External Harddrive showing Empty but isn't

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Level 1

11 points

External Harddrive showing Empty but isn't

Before I went to bed last night, I started transferring some of my iPhoto libraries from my MacBook Pro (Oct '09) to an external hard drive. When I woke up this morning to make sure everything had been copied properly, I found the drive unresponsive and I was unable to eject it.

I reboot my laptop and after plugging in my drive, I was horrified to find that the drive was no longer recognizable. I believe the data is still on the drive because it is a 400Gb drive and it says there are only 262GB available.

This drive contains all of my family photos that have been organized. Luckily, I have most (if not all) of the photos backed up on either CD, DVD or another drive. However, they are not organized and I really don't want to have to repeat the organization process which took quite a while...

Does anyone have any ideas how to recover the information on the drive? Since it isn't show any folders at all, I am not sure how to proceed.

MacBook Pro 15" - 2.53GHz, Mac OS X (10.6.1), Sony A-100, Panasonic PV-GS35, 24" ACD

Posted on Feb 7, 2010 9:15 AM

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Answer 1

Feb 7, 2010 10:16 AM in response to pjhaan

Hi pjhaan;

Have you tried to repair the external drive using Disk Utilities?

Allan

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Answer 2

pjhaan Author

Level 1

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Feb 7, 2010 12:09 PM in response to Allan Eckert

I was getting ready to try the disk utility. This time, when I plugged in the drive, all the files were there again.

I am not sure why it showed up as empty the first 2 times I connected it. Like the saying goes, third times a charm.

Thanks

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Answer 3

Feb 7, 2010 12:34 PM in response to pjhaan

Hi pjhaan;

The logic card or power supply for the external drive might have an intermittent fault.

Allan

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Answer 4

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 7, 2010 2:13 PM in response to pjhaan

Scratch that...the files showed up but I couldn't do anything to the drive or even eject it.

I am now going to reboot and try the disk utility.

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Answer 5

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 7, 2010 2:27 PM in response to Allan Eckert

Thanks Allan,

I tried disk utility and got the following:

*Disk Utility stopped repairing “disk2s1”*
Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.

*Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.*

Hopefully, I will be able to get the drive to connect once to move every thing to a different drive. I am a little concerned though because the other drive I have connected through the Cinema display is also acting a little picky. I tried to copy a file from that hard drive to a different location on the drive and it tells me it can't because it is already in use (which it isn't).

I am going to try connecting directly to see if maybe it is an issue with the Cinema Display cable.

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Answer 6

Feb 7, 2010 6:15 PM in response to pjhaan

Hi pjhaan;

You didn't post the complete error. It should have another sentence which tells what is wrong with your disk and the reason DU failed. There are errors that DU is not capable of repairing. It sometimes take a more powerful tool such as DiskWarrior to fix the disk then.

Allan

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Answer 7

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 7, 2010 7:04 PM in response to Allan Eckert

I connected directly and the drive shows up but is still empty. The 600 GB drive still won't let me copy files...

The operation can’t be completed because an item with
the name “iPhoto Library - FULL” already exists.

I know it doesn't exist because I just deleted it and emptied the trash. Maybe both of my drives are about to take a crap...

I copied all of the errors that I saw on DU. I am going to reboot and see if I get a different error.

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Answer 8

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 7, 2010 8:02 PM in response to Allan Eckert

I reboot and connected to the first drive (400GB WD My Book) to be sure that absolutely no applications were running. When I tried to copy files from one drive to the other, I got the following error:

The operation can’t be completed because the item “Ellas iPhoto Library” is in use.

If I try to copy an iPhoto library file from the second drive (640GB WD MyBook) to a brand new directory on the same drive, I get a file exists error:

The operation can’t be completed because an item with the name “iPhoto Library - FULL” already exists.

It seems to be hit or miss on copying a file to a new location on drive 2 (640GB) and drive 1 (400GB) is pretty much inaccessible. On the new connection, running disk utility produces a new message:

*Verify and Repair volume “WD - 400GB”*
*Error: Could not unmount disk*

Any operations on the 400GB drive cannot be completed because the "files are in use". Nothing other than FireFox is Running...

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Answer 9

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 8, 2010 4:53 AM in response to Allan Eckert

I have an older version of DiskWarrior (3.0.3 Rev 39) but the ALSOFT site says it is not compatible with 10.5 or later. I might have to buy the upgrade to try it.

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Answer 10

pjhaan Author

Level 1

11 points

Feb 9, 2010 10:33 AM in response to pjhaan

I connected the 400GB drive to my wife's Mac Book and it says it needs repair. It is given partial connectivity to make backups. When I verify the disk in DU, it says...

Verifying volume “WD - 400GB”
Checking Non-journaled HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Invalid node structure
Volume check failed.

Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.

I am going to try to move the files to the second drive using my wifes computer...

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