Data Recovery of Time Machine Backup From a Corrupted Drive

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Data Recovery of Time Machine Backup From a Corrupted Drive

I had to install 10.2 and 9.2.2 on an internal drive in my 2003 MDD G4 but first I had to reformat it (and wipe out its data) since it did not have OS 9 drivers installed. No problem thinks I since its contents are backed up to my 500 GB Western Digital HD. Installation of 10.2/9.2.2 was successful but when I go back into 10.5.8 to restore the contents of the newly formatted drive the external drive with the Time Machine backup will not mount. It churns and grinds forever and nothing I've tried (after consulting the WD support web site) helps. It is recognized by Disk Utility but that is all.

Any thoughts on whether/how to recover the lost backup? Many thanks in advance.

Mac G4, Mac OS X (10.5.8), External 500 GB Western Digital drive

Posted on Sep 14, 2009 2:53 AM

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Answer 1

Pondini

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Sep 14, 2009 8:45 AM in response to mvaldeslora

mvaldeslora wrote:
. . .
the external drive with the Time Machine backup will not mount. It churns and grinds forever and nothing I've tried (after consulting the WD support web site) helps. It is recognized by Disk Utility but that is all.

Doesn't sound good. 😟 What does DU show -- can you do a +*Repair Disk+* (not permissions) on it?

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Answer 2

mvaldeslora Author

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Sep 14, 2009 11:13 AM in response to Pondini

No options in DU are active so it doesn't allow me to do anything on the drive...

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Answer 3

Pondini

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Sep 14, 2009 11:21 AM in response to mvaldeslora

mvaldeslora wrote:
No options in DU are active so it doesn't allow me to do anything on the drive...

Does DU show it set-up properly -- Partition map scheme of +Apple Partition Map+, format of +Mac OS Extended (Journaled),+ and containing data?

You might check with Western Digital, to see if there's a firmware or driver update, but it doesn't sound good. (We do see a lot of problems with WD drives reported here, I'm sorry to say.)

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Answer 4

mvaldeslora Author

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Sep 14, 2009 10:51 PM in response to Pondini

A friend loaned me a boot disk yesterday that has Disk Warrior. It is trying to rebuild the directory but it has been at it for HOURS - more than overnight at this point. It is a 500 GB hard disk that was about 90% full. How long should I let it go on before I pull the plug??

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Answer 5

Pondini

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Sep 15, 2009 7:16 AM in response to mvaldeslora

mvaldeslora wrote:
A friend loaned me a boot disk yesterday that has Disk Warrior. It is trying to rebuild the directory but it has been at it for HOURS - more than overnight at this point. It is a 500 GB hard disk that was about 90% full. How long should I let it go on before I pull the plug??

I do hope it's version 4.1.1 (or 4.2), as 4.1 or lower is *not compatible with Leopard.*

If those are your only backups, you probably have little choice but to let it run and keep your fingers crossed. I've never used it on a disk with that much data, or many problems, as yours seems to have. And I've not seen any reports or times posted, except "lengthy." It's too bad they don't have a forum, but I guess you could try their tech support folks.

This isn't looking good, is it? 😟

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Answer 6

1 Vision

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Sep 15, 2009 7:42 AM in response to Pondini

It's really Fn strange that apple does it's last security updates to leopard and COUNTLESS external HD back-up and time-machines Crap out! I have a new G-Drive Q 500GB, 2 partitions. The one with time-machine on it does not mount. DU says (The Keys are out of order) and to save and reformat the drive. The problem is permissions do not let me save, copy or back-up any of my stuff on that disc and I cannot change permission because the lock is greyed out.

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Answer 7

mvaldeslora Author

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Sep 15, 2009 10:54 PM in response to Pondini

Well, I am happy to report a happy ending. Turns out DW had crashed but I initiated the procedure again and it was able to rebuild the drive's directory in a couple of hours. Time Machine then recognized the drive and I was able to restore the contents of the drive on which I installed 10.2/9.2.2 earlier in this saga. I will reformat the external WD drive now and see how it performs before I decide whether it's a keeper or not. Thanks for all comments and observations.

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Answer 8

Pondini

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Sep 16, 2009 8:12 AM in response to mvaldeslora

mvaldeslora wrote:
Well, I am happy to report a happy ending. Turns out DW had crashed but I initiated the procedure again and it was able to rebuild the drive's directory in a couple of hours. Time Machine then recognized the drive and I was able to restore the contents of the drive on which I installed 10.2/9.2.2 earlier in this saga. I will reformat the external WD drive now and see how it performs before I decide whether it's a keeper or not. Thanks for all comments and observations.

Yay! 🙂

If those are your only backups, please do yourself a favor: do not trust them to that drive! Get a new one, and put TM backups on one, and use the other to regularly update a "clone" or at least home folder backups via CarbonCopyCloner, SuperDuper, or the like.

Murphy was an optimist!

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