then use the option to restore from TM backup.
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I am in the process of replacing my hard drive and have run into a problem. I reinstalled OSX 10.6.3 using a DVD I bought off Amazon. That went well and I then restored my hard drive using an external and Time Machine.
After that, things still looked good but I couldn't log in to my user (and access my MacBook) because my password wasn't working even though my hint was correct. Yes, I am POSITIVE my password was correct; I even tried a couple other passwords to humor myself. I then gave up and decided to restart the computer.
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Please help =[

You probably bought the wrong RAM that has different pin assignments, so it won't fit in the slot. Return it.
I bought 4GB Memory online for my MacBook, so I could get it to run twice as fast.
Doubling the memory does not make your computer run twice as fast.

Need to reformat hard drive and restore Time Machine backup. What's the safest way to proceed?

I have a Mac desktop, purchased in 2007. We upgraded last year to Snow Leopard. It has been slow for a few days, and yesterday wouldn't go past the gray screen. Tried booting in recovery with no success, same for safe mode. Even tried fsck -fy. Eventually went to the Snow Leopard install disk and tried to repair disk, but got an "Disk Utility can't repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files" message. I've got Time Machine back ups on an external hard drive, but I want to make sure I do this right and don't make things worse. What steps do I need to take?

In most of the cases, that Disk Utility message means that the hard drive is damaged.
However, you can try to erase the disk and restore the Time Machine backup to see if it works. Follow these steps:
1. Insert the Snow Leopard DVD and press the C key while your Mac is starting.
2. Go to Utilities menu > Disk Utility, select Macintosh HD on the sidebar, go to Erase tab and erase the disk. If there's an error during this step, take the Mac to an Apple Store to get a new hard drive.
3. Close Disk Utility, go to Utilities menu, choose the option to restore a Time Machine backup and follow the steps.
If the computer is slow after doing this, take the Mac to an Apple Store as soon as you can

Time Machine backups corrupt or external hard drive failure?

My goal today was to upgrade my MacBook Pro's HD, and to restore my system from my latest Time Machine backup which resides on an external hard drive. I installed the new hard drive, formatted it as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), and selected Restore System From Backup from Utilities. The system restore was five minutes form finishing when I received an error that the system restore could not be completed, and that I should restart my machine and try again. I did as instructed, but once the system restore process began, the screen went gray, and I was told that the Snow Leopard install could not be completed.
Before beginning the process a third time, I ran Disk Utility from the Snow Leopard install disc and attempted to verify and repair the external (Time Machine) hard drive. The Time Machine hard drive could not be verified, nor could it be repaired. I popped in the old hard drive into my MacBook Pro, booted Snow Leopard, and ran Disk Utility, and tried again repairing the Time Machine hard drive. Here is the log of the error I received:
2010-12-29 21:14:30 -0800: Verify and Repair volume “Time Machine”
2010-12-29 21:14:30 -0800: Starting repair tool:
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking extents overflow file.
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking catalog file.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Invalid node structure
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: The volume Time Machine could not be verified completely.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Volume repair complete.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800:
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Disk Utility stopped repairing “Time Machine”: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
Do these errors indicate that my Time Machine backups located in the Backups.backupdb are corrupt, or is the external hard drive corrupt and failing?
The Time Machine backups are on a Maxtor OneTouch, and from what I've read, they're prone to an early demise. I've also recently noticed that my Time Machine backups started slowing. For example, I would plug in my external hard drive and if 1.3GB needed to be backed up, it would stall at 300 MB before jumping to 700 MB, stall again, then jump to 900 MB. That could be a sign of a failing hard drive, correct? If the external hard drive is failing, I can purchase a new eternal hard drive then copy the Backups.backupdb to the new hard drive, correct?
However, if Backups.backupdb is corrupt, then from what I understand, I would have to start fresh. I would prefer to not start fresh unless there's no other option, as I would be losing almost three years worth of Time Machine backups.
Any guidance is appreciated. Thanks!

