Why do new hard drives keep failing in Mac Mini OSX Server?

Why new new hard drives keep failing in Mac Mini OSX server?

If it only failed in 8 days.. I just return the drives back to newegg and get a different brand like western digital. NewEgg has a 30 day return policy.
If you deal with any hard drive manufacturer now, they will give you a refurbished item and not a new item that you are entitled.
As for testing hardware....
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1509
even if it still passed Apple tests.. it does not mean logicboard is fine..... it just means it passes the tests.
At this point, If i were you, I would just go back to NewEgg and send back the Seagates letting know they are bad and prefer a different brand such as Western Digital.
Install the Western Digitals and see how long they last. If they fail again in a a short amoung of time, it's the logicboard then.
This is based on experience in dealing with repairs with Macs, PCs, and other various kinds of Servers and computers over the last 10+ years.
In fact, One of my clients who has a Dual 4-core Intel Xeon Server with a Supermicro logicboard, one of their SATA drive ports are bad. Every 4 months like clock work the Mirror RAID Drive would degrade on that port. Then after figuring out that the drives are not necessary bad, I swapped to using another spare SATA port and since then no problems.

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New hard drives keep failing?

Hi guys,
A few months ago I decided to upgrade my Mac with a couple of new hard drives. I replaced the optical bay with a data doubler and placed a 1TB Toshiba HDD in it. In the primary bay I put in a 250GB Samsung 840 SSD. It seemed to work really well at first, I had all my media on the HDD and my apps on the SSD. But soon I noticed that when listening to music it would skip like a scratched CD at random points, if I went back to that point it wouldn't skip at the same place, completely random. Same thing with video, but the visuals would pause and lag when the audio skipped. Also, sometimes it would freeze with apps like word processing and iphoto, showing the spinning wheel. Eventually, after reformating both drives, updating the SSD firmware, doubling the RAM and trying countless other tweaks like not turning the hard drives off when not needed, all to no avail, I ran S.M.A.R.T utility and found that the HDD had 56 reallocated bad sectors. I took the HDD back and got a replacement. Ran the utility again and had no bad sectors. But soon the issue with media came back and has been getting worse and worse. Ran the utility again and the new HDD now has 831 bad sectors. I've sent it off for another replacement, but I am worried that the same problem will keep reoccuring. The utility says that there is absolutely nothing wrong the SSD. I am wondering what you guys think is causing this? and if I should replace the SSD in case it is faulty (despite the utility saying otherwise) and its causing the HDD to develop the bad sectors and fail? Hopefully someone out there can help me with this as I am at my wits end. I have an MBP7 mid 2010 13 inch running Mavericks. 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo. 4GB RAM (I doubled it to 8GB, but returned the new RAM after noticing no change.)
Many thanks in advance,
Jasper.

JasperThaddeus
I replaced the optical bay with a data doubler and placed a 1TB Toshiba HDD in it. In the primary bay I put in a 250GB Samsung 840 SSD
Simplify things, stick the SSD in the "front seat"
stick the slow HD in the optibay.
JasperThaddeus
then does it make any sense for the HDD to be developing bad sectors so rapidly?
Yes, its technically called "infant HD mortality", .....or as the pros call it "a DUD".

I dropped my macbook pro and the screen is broken can i still use it with an external monitor? Or can I or how do I transfer hard drive files to my mac mini?

I dropped my 17" macbook pro and the screen is broken. Can I still use it with an external monitor? When I plugged it into a monitor I had used it with before, I'm not able to see anything on the macbook screen to control it. It came on but I just got the blue screen with nothing else after typing in my password. (Didn't see the password form just assumed it was there somewhere and it did go from space to blue screen but no desktop icons, files, dock strip at top or anything else, just blank blue screen) so I can't access the system preferences.
Or can I / or how do I, transfer hard drive files to my mac mini? If not salvageable as is can I pull out the hard drive and make it an external harddrive? In otherwords is anything salvageable? It seems it's coming on I just can't access anything. BTW I was told it would cost aprox $1000 to replace the screen! I paid almost $4000 for this thing and it was running great - makes me sick to lose it!

