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Author Topic: Another advantage of large drives  (Read 2998 times)

Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« on: October 16, 2010, 11:20:12 AM »
Late yesterday pm, the app I was using SiperDuper, seemed to have stopped; the progress bar didn't! Then, another app quit responding...and another...and finally everything froze except the mouse. Gave it about 15 minutes before pressing the power button.

Restarted, never got past the grey screen.

Restarted with Applejack in auto. Ran repairs. Restart got the the blue screen and a constantly spinning gear.

Restarted with Applejack in AUTO. Repairs take longer because of added tasks. Restart no better than before.

Restarted with Diskwarrier. Says it repaired many things. Still unable to complete start up. But I waited longer and saw that the blue screen and spinning gear were acting strangely, The gear would make 5 revolutions and disappear for a few seconds and do the same thing over and over and over and...

Ran DW again. It froze. rolleyes.gif

One more time with DW. More fixes, still claiming that all was repaired. Except still no complete start up.

Now trying TechTool Pro. Shows another 16+ minutes to complete Surface Scan. It had previously found 1,300+ empty plist files! And many of them were "Global..." plists. I seriously suspect that's why the start ups are never finished. I surmise that many of these "Global" plist files are created and populated when the OS is installed. They are now either corrupt, empty, moved or all three. Basically the OS os "hosed" to use a technical term! smile.gif

If TTP doesn't change things for the better, I may run DW again, but it is beginning to look like I need to find my Install disks...
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Offline jchuzi

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #1 on: October 16, 2010, 11:42:20 AM »
Did you run SMART? The drive may be failing, in which case reinstalling will do absolutely no good.
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #2 on: October 16, 2010, 11:57:54 AM »
DW (I think) found no problem with the SMART status, but it may have been TTP. dntknw.gif

TTP finished all the tests in its suite and found nothing wrong despite showing all those 'empty' plist files.

And thanks so much for your encouraging words! eek2.gif laughhard.gif Fortunately, I have room on this MBP to hold the entire boot volume on the iMac. I'm probably going to transfer all of the work files to it, assuming FireWire mode works. Then I can think about more disastrous repairs. I know one thing I'll do is mark many of the 'mystery' keys on the MBP! Especially "E" "I" and "O"! rofl.gif
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Offline jchuzi

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #3 on: October 16, 2010, 12:40:29 PM »
Just for a little more encouragement, SMART is unreliable if it verifies the disk as OK. It is totally reliable if it says that the disk is failing. Doesn't that cheer you up?
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Jon

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Offline jcarter

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #4 on: October 16, 2010, 03:55:32 PM »
Sounds pretty much like what happened to my dear old Soccer ball.
Failed hard drive.
Jane
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #5 on: October 16, 2010, 08:30:21 PM »
Getting a new drive by next Saturday, hopefully much sooner. So much for S.M.A.R.T. rolleyes.gif They promised to give me the old drive back. It was still mounting but not always accessible. Still, would save some time if I can scrape some stuff off there... Guess I'll have to start refilling the piggy bank for the memory upgrade. sad.gif

BTW, I gave up on the MBP keyboard! I just plugged in the one I was using on the iMac! clap.gif rofl.gif
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Offline gunug

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #6 on: October 17, 2010, 08:48:17 PM »
I also have a history littered by lost data and lost drives. . .there is no such thing as really backing up enough times and enough ways!  Obviously, in the words of the president from Arkansas, "I feel your pain!" I'd be interested in knowing whether reformatting the "bad" hard drive, after you've reclaimed all that you could, would leave you with a drive that is operational!