ali_baba7 wrote:
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Invalid node structure
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
It's possible a heavy-duty 3rd-party utility such as +Disk Warrior+ can fix that. It's about $100, and there's no guarantee, but it's probably a good investment for the future.
Do these errors indicate that my Time Machine backups located in the Backups.backupdb are corrupt, or is the external hard drive corrupt and failing?
The structure of the file system is damaged.
That may have been caused by the disk beginning to fail, but there's no way to tell for sure until you erase and reformat the disk and try to use it.
I've also recently noticed that my Time Machine backups started slowing. For example, I would plug in my external hard drive and if 1.3GB needed to be backed up, it would stall at 300 MB before jumping to 700 MB, stall again, then jump to 900 MB. That could be a sign of a failing hard drive, correct?
It could, but it could also be whatever's wrong with the file structure.
If the external hard drive is failing, I can purchase a new eternal hard drive then copy the Backups.backupdb to the new hard drive, correct?
No. You can't copy corrupted backups. They're all linked together, like a database, so if anything's damaged, the whole set is suspect, and can't be copied.
There are a couple of options:
If the disk is physically ok, and the directory damage was recent, you might be able to restore from an earlier backup. But since you noticed problems some time ago, the damage may not be recent.
Or, you might be able to get up and running by just installing OSX from your SL Install disk (and the 10.6.5 "combo" update). You'll be missing whatever wasn't restored in that last 5 minutes or so. Things are restored in the same order they're listed by the Finder, so it will be the last things in the last user account. You should be able to figure out where it stopped, check or delete the very last file (likely incomplete) and selectively restore as many of the remaining things as you can, via the "Star Wars" display.
Just to make things more difficult, if the disk is failing, the more you use it, the more likely it is to get worse or fail completely.
So your safest bet may be to install OSX, then download and install the 10.6.5 "combo" update. Info and download available at: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1324 Be sure to do a +Repair Permissions+ via Disk Utility (in your Applications/Utilities folder) afterwards. Then recover what you can.

I had a hard drive failure on my iMac. I can restore my music, tv shows, and apps from the iTunes store. How do I restore my movies?

We came back from vacation to find our iMac not working. Turns out I had a hard drive failure due to an invalid node structure? They could not recover anything. I can restore our music, apps, and tv shows from iTunes. Anyone know how to restore the movies we purchased from iTunes?

It has always been very basic to always maintain a backup copy of your computer for just such an occasion. Use your backup copy to put everything back.
If for some reaosn you have failed to backup, then you can transfer itunes purchases from an ipod. File>Transfer Purchases

Trying to restore my Mac OS after a hard drive failure and my password is no longer recognized, however I can log in by double clicking on the Lion Icon? How can I reset my password

I am trying to restore my Mac OS after a hard drive failure and my password is no longer recognized, however I can log in by double clicking on the Lion Icon? How can I reset my password

First, make sure caps lock is not on.
Another reason why your password might not be recognized is that the keyboard layout (input source) has been switched without your realizing it. At the login screen, you can cycle through the available layouts by pressing the key combinationcommand-space or command-option-space. See this support article.
If the user account is associated with an Apple ID, and you know the Apple ID password, then maybe the Apple ID can be used to reset your user account password.
Otherwise*, boot into Recovery mode. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, select
Utilities ▹ Terminal
from the menu bar. In the window that opens, type this:
res
Press the tab key. The partial command you typed will automatically be completed to this:
resetpassword
Press return. A Reset Password window opens. Close the Terminal window to get it out of the way.
Select your boot volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name) if not already selected.
Select your username from the menu labeled Select the user account if not already selected.
Follow the prompts to reset the password. It's safest to choose a password that includes only the characters a-z, A-Z, and 0-9.
Select
 ▹ Restart
from the menu bar.
You should now be able to log in with the new password, but your Keychain will be reset (empty.) If you've forgotten the Keychain password (which is ordinarily the same as your login password), there's no way to recover it.
*Note: If you've activated FileVault, this procedure doesn't apply. Follow instead these instructions.

I went to Mac Store and had replaced hard drive because I encountered 4HDD ERROR(hard drive failure). I had backed up my old hard drive by TIME MACHINE regularly. Now how can I restore everything I had?

I went to Mac Store and had replaced hard drive because I encountered 4HDD ERROR(hard drive failure). I had backed up my old hard drive by TIME MACHINE regularly. Now how can I restore everything I had?

