Terminal help - hard drive rescue

Hi, I have a little bit of a problem. My hard drive is unbootable, but still mountable. *My goal is to gain access to the hard drive, and copy everything on it to an external hard drive*. Note, because it's unbootable, I don't have a lot of options.
Also, *the Firewire port on the machine is not working*. Thus, any file transferring must be accomplished over USB or Ethernet. I also have access another Mac, if that would be of any assistance. Now let me throw you some ideas here. (For the record, I don't know if any of this will help, but it's worth a try.) *I have booted the machine off the Leopard Install Disc. This now gives you access to several options:*
*Startup Disk. Disk Utility. Terminal. System Profiler. Network Profiler.*
Something tells me Terminal might be able to make some magic happen. Unfortunately, I know nothing about the voodoo commands that can be issued in it to get this plan into action. I hear rumors about something called Single User Mode, however I know very little about it (other than, if entering the wrong command, erasing your drive).
So if anyone out there has any suggestion as to how to set this up, I'd appreciate it. Thanks.

How do you know the disk is mountable? Do you see it with Disk Utility when booted with the install disk? Try this, if you downloaded the 10.5.2 COMBO update before experiencing your problem. Boot with the install disk, select your language, select Disk Utility from Utilities->File->Open disk image, select the combo image, mount it, and try to run it, selecting the hosed HD. If you don't have the COMBO update, download it from http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/apple/macosx_updates/macosx1052comboupdate .html, and transfer it to the HD via USB or ethernet from another computer. Since you don't have an operable FireWire port, using target disk mode (the preferred option) is out.
If you can't do the above, then post your Terminal queries to the Unix forum under OS X Technologies where the Terminal and Unix gurus hang out. http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106388 and http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106237 describe single-user mode operations.

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Please Help - Hard Drive Gone - Won't Mount - No AppleCare...

Hi guys,
I'm in trouble here..
I was loading a bunch of photos from an external drive to iPhoto and my iMac froze up for a long time.
I couldn't do anything at all - so I finally force-powered down.
When I powered back up - My Hard Drive was gone and Finder will not open.
Other applications in my dock such as web browsers, iTunes etc. seem to be unaffected - I can also access Disk Utility and other Apps through Spotlight, but No sign of my "Macintosh HD".
I ran a "Verify Disk" in Disk Utility - and here's the report it provided:
Verifying volume “Macintosh HD”
Checking HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Checking multi-linked files.
Checking Catalog hierarchy.
Checking Extended Attributes file.
Checking volume bitmap.
Checking volume information.
Volume Header needs minor repair
The volume Macintosh HD needs to be repaired.
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
1 HFS volume checked
Volume needs repair
---The "Repair Disk" Button in Disk Utility is all grayed out though so I can't run it...
I'm at a loss. I can't afford AppleCare, and they won't help me because I'm just out of my 90 day phone support...
I'm on an Intel Core 2 Duo iMac - the last Glossy White one before the new ones.
I've got the latest version of Tiger.
Any advice would be a Godsend. I'm afraid I may have ruined my iMac.
Thanks!

We usually try to give folks who come here simplified advice that keeps them comfortable troubleshooting and repairing their Macs and won;t raise other issues for them. Command line tools don't usually fall into the simplified category and fsck for Mac OS X Tiger is not recommended by Apple, except as a last resort. It is known to cause other issues.
From the Apple Knowledge Base article that Dale has linked below;
Note: If you're using Mac OS X 10.4 or later, you should use Disk Utility instead of fsck, whenever possible.
If you can successfully start up in Safe Mode or use Disk Utility while started up from a disc, you don't need to use fsck.
IMO, it isn't helpful for you to come along and contradict sound advice from folks who have used the Knowledge Base and are aware of Apple's recommendations because you think that you know better.