I'd like to promise you that everything will be fine if you just get the monitor going - but it's hard to know what the hardware damage might be. It might be the monitor, or the damage might be greater.
Your best solution would be visit your local Apple Store and let them know what your situation is. They have access to diagnostics you don't, and they might be able to the best way to save your data and keep you computing. It's still not covered, but they can tell you what your current options are.
Um, you might consider investing in a backup drive.
And there other repair options, too. Powerbook Medic http://www.powerbookmedic.com/xcart1/pages.php?pageid=67 offers reliable repairs, and quotes prices well under Apple's.

Can I add a larger hard drive to my 2009 mac mini

can I add a larger hard drive to my 2009 mac mini. It has a 120GB now. Can that be replaced with a much larger one?

Up to 2TB per the following: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/mac-mini/

Why does the hard drive keep crashing on 2009 MacBook Pro?

We are now on the third hard drive, the second in 5 months. The problem started after I dropped book on it, but no repairmen have suggested that has anything to do with it.

drop your books on it and you can crash your armature heads in the HD, ....HD are fragile.
I assume the first one died of age.....second from the book drop.......and the third?
endlightend
Hard drives don't fail often, but they do occasionally
They fail, and often, and new ones fail a LOT more than older ones (sounds silly, but logical)
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 are highly prone to 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.
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 return for data extraction. HD life varies, but barring mechanical failure, 3-8 years typically.

Had a new hard drive installed on my Mac. Now how to get ALL my music/photos from iPhone to Mac?

I had a hard drive crash on my Mac laptop over Xmas, and had a new one installed. The iCloud contains all my purchased music, but I need to sync from my existing iPhone to get all the songs I previously had uploaded to my library from CDs. (Don't want to do that again if I can avoid it!) My iTunes library (actually on iCloud now) is about 600 songs short. Is there a way to do this? Every time I attempt to sync, I get a warning that all my songs on the iPhone will be wiped and replaced with what's in the library. That's exactly the opposite of what I want to do.

The iphone is not a backup/storage device. It simply mirrors the selected content of your computer. The sync is one way - computer to iphone. The only exception is itunes purchases.
It has always been very basic to always maintain a backup copy of your computer for this very occasion. Use your backup copy to put everything back.
If for some reason you have failed to backup, not good, then you can purchase third party programs to retrieve the other music, at your risk.

Replacement hard drive not recognized in mac mini

Hi folks,
I have an issue similar to several threads that were active during 2007 and 2008, but the information and answers given then do not solve my problem.
The original 80 GB Hitachi drive in a 1.5 Mhz PPC failed. I replaced it with a Western Digital PATA 320 GB ide drive and reassembled the Mac Mini.
The original Apple OS X was put in the optical drive and the computer was started with the "c" button pressed when powered on, but repeatedly the disk was ejected after a short time. Since the mac mini does not boot from the proper install cd, I cannot use disk utilities to partition and format the WD drive per the other thread messages.
The WD drive is not formatted for Apple yet. I connected the headless mac mini to an older ibook with a firewire cord and I attempted to boot the mac mini in target disk mode. The ibook never mounted the mac mini as an external drive, an icon did not appear on the desktop, and running disk utilities on the ibook did not recognize the mac mini connected by firewire as a mounted drive. I mounted an Acom hard drive connected by fire wire as a test of the ports and wires and that device was recognized in disk utilities and an icon for it was seen on the desktop.
Back to the issue at hand. What else can I do to partition and format a new hard drive installed in an older mac mini where 1) the install disk is kicked out of the optical drive and 2) the unformatted drive cannot be accessed via target disk mode from an ibook?
Is 320 GB incompatible with a PPC mac Mini?
Thanks in advance for offers of help and correct answers.
Mich

Hi Mich,
the older PPC computers are usualy limited to 128Gb max. HD size.
You need something like this:
"MacOS X 10.4.x and Earlier Hi-Cap Installer.app"
Its available for $25 here:
http://www.intechusa.com/

Macbook--installing a new hard drive--keeping my files

i was wondering if there was a way to change hard drives while keeping my settings and files the way they are on my present hard drive.
is this possible or will i have to back up all my files once again and redo all my settings. this is always a painful process so if anyone has advice for me, i'd be quite thankful.
also any advice on a 100 or 120 gb hard disk that is compatible with my macbook?