Thanks for your response.
I had tried COMMAND+ALT+R which led me to directly to INTERNET RECOVERY via wifi. After 1 hour or so it dropped me at the same point.
I've tried MIGRANT ASSISTANCE as well, it kept on LOOKING FOR OTHER COMPUTERS even though I clicked on TIME MACHINE BACK UP USING EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE
so what to do now?
P.S. Guys at MacStore were so careless to even listen to me when I asked them about retrieving back up :(
Please help

Restoration after Hard Drive Failure

Hello all.
My Powerbook G4 suffered a hard drive failure a couple of months ago, and every bit of information was lost in no-man's land. After seeking help with Apple, I was sent to DriveSavers. Thankfully, they were able to recover 100% of my drive or that's what they tell me anyway. (No need to scold me, I have learned my lesson about backing up EVERYTHING -- especially when the bill arrived from DriveSavers!) The Powerbook was kaput, so I decided to purchase an new iMac. DriveSavers has put my entire Powerbook contents onto several DVD discs, but so far I have had very little luck with actually transferring and using any of it on the iMac. I have been able to copy document files from Appleworks, Photoshop, etc. onto the iMac, and I can open them and use them with no problem. Although, I did have to go back and re-install the actual Photoshop and Appleworks applications from their original software discs since I was unable to successfully copy the applications from the DriveSavers discs onto the iMac. Still, I am in desperate need of certain Apple applications from the Powerbook that just will not appear on the iMac -- things like Address Book, all of my Stickies , plus the other Stickies that were only located on Dashboard (i was a stickies freak), the emails and contacts saved in Mail, the appts. & scheduling in iCal, etc. I cannot successfully access these kinds of things. I am able to copy an entire disc from DriveSavers onto the iMac, but when I launch the Address Book application from that folder, it just opens up the empty, brand new Address Book from the iMac or the new, empty iCal. The same thing happens with other similar programs. (I think iTunes has been the only thing with which I have any kind of success.) I've even rifled through the DVD discs and gone through my old User folder to the Library folder, then the Caches folder, and finally to the .com.apple.AddressBook folder where I extracted just the Metadata folder which clearly contains all of my contacts. When I try to add just the contact cards to the iMac's Address Book application, I still doesn't work and remains empty. The only way I've been able to look at any of my contacts is to use TextEdit to open those contact cards, and then dig through all of the jargon and piece together the info. It's very frustrating and time-consuming. I would just like for my Powerbook to be reincarnated, if you will, here on this new iMac. Is this even possible? I am completely baffled, and beginning to fear that I may have paid thousands of dollars for DVDs that would serve me better if I were lost in the Sahara and needing to signal a plane flying overhead by reflecting them against the sun. If anyone has any advice or tips, I would be very grateful.
Cheers,
Maize
Intel-based iMac Mac OS X (10.4.6)
PowerbookG4 Mac OS X (10.4.6)
PowerbookG4 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Hi,
Maybe this article can help :
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106941#2c
Take a look at the 'manual' backup and restore sections of the article.
Good luck!
iBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.7)

After replacing a failed hard drive with new one I inadvertently created a different account name(home/user) than the one in the Time Machine backup. Now I cannot restore the photos in iPhoto. What are my options?

After replacing a failed hard drive with new one I inadvertently created a different account name(home/user) than the one in the Time Machine backup. Now I cannot restore the photos in iPhoto. What are my options?

The best thing to do would be to start over. Use Setup Assistant this time.
Boot into Recovery, launch Disk Utility, and erase the startup volume. This operation will destroy all data on the volume. Quit Disk Utility and install OS X. If your Mac was upgraded from an older version of OS X, you’ll need the Apple ID and password you used to upgrade, so make a note of those before you begin.
When you reboot, you'll be prompted to go through the initial setup process. That’s when you transfer the data from one of your backups. For a walkthrough, see here:
Using Setup Assistant
Don't transfer the Guest account, if it was enabled on the old system.
Note: You need an always-on Ethernet or Wi-Fi connection to the Internet to use Recovery. It won’t work with USB or PPPoE modems, or with proxy servers, or with networks that require a certificate for authentication.

Could this be a failed hard drive?