Hong Kong vs Canadian hard drive + Rescue and Recovery FROZEN at Installing Language Pack

Hello everyone,
I have a Lenovo T61 Widescreen (Type: 7658CTO) that I bought in Canada in May 2008. Unfortunately my warranty has expired.
I had some problems with my 1st hard drive (which came shipped with my Canadian machine) and so had it swapped with a new one using Lenovo's Hong Kong On-Site service in January of this year (I now live in Hong Kong).
I am trying to do a Rescue and Recovery (full system restore to factory settings) using the Hong Kong drive, but it is frozen at "Please Wait, Preload Customization in Progress...." There is an accompanying command line screen that says "Installing Chinese Hong Kong language pack". At the top of this command line screen it says "Select X:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe - call c:\swwork\autoex.cmd"
It has been frozen for over an hour. I have tried rebooting but it freezes again at "Please Wait, Preload Customization in Progress..."
I do not have Rescue and Recover CDs as they were not an option at the time I purchased my machine. In the past, I have several times successfully recovered and reinstalled from my hard drive partition on my Canadian hard drive.
Both Canadian and Hong Kong hard drives were running English Windows Vista Home Premium Edition.
Unfortunately, I do not have my Canadian hard drive anymore because I had to hand it over to the Hong Kong technician in order to recieve a new hard drive.
Could it be that the Hong Kong On-Site Warranty service merely made a Ghost Image of a English Vista config without copying the necessary back-up partition to the hard drive?
Any other ideas for why my Rescue and Recovery is frozen???
Thanks!
Richmond

Hi,
Your question is confusing.
"Factory recovery" option creates self-contained media with the full image of the OS + needed drivers and is bootable, so you can boot from it and install OS+drivers to the original state. When you bought your machine, it should have a "Q" partition (possibly hidden) that holds this image, and that is what is copied to the media plus the boot environment.
"Create rescue media" from the advanced menu in Rescue and Recovery makes a bootable disk that you can use to boot the computer from, and on it will be a separate little version of R&R that lets you choose to restore from a backup or from factory disks/images. It does not (if I am right) have an image of the OS or drivers. However, it does (if I am right again) search your connected drives for such images and will offer you to restore from one if it finds one.
It seems to me that when you used rescue media, you probably booted into the rescue media but then might have restored from a non-Lenovo windows image? Did you by any chance have a drive with a non-Lenovo Windows installation disk connected?
Also, the fact that R&R is a 32-bit program should not affect what OS is restores; it restores whatever is in the image.

Help, hard drive sled 4 torx screws are different types

I have a late 2007 Santa Rosa MacBook. I was a Boy Scout and try to always be prepared. So I ordered a spare Seagate ST9160821AS drive. The copy went just fine. So I decided to order a spare hard drive sled from Ifixit.
There I notice the 4 torx T-8 screws are not the same. 2 have "shoulders / built in washers" while 2 do not.
So I remove my original sled and see the same 2 with shoulders and 2 without torx screws.
Problem is I didn't pay any attention as to where they originally went.
So if you have a virgin MacBook (or knowledge), could you tell me where the shouldered screws go. Maybe the end with the pull out tab or on the same side? I do not know.

Thank you for the reply. I have carefully studied the 4 holes in the sled and they all seem to be the same diameter.

Hard drive rescue

I've recently switched to Macs from that other operating system and, as such want to sell my old PC.
After reading many positive accounts, I used a utility called dban (dban.org) to securely wipe both the drives in the machine (1x80GB, 1x120GB). Since doing that however, neither drive will show up when I reboot the PC (meaning I can't format them to reinstall XP). When I pop them in my firewire enclosures, neither will show up under "My Computer" on other XP machines either.
So to the Mac...
I read somewhere that Disk Utility is good at rescuing this sort of thing, so I thought I'd give it a go. I put the 80GB in my FW enclosure and, wahey, it popped up on the desktop.
"Right then," I thought "I'll use Disk Utility to reformat the drive just to be safe."
That was over an hour ago.
The drive has just been whirring away, accompanied by the beachball in Disk Utility (which Force Quit says is not responding). Eveery 15 minutes or so it gives a little chirrup of activity, then goes back to whirring again.
My questions, I suppose, are:-
1) Is the drive dead?
2) Is Disk Utility supposed to go into a beachball frenzy and, if so, how long is it supposed to take to erase/partition this drive?
3) Anybody got any other ideas? I tried DiskWarrior v3, bujt it can't even see the drive.
All suggestions greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

