User profile for user: chlorals
chlorals Author
User level: Level 1
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Fried Hard Drive??

I purchased a MacBook a little over a year ago. Yesterday I was online and all of the sudden, the computer froze. I turned it off and I got a flashing screen with a folder icon with a question mark on it. Took it to the store and it turns out my hard drive is fried!! I lost EVERYTHING- hundreds and hundreds of pictures of my baby. I am so upset. The SAME thing happened to my brother and I was just wondering if this is common with Mac. I have been a PC user for years and thought I would give it a try. I am so not impressed. And because my warranty expired, they can't do anything for me. I have not installed any software so I just think it's ridiculous that this would happen. My question is, does this happen a lot?

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Posted on Aug 31, 2007 5:35 PM

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15 replies
User profile for user: frustrated81
frustrated81
User level: Level 1
0 points

Aug 31, 2007 5:52 PM in response to chlorals

Oh my god!!!!!!!!!!! The same thing just hapened to me too!!!!1
Iwas so frustrated i kept on switching the computer on and i kept on getting the same folder with the question mark on and i also got a another symbol it's a circle with a \ inside it. I was going crazy and telling myself that i will recover everything, but now after reading your message i gave up :/
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User profile for user: Merged Content 1
Merged Content 1
User level: Level 6
11,068 points

Aug 31, 2007 6:50 PM in response to chlorals

There are services available that will take apart your hard drive and try to recover lost data. These services can be $400 plus but may be worth trying. I always recommend backing up! An external drive can be a life saver. I back up my system nightly to my external drive and I have had my drive fail one and with in 3 hours of replacing the drive, I was up and running again.
This also isn't apple fault. They purchase the part from other manufactures. As with all electronics there is a failure rate. You were one of the "lucky" few to get a bad hard drive.
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User profile for user: lazypilot
lazypilot
User level: Level 1
135 points

Aug 31, 2007 7:33 PM in response to Merged Content 1

I feel your pain. I too have learned the hard way about making weekly back ups. I
have had many windows and mac computers over the years and have learned that hard drives fail. I have seen drives go for years without problems and I have seen drives fail within months of install. It's just the nature of the beast. Your only hope is a drive recovery service but it's going to cost!

Sorry for your loss.
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User profile for user: amrajah
amrajah
User level: Level 1
0 points

Aug 31, 2007 11:55 PM in response to chlorals

You too, huh? I've been through TWO hard drives already and am sending my last drive into the Hitachi manufacturer for replacement. I have a feeling that after two HDs from different manufacturers failing that the Macbook hardware might be flawed. Plus it seems like a lot of people are having this same issue.

I went to macrumors.com forums and asked for help on this issue and was laughed at and ridiculed. God forbid that Mac hardware fail! gasp
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User profile for user: Andrew Bristow
Andrew Bristow
User level: Level 2
355 points

Sep 1, 2007 5:35 AM in response to JMF

I've had two hard drives die on my own PC's over the years, replaced one from another PC for a friend, the second HD in my Mac at work died along with the primary HD on a mac at a previous job and also the HD in my IPOD also died.

Hard drives have moving parts and they dont live forever. Laptop HDs are more likely to fail as they are more likely to me moved around when in use.

Its not just Apple hardware that suffers this fate. Any machine that uses a HD to store data could have this happen.

All you can do is make sure you keep backups of valuable files such as photos, videos etc. CDs and DVDs are a cheap and effective way to do this.
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User profile for user: damfair
damfair
User level: Level 2
230 points

Sep 1, 2007 7:17 AM in response to amrajah

Mac hardware implies that Mac made it, like virtually every other computer "assembler" out there, Mac uses another company's hard drives. If it is the Mac systemboard or power utilization circuit that is somehow involved, then you should blame Apple, otherwise look to the hard drive manufacturer. You could substitute Dell or HP or Compaq etc for every place above where Mac or Apple is used!
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User profile for user: amrajah
amrajah
User level: Level 1
0 points

Sep 1, 2007 9:41 AM in response to damfair

Still though, you have to admit that it's a bit odd that a bunch of hard drives from different manufacturers are failing within one year on the same comp. I mean, yes, HDs will fail but not after barely a few months use! For example, my HDs died in six months respectively and I treated my computer with the utmost care. It's really annoying.
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User profile for user: mp3fan
mp3fan
User level: Level 1
60 points

Sep 1, 2007 11:07 AM in response to damfair

damfair wrote:
Mac hardware implies that Mac made it, like virtually every other computer "assembler" out there, Mac uses another company's hard drives. If it is the Mac systemboard or power utilization circuit that is somehow involved, then you should blame Apple, otherwise look to the hard drive manufacturer. You could substitute Dell or HP or Compaq etc for every place above where Mac or Apple is used!


It's incorrect to attribute all hard drive failures to the hard drive itself. If the controller on the motherboard is faulty then it might be to blame and as others have already noted, it's strange that multiple drives from multiple manufacturers seem to be failing on some Macbooks.
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User profile for user: LazyJones
LazyJones
User level: Level 1
0 points

Oct 5, 2007 5:10 AM in response to chlorals

I joined the dead HD's sociecty a few days ago. Same scenario: freezing, turning off and on, questionmark folder.

I must say this is really ******* me off since Apple is apparently aware of the epidemic HD failures with their MacBooks. There are several topics in the support forum as well dealing with this issue... At least they should have notified customers about this!

I want to ask if any of you guys had luck restoring some data from your HDs? Have you tried services like DriveSavers?
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User profile for user: maccajude
maccajude
User level: Level 1
5 points

Oct 5, 2007 6:59 AM in response to chlorals

this is ridiculous. i've went through the fried hard drive situation twice now. apple wouldn't do anything about it though since both were third party hard drives i bought brand new from seagate... i guess that's what i get for upgrading my hard drive! ridiculous...even though it's clearly the apple machine that is screwing up so many hard drives.
so now, i'm just using the 60 gig HD that came in my macbook and learning to adapt to limited space. so when this drive crashes, apple can't deny me!
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Fried Hard Drive??

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