My daughter bought a new 20 GB gen 3 iPod in August of 2004. Now, when she turns it on, she gets the sad face along with a triangle and exclamation point. She has followed the steps in the Apple KB article for this scenario here and I have tried to help her - but all is to no avail.
A reset does not fix the problem. We have tried to restore it. But when the iPod is put into disk mode and attached to her computer, the iPod does not show up anywhere. It is not recognized by iTunes or iPod Updater. When the iPod is removed from the computer, the computer gives a message saying that the device was not recognized and asks if we want to re-initialize. (Curiously, it does not ask that while the iPod is attached.)
After the last attempt at this, we could hear the hard drive of the iPod trying to repetitively spin up, about every 3 or 4 seconds. It wouild spin up and stop, spin up and stop, etc. At least, it sure sounded like the hard drive to me.
If anybody can shed some wisdom on this, I would appreciate it. My opinion is that there has probably been a hard drive failure. Has anyone experienced similar symptoms? And if so, what was the solution? If this is a hard drive problem, I am disappointed that it did not last more than 16 months. Are there any statistics anywhere about the lifetime of these devices?
Thanks,
Rich
EMAC G4 1.0 GHz Mac OS X (10.3.9)

You might try a PRAM reset and see if this does any good.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379?viewlocale=en_US
It sounds like the hard drive itself is toast based on how it looks in an enclosure. So you won't be able to boot from it. Possibly after a PRAM reset you could option boot to a disc or to your external drive.
I had the experience of a failed hard drive totally messing up my PowerMacG4, and it took some doing to get it going again. I finally got it going again, and it has been working ever since without issue.
The MBP is a different machine, but having experienced first hand what a dying hard drive could do, I think it's well worth doing any resets you can.
If no joy, make an appointment at the genius bar and ask them if they can run a hardware test from their store feed. If you do have other issues, they should show up then.
If you end up being able to boot to the optical drive, you could try running the extended version of the Apple Hardware test yourself.
Good luck!

Rebuilding After Hard-Drive Failure

My hard-drive failed a few months ago. After replacing the hard-drive, I recovered my iTunes library (music only) from a back-up of the failed hard-drive. My music now syncs between devices via iTunes Match, and I have successfully transferred all of the app and movie purchases from my devices (iPhone and iPad) to my desktop. However, I have one movie that was downloaded to the iTunes library on my desktop post hard-drive failure using a redemption code from a Blue-Ray/DVD/Digital bundle. How do I get that movie to upload to my iPad? If I plug the iPad into my desktop, and I try to sync movies, iTunes tells me that this iPad is currently syncing to a different iTunes library and warns me that if I continue, everything on my iPad will be erased and replaced by the contents of this iTunes library. I have a huge number of apps organized in folders. I am afraid that I will lose all of those folders, and I will have to reorganize my apps if I proceed with the sync. Is there any other way to get the movie onto my iPad?

You should be able to:
Backup the device to the new installation
Transfer your purchases into a newly authorized library
Recover any other media using third party tools as suggested in this post from forum regular Zevoneer
Restore the device from the backup
This process should switch the association of the device to the new library, preserving the data and settings in your apps.
May also be prudent to attempt a backup to iCloud directly from the device before you start... Settings > iCloud > Storage & Backup > iCloud Backup > On. It won't save any media but it would preserve the general account settings and documents in case anything goes wrong while you are trying to extract your other data.
When you get it all fixed, make a backup!
tt2

Recovery after hard drive failure?

Hi everyone,
Simple question regarding what to do if my hard drive fails. Please bare in mind that my knowledge of computers is less than to be desired!
I currently use Carbon Copy Cloner (time machine gives me too many issues) to make an identical bootable copy of my hard drive. I assume that if my current hard drive fails, I could just boot from my cloned external drive and then clone my external drive to a new internal HHD.
Seems easy. So what's the pupose of the recovery partition? Would most of you guys approach the task of hard drive failure in the same way as me?
Cheers
Tom

The recovery partition is instead of having installer discs. It allows you to restore the last installed operating system to factory state. At times it may tap into the Apple App Store Server, and need a contact to support to get the right installer to show up. Mind you, no Mac can install an older operating system than shipped with, except for this tip:
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6841
Apple discontinued providing installer discs with Mac OS X 10.7 installed Macs.