As for the soccer ball's problems maybe that it's been jumping around like this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nJbNvhC7A8...feature=related
« Last Edit: October 18, 2010, 08:38:16 AM by gunug »
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Offline Paddy

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #7 on: October 17, 2010, 11:13:10 PM »
Jim, this definitely sounds like one of my hard drive failures - I spent SOOOO much time running various repair routines, always hoping each time would do it, and I'd get one normal restart every so often (which would fairly quickly freeze) to give me hope, but in the end, it was toast. sad.gif

This is one reason I just about always buy Western Digital Scorpio Blacks these days - not only are they reliable, but they have 5 year warranties. I figure they're more likely to be replaced because I've outgrown them, than outlive their warranties. So far, so good.
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Offline jchuzi

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #8 on: October 18, 2010, 05:37:30 AM »
I have had good luck with all six Hitachi drives that I bought. From reading comments by a professional tech person, Seagate seems like it should be avoided. That pro sees a lot of drives and often complains that Seagate drives can be DOA or fail soon after installation.
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Offline jcarter

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #9 on: October 18, 2010, 07:32:32 AM »
Cute movie, boo hoo, its sitting forlornly on the kitchen counter ready to go to computer heaven.
Jane
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Offline Paddy

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #10 on: October 18, 2010, 08:13:26 AM »
I shouldn't have said I only buy Western Digitals - I think I actually have more Hitachis at the moment (which may have more to do with Canada Computers' specials, along with good reviews at Newegg...) - and they've been rock solid. And I've not been too impressed with Seagate ever since I had to return 2 newly purchased drives because they had a firmware glitch that didn't allow the full cache to be seen or utilized and the firmware fix was Windows only and could ONLY be run on a PC - emulation didn't cut it and I'm not sure if Bootcamp would have worked either, but I didn't have it installed so it was moot. Since then, if the reviews at places like Newegg.com are any indication, the failure rate of Seagate drives is well beyond the norm. Drive companies seem to go through cycles; I remember a number of years ago Western Digital was having problems and of course, then there were IBM "Deathstars" (Deskstars)...

That said, I'm considering a larger WD Scorpio Blue for my Macbook Pro - from reviews and comparisons I've read, they're not all that much slower in use than the Blacks and I'd really like to have the larger capacity, as I could then clone to the MBP from the MacPro. I have to replace a fan in the MBP as soon as I have a little time - it's been noisy for ages - and when I do, I might as well take the few extra steps and install a new drive.

For my Mac Pro, the Hitachis and the WD Black 1TB drives are great.
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #11 on: October 18, 2010, 03:06:49 PM »
I favor Hitachi also. smile.gif

The one in the iMac was Western Digital...

Good news is I'm typing this on an iPad at the Apple Store waiting to pick it up. I'm also going to swap the keyboards n Judy's MBP, At least it has AppleCare!
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #12 on: October 18, 2010, 07:05:11 PM »
Now it's a matter of finding all those utilities and apps that I've lost... sad.gif Nobody's fault but my own. A few months ago, I moved 90% of my apps to the larger of the two partitions on the internal drive; the other one was simply too small! That's one reason I will not be partitioning the new drive.

Fortunately 1Password had its backups on the external. Have no idea where the SuperDuper back is, sure doesn't look like I can see it. it may well have been hosed when the disk crashed while SD was running. dntknw.gif Ah, there's another app I need, ASAP, Typinator! URLMPro is up and running, also. later...
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Offline Xairbusdriver

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #13 on: October 19, 2010, 12:04:03 PM »
Just re-installed one of the third-party apps I'd lost and tried to start it up. "You can't run this exquisite and amazing software on the OS you have installed...stupid[/co;or]!" eek2.gif

Oops! The "Genius'" had installed the same OS they that had come on the iMac back in 2007... wallbash.gif I never thought of checking!!! Thet could have been part of the problem with getting Judy's MBP to get to one of the printers? Thinking.gif Anyway, I'll be away while I reinstall Snow Leopard and all the updates...I seem to remember something about needing to have Leopard on first? Surely not, but we'll soon find out...later...this is so much fun. At least every developer has been kind enough to look up my infor and send the needed license key/serial numbers/etc. And you can bet they are all going into 1Password ASAP! yes.gif The backup files for that app were all on the external, fortunately. clap.gif
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THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF COUNTRIES
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CAUTION! Childhood vaccinations cause adults! :yes:

Offline Jack W

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Another advantage of large drives
« Reply #14 on: October 19, 2010, 02:24:05 PM »
Jim,

Where are your backups???
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My Macs: 2010 27" alum iMac 2.8GHz, Snow Leopard 10.6.8/Mavericks 10.9.5, 4GB SDRAM (Workhorse),
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