Place the new drive in an enclosure and hook it up to your machine; next, use this application to clone your current hard disk's contents to the external drive. From here, move the new drive into the MacBook, and put the old drive into the enclosure if you want.
(13513)

Why does my hard drive keep dismounting...help please I am going bonkers...

Brand new AEBS ver7 firmware
Works fine on the network and to the gateway for the internet.
Plug in a Lacie320 drive tot he USB, it sees it, it appears to work (but slow) for a while. Leave it to backup and when I return the disk has dismounted? Gone
Cant look at logs as I cannot reconnect without rebooting the router at which time the logs all are deleted.
If I try to reconnect it gives me an error connecting to Airport.
Only way out is to reboot AEBS.
If I try to delete files from the hard drive when connected it hangs, computer has timer going round forever message box is open but is not scanning files to delete, it is as if it can't see the drive and is searching...plus it has a small message box I cannot read (half off the screen), only way out of this is a physical reboot (hold power button down for 4 secs)
Now I have the drive on the USB direct to the machine, works great. So is this a firmware issue on the Airport unit?
Help please, I have spent days messing around with this and am about to give it up.
MacBookPro DualCore Mac OS X (10.4.8)
MacBookPro DualCore Mac OS X (10.4.8)

If you look in the iTunes folder on your original hard drive you should find a lot of files named "Temp File". These need to be deleted. I have not figured out what causes these or how to stop them from being made. If anyone knows the answer it would be greatly appreciated. When I delete mine it takes a very long time for them to delete, not the 2 minutes that countdown clock claims!
Dell 5100 Windows XP

Why does the hard drive keep spinning up when in sleep mode?

When my iMac 27" is in sleep mode I have noticed that the hard drive spins up very regularly every 4 or 5 minutes. Also when placed in sleep, the monitor takes about 30 seconds to go black. It also wakes on its own for no apparent reason. No new software has been added, only normal updates, running Lion. Time machine backup is done every couple weeks.

Power or other problems related to unexpected system sleep, shutdown, lights or fans call for an SMC reset. Read all the steps.
Before Resetting the SMC
Try each of the following steps in this order before you reset the SMC. Test the issue after completing each troubleshooting step to determine if the issue still occurs.
Press Command + Option + Escape to force quit any application that is not responding.
Put your Mac to sleep by choosing the Apple () menu from the upper-left menu bar and then choosing Sleep. Wake the computer after it has gone to sleep.
Restart your Mac by choosing the Apple () menu from the upper-left menu bar and then choosing Restart.
Shut down your Mac by choosing the Apple () menu from the upper-left menu bar and then choosing Shut Down.
Resetting the SMC for Mac Pro, Intel-based iMac, Intel-based Mac mini, or Intel-based Xserve
Shut down the computer.
Unplug the computer's power cord.
Wait fifteen seconds.
Attach the computer's power cord.
Wait five seconds, then press the power button to turn on the computer.
If the problems persist after performing the above read the following.
Open the Terminal app - it is in your Mac's Utilities folder and looks like this
Select the entire line that follows (triple-click to select it), select Edit > Copy, and then Paste it into the Terminal window:
clear; printf '\e[3J' && echo "**** Sleep/Wake events"; egrep -i 'eep\ cau|ake\ rea' /private/var/log/system.log; echo "**** Assertions"; pmset -g assertions
Copy the text of that entire window by selecting Edit > Select All, then Edit > Copy. Paste the text in a reply to this Discussion.

Why does my hard disk keep failing?

I've had my late 2009, white Macbook running Snow Leopard since February 2010 and in the two years I've had it the 'Macintosh HD' has broken three times. One time an application told me to download Adobe shockwave which totally messed it up and it would barely stay on for five minutes and the second and third times were seemingly unprovoked. The first two times I lost all my files - I'm fifteen and I can't afford to buy expensuve backing up software to back up a laptop that I already saved for a long time to buy.
I had another problem that I think was an unrelated hardware problem, but once every hour or so, the screen would become pixelated, freeze and fade to white, only changing back if you moved it. It seemed to sort itself out but it was pretty concerning.
I had to reset it again this morning after running disk utility which told me that the hard disk could not be repaired. I figured this might be imminent so my files are all safely backed up, but I'm not particularly amused and doubt this is normal for a Mac seeing as no one would spend £800 on something that you have to reset annually. I was wondering if some way I'm using my Mac is causing it to do this. I'm careful with my space used and I rarely have under 170 GB free, so I don't think it's my files. Maybe I've just got a faulty computer? Any ideas?

