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Level 3

565 points

iMac Hard Drive Failure

Hi,

I think the Hard Drive in my iMac (24" 2.16GHZ Intel Core 2 Duo) has fairly much died. This afternoon, I was able to start it up but after entering my login details, the Desktop picture would load up however the Menu Bar & the Dock would not load. After several attempts at restarting etc, I then decided to reset PRAM, try booting in safe mode & also unplugging the power cord. Every time I tried to boot up after this, it started up but before the login window appeared, the computer turned itself off. I managed to then boot via my Techtool Pro eDrive & it indicated that my HD couldn't be repaired. It also indicated an error with Volume Structures. I managed to get in to Disk Utility & although "Verify Permissions" & "Repair Permissions" were greyed out, I managed to select "Verify Disk" & that also indicated that there was a major problem with "Bad Nodes".

Just wondering if there was anything else I should try or can I safely assume that the HD is bad?

Any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Ben

iMac 24" 2.16GHZ, MacBook Pro 15" 2.2GHZ, iMac G3 15" 700MHZ (Graphite/CRT), Mac OS X (10.6.2), iMac G4 15" 700MHZ, 2nd Generation iPod 10GB, iPhone 16GB, iPhone 3G 16GB 

Posted on Jan 27, 2010 12:31 PM

Best reply

elmac

Level 5

4,252 points

Posted on Jan 27, 2010 12:39 PM

Hi, Wickford guy, I used to live in Rayleigh.. anyways, the more you play around with the HD the more chance you have of NOT being able to recover any info via the Recovery Programs. Have you Back Up your info etc.. on another ext HD?
Do you have AppleCare? if Yes - Apple will repair your Mac but will NOT pay to recover your files etc..
If you do have your Mac repaired it would be a good idea to have an external HD & use something like SuperDuper to have a backUp & a bootable drive...L

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25 replies

Widdzuk

Level 1

0 points

Jan 28, 2010 12:05 PM in response to Ryan Roberts

Hi Ryan,

Don't worry too much yet. If you search about S.M.A.R.T and the seagate drive. Seagate don't use the smart check the same. They don't use the 190 temp sensor for their hdd's. So they do come up with a fail. But remember it 'could' be. If you google what I mentioned you will get alot of info regarding the SMART fail 190 on seagate drives.

Thought I'd share.

Cheers

Jan 28, 2010 12:09 PM in response to dora jar

I have AppleCare so I'll visit the store tomorrow, thanks for the confirmation.

I think I'll do a clean install before handing it over though, I don't want a bunch of people I don't know being given my data or my client files (I'm a web designer).

This is a major pita 😟

Jan 28, 2010 12:10 PM in response to Widdzuk

Ah OK thanks for that bit of info, I'll give it a search and see what I can find out. The iMac itself works OK, there have been a few small issues possibly related to the HDD but nothing so far that has caused me trouble.

BenRector Author

Level 3

565 points

Feb 1, 2010 2:21 PM in response to Ryan Roberts

Hi,

Thanks to everyone who gave me advice with my Hard Drive problem last week. I managed to Erase & install everything...it all seemed to be fine so I went ahead & installed all my apps, set my preferences etc etc etc & guess what...after spending days setting it up again, the same issue is back!

It became very sluggish & after a few restarts etc, I decided to verify the disc & I am again getting the message "Invalid Node Structure, Volume Check Failed, Error: Filesystem Verify Or Repair Failed".

So my question now is, can I now assume that I would be better off having a new Hard Drive fitted or should I try anything different?

Kenichi, you had suggested last week to use the "Zero Out Data" option. I didn't actually use this method as I was advised it would take an extremely long time. Would this be worth a try or should I go for a new HD?

Many thanks in advance.

Ben

Feb 1, 2010 5:40 PM in response to BenRector

If the drive is not faulty, +zero out data+ may take up to a few hours... That's somewhat long, but I would not call it "an extremely long time." 🙂 You could have the iMac start the process when you will be away for a while, or before going to sleep.

I managed to Erase & install everything...it all seemed to be fine so I went ahead & installed all my apps, set my preferences etc etc etc & guess what...after spending days setting it up again, the same issue is back!

You may also want to consider that some third-party software you are installing, after the initial Mac OS X installation, is causing the problem. Whether you do a +zero out data+ erase, if you try another erase and install, try using it with the standard installation (after running Software Update) for a while longer. Then install one third party software at a time; don't install everything else at one time.

Another possibility is that there is a portion of the hard drive media that is bad. So installing Mac OS X after erasing does not get to that portion yet, so everything is OK. But when you add your user data and additional software, it gets to that portion and this problem with data corruption recurs. Doing a +zero out data+ erase should make such a problem evident, because it will write zeros to all sectors of the drive. If there is a bad portion on the hard drive media that is extensive, the +zero out data+ procedure should stall or error out. And then you will know that you need to get a hard drive.

BenRector Author

Level 3

565 points

Feb 1, 2010 5:51 PM in response to Kenichi Watanabe

Hi Kenichi,

I've carried out a "Zero Out Data" (only took an hourish). All went ok with no error messages. SMART Status is showing as "Verified" also so I'm now assuming that the disc is physically ok. I will go ahead in the morning & install the OS & will try it for a while before loading any 3rd party software.

Thanks again for your advice...wish I'd used your suggested method last week & maybe I wouldn't be having to go through it all again!

Ben

BenRector Author

Level 3

565 points

Feb 4, 2010 4:32 PM in response to BenRector

Happy to report it is all back up & running. After I run "Zero Out Data" I installed the OS etc & then loaded my 3rd Party Apps gradually & checked the disc every so often. Everything is how it was & HD is back to good health!

Ben

Feb 4, 2010 4:48 PM in response to BenRector

That's good news! Thanks for reporting back with the outcome.

Feb 23, 2010 4:02 PM in response to BenRector

I had a similar case which started a year ago, managed to repair my HD and then a few days ago the problem came back and my drive appears to be failing (using the applications "SMART Utility" I get a warning of serious problems with my HD). You might want to give this utility a try, as in my case the SMART test keeps saying "veryfied", but my drive keeps crashing. For more info check my post here ( http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11129832#11129832).

Christos

utilizer

Level 1

0 points

Mar 19, 2010 4:40 AM in response to BenRector

Looks like this is around the time when the drive shipped with this unit starts to fail. I had a 160 GB HD from Seagate in the iMac and when attempting to run the iMac in Safe mode, that's when I heard the drive just completely fail. I knew what it was then so over to Amazon and ordered the 500 GB WD5000AAKS. I've already replaced the power supply unit on this iMac and dreading the fact I have to open the computer again, but good thing that the Time Capsule is there to back everything up.

iMac Hard Drive Failure