Kernel Panic when connecting TM disk

Question

Kernel Panic when connecting TM disk

Dear all,

since this morning I am experiencing kernel panics when the external drive where my Time Machine gets backed-up is connected. I am attaching here the text of the kernel panics hoping that someone can shed light on them.

I have rebooted in recovery mode and got an error when trying to repair the TM volume (which Finder cannot see), there was an "error at -8" message. A kernel panic followed suite.

I rebooted in safe mode, it took ages, was able to see the second partition of the disk, from where I have to take out some data and save it, then completely blocked itself. I could not eject the disk in any way (Terminal, keyboard shortcut, Finder). Then a kernel panic followed.

I am attaching an EtreCheck v5.2 report that says the system is in Excellent condition, hopefully someone can find something useful in it for me.

Also, a utility called DriveDx indicated my drive as failing (attached images).

What can I do to access that disk without causing a kernel panic?

Thank you

MacBook Pro 15", macOS 10.13

Posted on Mar 9, 2019 12:55 PM

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Answer 1

Mar 14, 2019 3:11 AM in response to Barney-15E

Dear Barney, dear BDAqua,

I have an update: I have been yesterday to the Apple Store in Torino and they checked the hardware of my Mac saying that everything was perfectly fine. They said that the kernel panics were caused by the external disk. End of the report, which is not helping us too much but fine, I just wanted to share what they said. They did not offer any real solution to my issue.

I have now attached the offending disk via a 7-port outlet-powered D-Link USB2.0 HUB to my 2009 MacBook Pro running El Capitan 10.11.6. The disk is seen (with both partitions!) and I get the message that it should be reformatted because macOS cannot repair it. When I try to go inside the folders of the Archive partition I get a spinning beachball BUT after a while it does get inside and gets NO KERNEL PANIC!

I am now slowly moving the data to another disk and to wherever I have some free space and, slowly but not complaining, it is working.

The point now is: for sure this disk has some issue but it seems then that they are no hardware issues, right?

And to the scariest question: does then my Mac has an issue? What should I do in that regard?

Thank you so much once more for your support!

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Answer 2

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 9, 2019 1:51 PM in response to NotationMaster

Well, you'll need a new drive to best try to retrieve this data.

No telling if it's HW or SW at this point, if you connect it again be sure to exclude it in Spotlight's Pref Pane.

I would say a commercial data retrieve would likely be the surest, and the most expensive by far.

Your best bet at repair is...

http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/

Hold alt key when selecting Repair Disk & it Scavenges a better Directory to attempt copying or Repairing.

Then Data Rescue...

http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php

rccharles on file recovery...

"Stellar Phoenix Macintosh - Mac data recovery software, recovers data from damaged, deleted, or corrupted volumes and even from initialized disks."

They have a trial version, so I guess you can see if your data can be recovered...

http://www.stellarinfo.com/mac-data-recovery.htm

FileSalvage is an extremely powerful Macintosh application for exploring and recovering deleted files from a drive or volume. FileSalvage is designed to restore files that have:

* been accidentally deleted.

* become unreadable due to media faults.

* been stored on a drive before it was re-initialized/formatted.

http://subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1

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Answer 3

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,108 points

Mar 14, 2019 7:12 AM in response to NotationMaster

Uninstall the Lacie apps. It works contra instead of for.

DiskUtility is very capable. Use it. Especially run First Aid, until it repaired everything.

mdworker is Spotlight and can use a lot of resources sometimes, especially if you "reset" its buffers. don't worry.
If your disk is really damaged, you may try (expensive) apps like DiskWarrior, but don't expect too much. Wonders do not exist.

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Answer 4

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,108 points

Mar 14, 2019 5:03 AM in response to NotationMaster

It looks like the disk is dying.

Start using a newer disk.

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Answer 5

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,222 points

Mar 10, 2019 10:27 AM in response to NotationMaster

The LunaDisplay is what allows me to use the iPad as an external display.

What makes you think that this causes the issue?

There are primarily two causes of kernel panics, poorly written third-party kernel extensions (as a guess I would say 90% or more are poorly written) and hardware faults.

The simple way to narrow down causes is to remove the potential culprits and test. The simplest solution is to remove kernel extensions to determine if it is hardware or software (kernel extensions). Hardware also includes external peripherals, so it may the be drive itself (or cable).

That kernel extension hacks the USB connectivity subsystem. Your panics appear to be in the USB subsystem.

If the panics subside after removing the kernel extensions, then it was them.

If you still get panics with them removed, try the drive on another Mac (preferably running same OS version).

If the drive works on another Mac and you have the kernel extensions removed, it would likely be a problem with the Mac. You'd have to take it to an Apple Store or certified repair center to have it checked out. The Apple Diagnostics should never be trusted to rule out a hardware problem.

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Answer 6

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 10, 2019 4:32 PM in response to NotationMaster

I am doubtful about purchasing DiskWarrior as what can I do in the two minutes before it starts kernel-panicking?

Good point & just what I was thinking after you posted how little time you had before it panicked.

The only things I can think of that might get you somewhere... or not...