I take it that you have a 250GB hard drive in it?
With that much free space, I would think that your HD should be fairly trouble free. Only thing that I can think of that would cause an issue is improperly shutting down constantly. And you should restart your computer at least once a month or so, but either of these things are likely to have caused corruption bad enough to take down the drive. I guess it is possible that your drive has some bad sectors, you might want to run a more comprehensive drive utility than Disk Utility. Disk Warrior for example.

Not Enough Hard Drive Space on my Mac Mini to Save Deleted User Account Folder: What to do?

I am no longer able to access my original user account on my mac mini because the account is corrupted and won't load. Thanks to the helpful advice I found on the internet, I was able to create a new user account and resume using my mac, but all of my old files are trapped in the old user account.
The plan was to delete the old user account, create a disk image of the old account folders, and then migrate those folders to the new user account. Unfortunately, I don't have enough disc space left on my Mac to do that. I have just under 11gb left after deleting absolutely everything I could, and I need 81gb for the old user files. The back up plan was to select the "don't change the home folder" option, but when I went to delete the account, there was no such option. The message simply read:
"The user's home folder will not be saved. To do so, you need 81.1gb of free disk space. Try emptying the trash or deleting other files on your disk, then deleting the user account. If you do not want to save the user's home folder, click delete immediately."
My only two choices were CANCEL or DELETE IMMEDIATELY. There was no "don't change the home folder" option.
So I am not sure how to proceed. Here are some questions:
1) is there a way to save the disk image directly to an external drive instead of the user's folder on the mac hard drive?
2) If I use the "delete immediately" option, will the files go into a "deleted users" folder where they can be recovered or will they just be erased from the computer and unretrievable?
3) Is there a way to use terminal to change access permission on the original user account files so that I can copy them onto an external drive or integrate them with the new user account without having to first delete the original user account?
4) In the absence of deleting the user account, will using either:
sudo chown -R `id -un` /Users/oldusername
and/or
sudo chmod -R u+rw /Users/oldusername
in Terminal allow the new user account permission to access the original user files and merge them seamlessly into my new user account? Or must I delete the original account first?
5) Is there something else I haven't thought of that would work, would be more efficient, or more effective? This wouldn't be the first time I have overthought a solution...
When considering any solutions, please keep in mind that I cannot launch the original user account as that starts the whole endless loading loop. So, while I have the password for the original user account, any solution would appear to require that I work from the new user account only, without launching the old account. Also I am a complete newbie at this. I've used Macs exclusively for 17 years but this is the first time I've had to do anything like this. Up to now, everything has always "just worked". So please be as detailed with any instructions as possible!
Any help greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Mac Mini 2ghz 1g ram running OS 10.4.11

I think ComputerFixer is correct, you should be able to drag and drop it to another drive, no worries. However, if not, you could create an disk image of it using DiskUtility and create it on a new drive. But again, I don't think that is necessary. If you have administrator rights with your new account, can you simply go into the old user account folder and drag and drop the files you want to save? I have done that as well as copy the older user account to another drive (in my case, another computer on the network) and salgage my files from there. Is that an option for you?

Transferred hard drive from Macbook to Mac mini and now have Disk Util prob

The problem is with Disk Utility. Basically, the DU window is just blank, that is, no hard drives show up in the left hand column. Also, none of the buttons at the top are clickable, though the menu bar drop down menus work. If I use Expose to push the window off the screen and then bring it back, then sometimes it shows the hard drive, but part of it's name will be cut off. Also, if the left hand side of the window is blank, but I right click somewhere there, it will behave as if I'm right clicking on the drive's name.
I also ran Disk Utility off the Leopard install disc and that's running fine. All the drives showed up fine and I repaired permissions and repaired the disks wherever possible. I also tried trashing the DU preference (plist) file, but that didn't help. I've restarted the computer multiple times and also tried from another account and still the same problems.
Like I mentioned, I'm not sure if this problem has anything to do with the mini or switching out the drive or if it was just coincidental with the drive exchange today. I can't remember the last time I tried using Disk Utility, but I'm sure it was some time ago.
The reason I was trying to open up DU was b/c my Time Machine backup drive is not being recognized by the mini as the backup (probably somehow it was tied to the Macbook), so I wanted to reformat it and start the Time Machine back ups all over again.
Anyway, I was wondering if you anybody had any suggestions. Maybe my Disk Utility program is somehow corrupted and I could reinstall just that program somehow? It almost seems kinda like a graphics issue since the window for DU kind of looks funny (things cut off, buttons disappear, etc.).
Update: I used Pacifist to extract the Disk Utility program from the Leopard Installer and it still has the same problem.

