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Help recovering MacBook Hard Drive Data?

Discussion in 'Community Broadband & Computers' started by Celebrate Calm, Jul 1, 2008.

  1. Celebrate Calm

    Celebrate Calm New Member

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    Our Macbook screen just went blank (they told us this only happened with PC's, heh) and Apple says we need to take it to Tyson's so they MAY be able to retrieve data off the hard drive.

    Does anyone know of a place close to here that can help with this? Thanks so much!
     
  2. gunzour

    gunzour "Living on the Edge"

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    I am not a Mac person, but I seem to remember that there is a way to connect two Macs via a usb cable and have one act as a usb drive. That way you can read the contents of you hard drive from the second Macbook.

    Now all you need is a second Macbook :)
     
  3. MyCrosswind26

    MyCrosswind26 New Member

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    Can you give me more details about when last time was working? what happen? What test did you try? as much details as you can and I see how I can help you.
     
  4. Skins fan

    Skins fan Tequila fan (100% agave)

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    Even Apples have hardware failures. Any hard drive will eventually fail over time. The newer Macs with 10.5 system software have Time Machine which will back up your data automatically to a second hard drive.

    If you want Apple to service it, Tysons is the closest store. You might also try looking on Craigs List. I don't know of any Apple repair places in Loudoun.

     
  5. Celebrate Calm

    Celebrate Calm New Member

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    It's my fault because I should have backed up my data every night--I lost about 11 days worth of data, but I can reconstruct it. Definitely tested the Calm Coach Approach, but I'm winning so far :)

    I was working on a WORD document and answering email--both AOL and Yahoo were up on the screen. All of a sudden, while responding to Yahoo email, the dreaded scrolling blue-thing came up. It scrolled forever and I couldn't force quit, so eventually we hit the power button. When I waited awhile and hit the power button, a white screen came up.

    Called Applecare--they said the hard drive disassociated itself. I'm not a tech guy so I'm not sure what that means. The computer is under warranty so we'll get a new hard drive. I have 3 really important files (two Excel and one Word) that I would love to recover, just not sure if we'll be able to.

    Any ideas or referrals are appreciated. It's a hard lesson, but a good one to learn. Back up your data every day. And I suppose I should subscribe to a data saving service as well.
     
  6. Mr. Linux

    Mr. Linux Senior Member & Moderator Forum Staff

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    If you have access to another Mac, here's something you can try...

    With the Macbook turned OFF, grab a firewire cable and connect it to the Macbook. Connect the other end to the other Mac which should already be turned on and logged in. Turn on the Macbook and IMMEDIATELY press the T key and KEEP IT PRESSED. Don't release until you see an orange logo appear on the screen of the Macbook.

    At this point, look on the other Mac. Look at your Finder window; it should now display another disk in the list of drives, which should be the one in the Macbook. Click on that and look through the drive for your files and copy them off that drive ASAP.

    You can get more info on the Target Mode function directly from Apple support:

    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1661

    Let me know if I can help in any way if this doesn't work for you...
     
  7. Celebrate Calm

    Celebrate Calm New Member

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    Mr. Linux, thank you for your help. I really do appreciate it. I will try this first thing in the morning. All I need to recover are two Excel files. Will let you know how it goes. Thanks again to everyone for their help. You guys are great.
     
  8. Twriter

    Twriter Get a Mac!

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    If using target mode doesn't work, try booting from the one of the CDs that came with the computer. If the computer boots OK and doesn't show an icon for the hard drive, then the logic board is good and the drive is bad.
    If it does show an icon for the hard drive, then use the Disk Utility on the CD to test and repair the drive.
    If you do end up bringing the computer in for repair at the Apple store, specify on the repair order that you want the old hard drive back. I found out the hard way that they do not normally return the drives! The reason you want the drive back is because the drive is actually two parts: the physical drive and a controller. If the just the controller is bad then the drive appears to be bad, when in fact the drive might be OK. You can use the new controller with the old drive and get back to where you were.

    --- John B.
     
  9. broken skull

    broken skull New Member

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    Take out the drive and hook it to a USB drive enclosure. It is pretty easy to remove the drive from the actual computer. Its like 3 screws in the battery compartment.
     
  10. Mr. Linux

    Mr. Linux Senior Member & Moderator Forum Staff

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    Yea, essentially, doing the Target Mode thing I described does just that, or at least 'simulates' it...

    CC, if you want to try the drive enclosure thing, I have a few on hand and I'll be happy to let you borrow one for a couple days to see if you're able to access the drive that way.
     
  11. Celebrate Calm

    Celebrate Calm New Member

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    Okay, this really helps. Let me try the suggestions above and see what happens. Will be a good 4th of July experiment!

    Again, thanks to each of you for taking the time to help. That's one cool thing about these forums. Enjoy some time off with your families this weekend, and I'll check back in later.
     
  12. analyst

    analyst New Member

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    Is your MacBook still under warranty? 1 year, or 3 with Applecare? If so, Tysons or Fair Oaks Apple stores will fix it free for you, but keep your old disk if they replace it. So you need to try to fix it yourself first, using your Install Disk 1. Connect your power adapter/battery charger. Push Disk 1 into the CD slot. Hold down the letter C on the keyboard, and then push the power button. Keep holding the C key. The MacBook will start from the CD OS. After it does, locate Disk Utility in the menus at the top of the screen. You may have to quit the Installer program to find the menus. Launch Disk Utility, and see whether your hard disk appears in the left pane. It should say Macintosh HD unless you renamed it. Select this disk, and click on the Repair Disk icon in the right pane of Disk Utility. The program will try to repair your file directory, etc. If it works, you may be back in business. If you have not repaired 'File Permissions' lately, go ahead and do that now (see right pane again). If Repair Disk cannot fix your disk, you will get a message to that effect. You have three choices now: Buy a better utility, like Disk Warrior 4, or reformat your disk and reinstall all your software. You will lose your documents, of course. You can also ask TechRestore.com to try to recover your files. They charge a lot less than most, but more than you want to pay for a couple of SS or docs.
    If Mac HD does not show up in the left pane, your HD may have died. File recovery is still possible, but very expensive. Toshiba sold Apple a lot of defective HD that ended up in MacBooks, so you may have one of those. Check to see whether Apple will replace a defective Toshiba, even if you are out of warranty.
     

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