1. You wrote: "Just read through the link you posted. Does what it says also apply non-startup disks as well?"By "non-startup disks" I presume you mean disks on which Mac OS X is not installed, i.e. non-bootable disks or data-only disks/volumes.
Only Steps 1 and 2 of the Procedure would apply to a non-startup disk. For a non-startup disk, substitute the volume in question for "Macintosh HD" in those steps.
The rest of the advice re: steps if Disk Utility cannot repair the disk, such as resorting to third-party disk utilities, would apply to non-startup disks.
2. You wrote: "I'm still new at the Mac thing and I REALLY don't want to fudge my main drive."Since you're new to Mac, you'll find my "Learning About Mac OS X" FAQ helpful: it has a number of resources that you will find useful in getting up to speed, such as books, online training, and more.
Good luck!
Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X
Note: The information provided in the link(s) above is freely available. However, because I own The X Lab™, a commercial Web site to which some of these links point, the Apple Discussions Terms of Use require I include the following disclosure statement with this post:
I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise, from my recommendation or link.

Help, hard drive issues!

I can't boot from my start up disk, is there anything I can do? I've tried booting from the install disks, booting from my external drive, I tried Disk Warrior, and now I'm running Prosoft Data Rescue II to try to recover my data. Is there anything else worth trying? I'm desperate, I have all my school work on there. Thank you so much.

Hi Graham
Sorry to hear of your woes. I assume you don't have a backup?
The only other things left that you haven't tried are FireWire Target Disk Mode (but you need access to another Mac for that) and, perhaps, Drive Genius.
Also bear in mind that if you are going to use Data rescue, you need a spare drive with plenty of free space on it.
15 1.25G/12 1G PBs, Mac minis, iBooks G3/G4, Mac OS X (10.4.3) Cube, TAMs, iPods 2G/4G, iPs, AEBS, AX

Hard drive asleep?

I am surprised how often when I return to FCP after a short break I have to wait for the multi coloured whirling wheel before I can start work again. This is not the computer itself being put to sleep but presumably the hard drive.
I cannot find anywhere in preferences or energy saving where I can alter this.
A friend with a similar system thinks that my computer does do this more often than hers but cannot offer further help.
It is nothing more than a minor irritant but as today is New Year perhaps it's a good day to clear some niggles up.
Pete Snowdon

Thank you, I have looked on that site. Most of it seems more concerned with people not being able to get their HD to spindown but I can see that by setting it to x minutes that could be helpful.
However I am not sure what is hapenning here. I think that this only hapens when accessing FCP and no other applications. I store my project info on the mac HD and use the other internal HD for capturing - the mac HD is set to sleep after about 25 mins but this spidown happens within that time and I do not observe it anywhere else but within FCP. Also when I used the mac HD for capture I am pretty sure I got the same thing. I just wonder whether this is a FCP issue.
What I am unsure about is by using this suggestion in terminal which hard drive am I affecting?

The hard drive on my MacBook died and I had it replaced. I can't locate my website files and every time I try to open my idisk it looks for a name and password (even reset my apple id as prompted) I keep being told that it's the wrong name or password?

The hard drive on my MacBook died and I had it replaced. Now I can't locate my website files and every time I try to open my finder/idisk it looks for a name and password (even reset my apple id as prompted) I keep being told that it's the wrong name or password? Any suggestions out there

Arty ~ Welcome to the Support Communities. iWeb can't import/open published HTML/media files on your iDisk. iWeb can only open its key Domain file which contains your site data — it's usually located here:
...If you don't have a backup of your Domain file (e.g. via Time Machine), paragraph 2.3 of this FAQ page gives some tips on how to use published files, graphics, photos, etc., to help rebuild the site from scratch:
http://iwebfaq.org/site/iWeb_Backup_retrieve.html
Also this thread may help:
Hard Drive replacement causes new/unknown user password?