Plugging the drive into an AC powered USB Hub.

Plugging the drive into an older Mac with older OS version.

Plugging the drive into a a different case & chipset if that is possible at all.

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Answer 7

Mar 11, 2019 4:08 AM in response to BDAqua

Plugging the drive into an AC powered USB Hub.

I have an old USB 2.0 AC powered USB Hub at home. I will try it on Thursday and report back.

Plugging the drive into an older Mac with older OS version.

Same as above, I have a 2009 MacBook Pro and will try also swapping the cable from the disk to the computer with the supplied USB-C to USB-A adapter.

Plugging the drive into a a different case & chipset if that is possible at all.

If all the above will fail I will rip this apart and try to mount it elsewhere, I guess this is SATA connected, right? I have a SATA to USB connector I used to install macOS on an SSD before swapping it into the 2009 MBP. That may work.

Also... do you think this may have anything to do with the cable? Would it be safe to connect the 2018 iPad Pro's USB-C cable to the disk to see if it works? Or do I risk damaging something with this procedure?

Anyway, a good news: LaCie's support answered me back saying that, being the warranty expired since such a little time they will send me a replacement drive. They also suggested me to use this software: https://www.seagate.com/gb/en/services-software/recover/recovery-software/ to try to see what can be recovered. They said to use it on my internal drive (???) and still I answered with the same question as before: how can I use that software on something that is panicking my Mac?

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Answer 8

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,108 points

Mar 15, 2019 2:00 AM in response to NotationMaster

Uninstall LaCie software.

When you want to put in a new disk, format it first, when it is still outside.

Then you know that it is correctly formatted, and you know that the LaCie files are gone (or of another make).

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Answer 9

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 10, 2019 9:01 AM in response to NotationMaster

Correct, I'd disconnect the drive, on the last KP...

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8159946?answerId=32561140022#32561140022

Can't be 100% sure yet, but it appears the problem with the external drive or USB port, or??? is causing Spotlight to loop endlessly... have you shutdown & restarted?

Have we ever gotten rid of all those mdworkers in AM?

Anyway you can connect that external drive to another Mac for a test?

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Answer 10

Mar 11, 2019 5:23 AM in response to NotationMaster

A small update: I uninstalled LunaDisplay. The developer didn't have any instruction on how to remove the software.

I used the AppDelete application and noticed that there were two .kext files, one in Extensions and one in the StagedExtensions folder. Somehow I managed to remove both of them and rebooted.

Upon reboot I opened the Seagate Recovery Suite (which asks me to restart my system to test a drive even after I have already restarted... so I cannot test it) and connected the drive. This time both partitions were correctly seen and, as soon as that happened, I got this message from macOS:

We already know that reformatting is not working at the moment because of the kernel panic.

I tried to open the disk to copy some files but with no luck... there is the first level of folders and then nothing inside them. Which means everything is still there just macOS cannot see it.

I don't know if removing LunaDisplay helped but there is another extension that gave a problem in the latest crash (which sadly I didn't manage to save) which is: SATSMARTDriver.kext

What is this?

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Answer 11

Mar 14, 2019 4:02 PM in response to BDAqua

I do not know how to explain this: the 10-year old MacBook Pro with El Capitan managed to save ALL my datas to an as old external drive which is now transferring everything back to a new disk which I received today.

Also, Disk Utility managed to repair the Time Machine partition after managing to Erase it.

During SOS I got the same "Error at 8" exit message: does anyone know what that means?

Now: can we make a wrap-up of all this? Why could this machine achieve what a much newer (though healthy) could not? What prevented my new machine to repair the disk causing so many kernel panics? There should really be a precise answer to all this (even if I still appreciate all educated guesses!). Could it be the Disk Utility in macOS High Sierra with APFS not being able to interact with the HFS+ anymore? What else?

Thank you

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Answer 12

Barney-15E

Level 10

122,222 points

Mar 10, 2019 9:03 AM in response to NotationMaster

Uninstall this software following the instructions provided by the developer, then see what happens:

com.astro-hq.driver.LunaDisplay 1.0.1

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Answer 13

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 10, 2019 10:18 AM in response to NotationMaster

Connecting the drive to another Mac would seem most telling.

Anxious to see the AM report later.

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Answer 14

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 14, 2019 11:01 AM in response to NotationMaster

We can't tell yet, but I think the AC powered Hub is the big diff.

If Disk Utility or fsck should fail to repair it, your best bet is DiskWarrior from Alsoft...

http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/

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Answer 15

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Mar 9, 2019 2:38 PM in response to NotationMaster

Oh, forgot...

In Finder's Menu, select Go menu>Go to Folder, and go to "/volumes". (no quotes)

Volumes is where an alias to your hard drive ("/" at boot) is placed at startup, and where all the "mount points" for auxiliary drives are created for you to access them. This folder is normally hidden from view.

Drives with an extra 1 on the end have a side-effect of mounting a drive with the same name as the system already think exists. Try trashing the duplicates with a 1 or 2 if there are no real files in them, and reboot.

If it does contain data...

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2474

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Kernel Panic when connecting TM disk

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