I see. Thanks for the info. Sounds like I may have already tried what you suggested, as I mentioned in my original post that, "I've restarted the computer multiple times and also tried from another account and still the same problems."
However, I haven't created a new account and tried opening DU when logged into that account. Do you think that may make a difference?
Thanks.

Hard drive problems on 2 mac minis

Hello,
I have 2 Mac minis that appear to have bad drives in them.
60GB intel 1.66, and 100GB intel 1.66.
Starting from install disc, Disk utility cant repair, in one case it cannot see the drive.
Tried Disk Warrior with no success either.
Also tried zeroing out the drives using Disk utility.
No luck there. It seems to freeze.
Does anybody have any suggestions ?
One is under warranty, the others warranty ended about 2 months ago.
Also, if I take the warranty one to a genius desk, can they change the drive right there on the mini ?
Or will he just say the drive is bad and the mini needs to be sent back ?
Thanks in advance for any help provided!
Message was edited by: got2go

If Disk Utility from a compatible boot drive will not complete formatting of the drive, and you have the drive correctly partitioned, then it does indeed indicate a failed drive.
Apple won't send you replacement drives for you to fit - and of course you don't have to take your mini to an Apple store, because any Apple approved service provider can do the work - meaning obtain and fit drives. Alternatively, if you want to fit the drive(s) yourself, there is nothing to stop you sourcing compatible components and doing the work. Start at http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/mac-mini/ and pick the right type of system (PPC or Intel) and look at the drive options there. That'll give you a good idea of what drives you can buy, including devices which are not only rather higher capacity than original, but also faster. That site also contains links to video to help you do the work.
Of course doing it yourself will void any remaining warranty, and if that is an issue, it is essential to have Apple (or an approved service provider) do the work.
If you do it, you WILL need a compatible install disk in order to reinstall a compatible copy of MacOS, or software such as SuperDuper! to clone your bootable external to the new internal - assuming you want to revert to booting from that of course.

2TB Time Capsule or External Hard Drive for use with Mac MINI and AppleTV

Hi,
My current setup is I have a 1TB Hard Drive linked to my intel Mac Mini via FireWire 400, the Mini shares my music and films through iTunes so that my AppleTV can pick them up.
All devices are connected to an AEBS 802.11n (early model) via Cat6 Gigabit cables.
As I have run out of space and am looking for a bigger drive, I wanted to know if I would be able to use the 2TB Time Capsule to hold my films and be able to stream them to the Mac Mini so that it may stream them through iTunes to the AppleTV.
The theory of if should work, as the devices are all Gigabit capable and connected by high quality Cat6 leads their shouldn't be network bandwith issues, I am just unsure of how quickly the TimeCapsule can read stored data from a hard drive and transmit, some of my films are HD and run 4GB plus.
The obvious answers is just to buy a bigger hard drive with FW400, however I would like to reduce the number of boxes I have under the TV, I plan to upgrade my AEBS to the latest one anyway so just thought it made sense to explore this option.
looking forward to hearing what you have to say.

Hello,
It should work in theory, but the disk access time of the TC is much slower. I was setup like you are with an external drive connected to a Mini via FW and I had true Gigabit transfer between computers.
When my hard drive failed I sold my Linksys gigabit router and bought a TC to reduce the number of boxes, but I soon learned that the read/write speed on a TC is a little bit faster than on a thumb drive! Not that great. All my machines are also connected with Cat6.
It's still OK to watch a movie though, but transferring 10+ Gb is a pain.

Why do new hard drives keep failing in Mac Mini OSX Server?

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