Will not recognize internal hard drive

I have a strange problem with a 2009 MacBookPro. It started acting "strange" for the user over the past few months. By "strange" I mean it would freeze, or fail to boot, or sometimes even restart without any reason. Now, it gets even stranger. Tried the standard things, RAM reseat, replace, check for loose connectors etc. It would fail to boot when the hard drive was connected internally. Then it would give a kernal panic and fail to even recognize a hard drive as being installed. Did a PRam reset, SMC reset and even the power off/control key to try to reset the open firmware. No sucess with anything. This is a suystem with an internal battery.
Yet, when using this exact same hard drive on an external USB drive connection, it would boot fine. Next tried it in Terminal mode to boot up another MBP. Failed to boot. When the 2nd MBP was booted from its internal drive and the suspect machine was plugged in as a Firewire (Terminal mode on "strange" computer) an External Firewire Drive appeared on the desktop, then a few seconds later, an identical copy of the first Ext FW drive appeared. This went on with evenbtually six copies of the one single Terminal booted hard drive appearing on the desktop of the second computer. None of the six drives would open or even allow any indiccation of what they contained.
Tried to partition the hard drive when it was put back into the internal slot but it would not unmount and failed to partition. The same thinmg happened when trying to erase it. Connected the hard drive via USB to a Windows 7 machine and used it to erase both the Recovery and Main partitions from the ard drive. Both were erased but the EFI partition could not be erased or cleaned. Put this same hard drive, as an external USB, into a very old XP machine and there the EFI partition was removed when a "Clean" command was sent via command line.
I then took the, now totally erased hard drive, and put it back into the computer as an internal drive and booted the computer from a 10.8 USB stick so I could partition the now empty hard drive. The drive was not even recognized as being present. Did the same thing, but using the USB external connection for that same hard drive. It partitioned and then formatted with 10.8.1 (what was on the USB stick). After the OS was installed, the computer would boot using this newly created OS when connected as an external USB drive. Put the drive back in as the internal drive. Got a Kernal Panic. Forced shutdown and retried. Noi kernal Panic but drive was not even recognized. Pulled the drive from internal and put it back into the external USB and tried booting. System would not recognize the drive as even being present.
I then erased and cleaned the drive in the XP machine again and then, using the USB connection on the second computer reinstalled 10.8 from the USB. When I tried the now newly created software again, the same thing happened as listed above. 2nd machine booted fine on the drive as a USB, "Strange" machine booted fine using the drive as an external USB, Kernal Panicked then would not be recognized in the "Strange" machine.
It appears that when the drive is connected internally. it not only does not have the OS software recognized but will rewrite something in the drive that makes it impossible to be recognized by any Apple. My first thought was that the EFI partition was corrupted somehow so that was why I tried cleaning the EFI partition along with the other two partitions. But even with a new EFI and other partitions, the drive was not useable once it was used to try to boot as an internal drive in the suspect computer.
Now here I am dropping into speculation mode. My guess is that something in the very basic ROM (Pram?) that recognizes a hard drive is in the internal slot and tries to get to the EFI instead fails and in the process it screws up the EFI (or maybe even an address table?) in the hard drive. If it recognizes that there is no internal hard drive, it will happily boot from either a USB stick, a USB connected external hard drive or a Firewire/Terminal mode computer connected to it.
Sounds like a motherboard problem but I am wondering if it is possible to "flash" the very basic ROM that is at the start of the process back to factory default or maybe just replace the chip if it is the same one used as part of the Firmware password protection system.
Anyone have any other ideas or thoughts about possible solutions or at least a way to definitely identify what the problem's cause?

Answer has been found. The internal drive SATA cable was replaced and the system is now working correctly.