Failed hard drive, no OS disk, no boot dvd

HI All,
My hard drive failed. I tried disk utility and it says that something is wrong with the boot sector. I was able to get some files off of it before Full failure, but now it just spins and does nothing.
I bought a new SSD to use, but I cannot for the life of me get it started!
I have no OS on a cd, dvd, boot drive or anything.
Here is what I did. I am hoping someone can help me
1) Using another macbook pro, I formatted my SSD to Mac OS X extended
2) Using my failed MBP, I put the new SSD into the hard drive bay. This was not recognized by the system.
3) I put the failed hard drive back into the drive bay, hooked up both my time machine backup drive and my new SSD to the USB ports.
4) I was able to restore the time machine backup to the SSD (hooked up via USB. PErfect! I see all my files!
5) I then removed the SSD from the USB and installed the SSD into the hard drive bay of the laptop and booted up. Nothing. Flashing folder again.
Can someone please tell me what I did wrong? Why isnt the SSD being recognized when I put it in the hard drive bay!??

No one?

Multiple Hard Drive Failures on my Macbook Pro - Entourage reminders?

Over the past 2 months I've had three hard drives fail on three different macbook pro computers.
I've retraced my steps, searched many forums, and spoken with multiple Mac Geniuses but still can't figure out what's happening. The IT guy at work is about to kill me and I really want to figure out what's going wrong so I can fix it (or change my current behaviors).
Computer #1 - Out of the box, 2-3 weeks old. I took the computer home to do some work over the weekend. I didn't turn the it off before transporting it, but I did wait for it to go to sleep completely (I've since read that it takes a few moments while things in RAM switch over to the Hard Drive to save incase of power failure). I worked on it a bit at home, mostly just internet searches and a few word documents. When I returned to work my computer was running slowly and suddenly all of the programs locked. Since I've had this problem before with my personal computer (a G4 Powerbook), I tried the force quit options to no avail so I just held down the power key to power off. When I rebooted I got the dreaded "no" symbol.
Computer 2: IT gave me a used macbook pro that they repurposed for me. I made sure to shut down before transporting this computer. A few days later, before I even got to transfer all of my files, the computer started running slowly, programs locked. I eventually got the computer to shut itself down (as IT didn't want me to do a forced reboot) but upon restarting I got an even more dreaded screen, the folder with a question mark in it.
Computer 3: It was a fairly new computer, though a bit more ram, and probably only a few months old (used by a freelancer). It worked great. I took it home several times, transfered all of my files. Set up everything perfectly. Three weeks in, after working at my desk for about 4 hours, everything began to slow down. I called IT immediately and remotely sent a force shut down message. Nothing happened for about 15 minutes so I left for a meeting. I came back a few hours later and my computer was off. When it restarted, nothing appeared. There wasn't a "no" symbol or folder with a question mark in it, just a blank screen.
I've read and thought about all of the options.
- Large Magnet somewhere - It would have affected my personal computer (if at home) or my colleagues (if at work) or everyone else in nyc (while on the subway)
- Too hot - Possible I suppose, but how does running iTunes, powerpoint, and entourage do this?
- Downloaded something/Virus - We don't have administrative privileges. I can only update some software and send/receive folders. Plus, can any single file cause this much damage?
- Moved before asleep - This might have happened on the first computer, but I doubt it could happen to three. I always shut it down now before transporting, and I was sitting at my desk for hours before I had any trouble last time.
The one common factor that I haven't mentioned.
We use Entourage as a mail client here.
Each time the computer froze, the first things to freeze were the Entourage calendar reminders. Entourage seems to run strangely with the airport, but not with our LAN. When my computer froze last time, I had the aiport on but was working off the LAN. Could Entourage cause this much trouble? Has anyone else had trouble with entourage calendar reminders or failing hard drives?
Oh, and it also always happens on a Monday. I've taken the computers home multiple times though, so I'm not sure if it's something I'm doing during the transport or not, but the computer is always off now when I move it. I also cary my personal computer with me often, same routes and bags, so I'm not sure why it's not affected.
Thanks

columbus new boy wrote:
How crap is that?
It's not crap at all.
It's not that simple. For example, I've 3500 songs on my MacBook but don't want them all on my phone, so I have to manually select each song again???
There has to be a solution.
Why not simply make a playlist with the songs you want on the iPhone?
and maintain a current backup of your computer.

ML failed Hard drive failure - restored TM to External, Now what?

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