New SCSI hard drive problem: Device busy too long

I set up second SCSI hard drive for my sun box Sparc Station 20. The set up is as follows:
New SCSI hard drive (ID #2) connects to Sun box and connects to tape drive (SCSI #4) with terminator.
Hard drive is Seagate model ST15150N with J01 (open : means disable drive terminator) and J04 (jumper on second position, ID=2).
I CAN format the hard drive and assign label etc.. but when I type the command : > newfs /dev/rdsk/c1t2d0s7 (I use whole slice 7 as one partition and c1 is my second controller).
The following error displays continuously:
WARNING: /iomnn@f,e0000000/sbus@f,e0001000/dma@1,81000/esp@1,80000/sd@2,0 device busy too long
Is this error come from the wrong hardware set up or from other reason ? Any suggestion is welcome . Thanks in advance.
William

First of all, thanks for your reply. I appreciate it.
A couple of things. I check my system profiler and I couldn't find out what kind of SCSI card I have. I even opened up my machine and there wasn't any writing on it. So how do I find out what type of card I have? My other question is if the same card worked for the SCSI drive I had before, why won't it work on the new drive. I've set it as the master at the end of the SCSI cord and like I said I used CCC. The drive shows up on my desktop but won't boot. Should I try loading OS from disks instead of using CCC?

G5 Hard Drive

Can I add the drive from my dead 2.7 DP to my G5 2.0 DP to get my info off. I guess compatibility is the question. Thanks

Hi Mookie H. Wilson-
Yes you can.
This document may be helpful: Hard Drive Replacement Instructions
Luck-
-DP

Encoding on terminal to read/write ntfs hard drive help!

I encoded in Terminal the codes that were posted online regarding the enabling of read/write for ntfs hard drive but something went wrong during the process. Would it be possible to undo it? Would there be any code to disable it so I could at least read it? It won't even read my hard drive anymore. I think I have accidentally delete the Volumes part where it was supposed to appear.

Difficult to say without knowing what you did more precisely. Use the terminal history command as follows:
     history > ~/Desktop/MyNightmare.txt
to save what you got up to in a file on your desktop. Copy and paste the lines that will show us what you did. Check for, and redact as necessary, any personal information such as user names, passwords, etc. before posting.
Also, I assume that you tried to edit your /etc/fstab file so please post the results of these terminal commands
     ls -la /etc/fstab
     cat /etc/fstab
too.
C.

Prosoft Data Rescue for Hard Drive "No Valid Packages" in Disk Utility

I have a Macbook and I believe the hard drive has crashed. When I turn it on, I get the circle with line through it and the folder with question mark inside blinking.
I got the Install Disk 1 to boot up but can not verify the hard drive. I get the following message "No Valid Packages" and disk verification fails. I also checked the SMART status of the hard drive and it says "Not Supported".
I also can not re-install the operating system, as there is no hard drive that shows up to install it to when I try to run the installer disk.
I know I need a new hard drive, much bigger one. I'm purchasing this today, a 320gb Samsung M6 Series internal drive and a Western digital external 500gb WDE1U5000N.
I also want to purchase the Prosoft Data Rescue but have several questions:
1)I read the this can work if disk utility sees the hard drive. The hard drive is seen in disk utility, but like i said before the drive has failed and it can not mount. I've read other reviews that said Prosoft can still be used in this case, but I want to make sure..please define what is meant by "disk utility being unable to see the hard drive"...Does this mean "dead hard drive or the hard drive not physically being VISIBLE in disk utility (because mine is, I just can't mount or verify it)
2)If I can use Prosoft, when I put it in my damaged Macbook to recover the files, can I then put these files onto my new external drive? Or do I have to have another internal drive to do this? (I'm just buying 1 right now)...How do you get the recovered data off if I can not move it onto an external drive? Do I put it on a disk and then take the damaged hard drive out, put the new one in and then put it on the external?
Sorry for the questions but I want to buy today by 5pm so it ships by Friday to me to fix this ASAP, thanks!

I read the this can work if disk utility sees the hard drive.
Prosoft Data Rescue can help recover files after a software failure. (Usually related file directory problems.) It sounds, however, that you've experienced a hardware failure of your original hard drive. No amount of software can ever recover a hard drive from a hardware failure. If you really need to recover the data, a data recovery service may be able to help. The cost will depend on the steps needed to recover the data and how much data is recovered.
-Doug

Help! how to apply Seagate hard-drive update from DVD drive on G4 Powermac

Short version of story:
Just put Sonnet PCI SATA card in G4 Digital Audio Powermac running Tiger. Have replaced two IDE drives with *Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 1 TB hard drive*. It's recognized and working fine. EXCEPT: this is the now infamous drive ST31000340AS that WILL most certainly fail if it does not get the firmware update that Seagate has made available. (These drives are failing like crazy-- Google for info, do not buy!) I have the firmware update on CD as an ISO file (of course Seagate makes nothing that it Mac friendly but this has worked for other Mac users). But when I try to flash the firmware by starting from the CD ("C" key held down), nothing happens. The G4 just goes ahead and starts Tiger 10.4.11. I have also tried holding down "O + F + option + control on start up. I'm not getting anywhere.
Since the drive is functional and it's the only drive in the G4, what am I doing wrong? Help!

I just got off the phone with Seagate who say that while my model numbers are the affected drives, my two drives have serial numbers that do NOT need a firmware update. (Yet!)
However, I'm not feeling very lucky. I took these two drives from my Maxtor One Touch III 2 TB external hard-drive because it was failing intermittently-- "now you see me, now you don't." Not very good for a backup drive! But Maxtor/Seagate is providing nothing for Maxtor One Touch III owners under warranty but another refurbished (as in previously failed) Maxtor One Touch III and asking hundreds of dollar$ for data recovery. There is not even a firmware update at this point. People should be avoiding Seagate Barracuda drives (these used to be the best of the best, but not now) or at least researching them *very thoroughly* before buying.
I guess, the good news is that I don't have to struggle with getting a firmware update to work on my PowerMac. Though thanks to you both I will know what to do if these drives eventually do need a firmware update. The other good news is that I got all my data back by pulling the drives from their enclosure which apparently causes overheating. I violated my warranty, pulled the drives, and got all my data back.
At the moment both of my Barracuda drives are happily purring away in my PowerMac G4 giving that old baby 2 Tb to play with. (I use iPartition so getting the drives recognized on the G4 isn't a problem.) And since I have my new iMac 3.06ghz 24" with all my data backup on WD external drives, I will only use the G4 networked for extra storage (backup for my backup). (I am also using Disk Warrior and Data Rescue II to keep an eye on these drives.)
Thanks again for the advice.

Internal hard drive not recognised, but has a lot of data i need on it!HELP

hi all
i'm on mac pro, quad core, leopard 10.5.2.
basically for some reason my hard drive was working fine, then one day last week i turned my mac back on and the hard drive will not initialize anymore.
i've gone into disk utility to try and repair disk. but it's listed there, not the name i gave it but 'disk1s1'.
i then go to verify disk and it comes up with this error.
*Verifying volume “disk1s1”*
* /dev/disk1s1*
*Invalid BS_jmpBoot in boot block: fa31c0*
*Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.*
so i started looking for data recovery software, i found one called data rescue and its found alot of data on it, some i dont need (like stuff i deleted a long time ago), but i have 3 logic project folders full of projects i need to get finished for releasing!
but the thing with data rescue is... it is renaming all the fle aiff001, aiff002 etc etc, and for logic files this is no good as you need the files named as they were other wise it won't recognise the files and all the individual parts won't load up!
so i need a way of either making the mac recognize my hard drive again so i can drag everything off it and reformat it, or use a data recovery software that does not rename the files?
can anybody please HELP!
cheers
BOOM!
Message was edited by: boomboom1980

orangekay wrote:
SMART is largely snake oil in implementation and practice and it's entirely commonplace for a dead drive to report itself functional and vice versa. I've seen Seagates whose heads were audibly grinding against the platters claim they were functioning normally, and I've seen others that said they were failing go on to provide years of reliable service. SMART status is a ballpark guess at best.
yes I understand that but I wouldn't trust a drive with a non-verified SMART status. as you say, it might continue to function but chances are pretty high that it will soon fail altogether. that's already happened to the OP who should consider himself lucky he can get anything off the drive at all with Data rescue. professional data recovery is of course also an option but a very expensive one. at least when I tried to use a service like this once about 5 years ago they wanted to charge me a small fortune. not sure what that would cost these days...

Terminal help - hard drive rescue

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