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"Recovery HD" is now empty and unuseable, how can I repair this?

Quite some time ago, on a laptop that has hard drives internally mounted. I partitioned the drives.

To which, on one of the drives I created a "Recovery Disk" (disk1s3) specifically to be able to repair the hard drive that has the Mojave OS X 10.14 Operating system installed (disk1s2).


In the past I have used this partition named "Recovery HD" to perform diagnostics and to repair the permissions on said other partition that runs Mojave (disk1s2).


Recently I noticed upon staring up while pressing the Option key, that said "HD Recovery" drive was now EMPTY and I was no longer able to boot up from this partition.


Disk names from said drives using the Terminal Command "diskutil list" (key info redacted)


/dev/disk0 (internal, physical)

The first disk mentioned above here, has an older OS X , and is not where the challenge at hand is to be found.... So I have redacted this information.... continuing onward.....


/dev/disk1 (internal, physical):

disk1 - *240.1 GB

disk1s1 - EFI EFI = 209.7 MB

disk1s2 - Apple_HFS - (name redacted) = 239.2 GB (Which runs OS X Mojave 10.14)

disk1s3 - Apple_Boot Recovery HD = 650.0 MB

(^^ The CHALLENGE is with THIS partition^^

as to why I made this post.)


I guess my 2 part question to the Communities collective experience is :


1. How did this even happen? How did the "Recovery HD" drive, suddenly become empty?


2. How can I make this 650 MB partition a "Recovery HD" once again?

Specifically to be able to be able to diagnose and repair the aforementioned "disk1s2" that runs OS X Mojave 10.14 as I once had been able to.


Thanks in advance to those who reply.

MacBook Pro

Posted on Dec 15, 2021 8:03 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Dec 15, 2021 11:21 AM

Repair a storage device in Disk Utility on Mac

Disk Utility can fix certain disk problems—for example, multiple apps quit unexpectedly, a file is corrupted, an external device doesn’t work properly, or your computer won’t start up. Disk Utility can’t detect or repair all problems that a disk may have.

If you run First Aid on a disk, Disk Utility checks the partition maps on the disk and performs some additional checks, and then checks each volume. If you run First Aid on a volume, Disk Utility verifies all the contents of that volume only.

  1. In the Disk Utility app  on your Mac, choose View > Show All Devices.
  2. Note: If you’re checking your startup disk or startup volume, restart your computer in macOS Recovery, select Disk Utility in the macOS Utilities window, then click Continue. If you check your startup volume (Macintosh HD), make sure you also check your data volume (Macintosh HD - Data).

  3. In the sidebar, select a disk or volume, then click the First Aid button .
  4. If Disk Utility tells you the disk is about to fail, back up your data and replace the disk—you can’t repair it. Otherwise, continue to the next step.
  5. Click Run, then click Continue.
  6. If Disk Utility reports that the disk appears to be OK or has been repaired, you’re done. You can click Show Details to see more information about the repairs. Otherwise, you may need to do one of the following.
    • If Disk Utility reports “overlapped extent allocation” errors, two or more files occupy the same space on your disk, and at least one of them is likely to be corrupted. You need to check each file in the list of affected files. Most of the files in the list have aliases in a DamagedFiles folder at the top level of your disk.
      • If you can replace a file or re-create it, delete it.
      • If it contains information you need, open it and examine its data to make sure it hasn’t been corrupted.
    • If Disk Utility can’t repair your disk, or you receive a report that the First Aid process failed, try to repair the disk or partition again. If that doesn’t work, back up as much of your data as possible, reformat the disk, reinstall macOS, then restore your backed-up data.

If your Mac has a Fusion Drive and you see a flashing question mark or alert, see the troubleshooting section of the Apple Support article About Fusion Drive, a storage option for some Mac computers.

If you continue to have problems with your disk or it can’t be repaired, it may be physically damaged and need to be replaced. For information about servicing your Mac, see Find out how to service or repair your Mac.

Similar questions

1 reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Dec 15, 2021 11:21 AM in response to a_non_prevaricator

Repair a storage device in Disk Utility on Mac

Disk Utility can fix certain disk problems—for example, multiple apps quit unexpectedly, a file is corrupted, an external device doesn’t work properly, or your computer won’t start up. Disk Utility can’t detect or repair all problems that a disk may have.

If you run First Aid on a disk, Disk Utility checks the partition maps on the disk and performs some additional checks, and then checks each volume. If you run First Aid on a volume, Disk Utility verifies all the contents of that volume only.

  1. In the Disk Utility app  on your Mac, choose View > Show All Devices.
  2. Note: If you’re checking your startup disk or startup volume, restart your computer in macOS Recovery, select Disk Utility in the macOS Utilities window, then click Continue. If you check your startup volume (Macintosh HD), make sure you also check your data volume (Macintosh HD - Data).

  3. In the sidebar, select a disk or volume, then click the First Aid button .
  4. If Disk Utility tells you the disk is about to fail, back up your data and replace the disk—you can’t repair it. Otherwise, continue to the next step.
  5. Click Run, then click Continue.
  6. If Disk Utility reports that the disk appears to be OK or has been repaired, you’re done. You can click Show Details to see more information about the repairs. Otherwise, you may need to do one of the following.
    • If Disk Utility reports “overlapped extent allocation” errors, two or more files occupy the same space on your disk, and at least one of them is likely to be corrupted. You need to check each file in the list of affected files. Most of the files in the list have aliases in a DamagedFiles folder at the top level of your disk.
      • If you can replace a file or re-create it, delete it.
      • If it contains information you need, open it and examine its data to make sure it hasn’t been corrupted.
    • If Disk Utility can’t repair your disk, or you receive a report that the First Aid process failed, try to repair the disk or partition again. If that doesn’t work, back up as much of your data as possible, reformat the disk, reinstall macOS, then restore your backed-up data.

If your Mac has a Fusion Drive and you see a flashing question mark or alert, see the troubleshooting section of the Apple Support article About Fusion Drive, a storage option for some Mac computers.

If you continue to have problems with your disk or it can’t be repaired, it may be physically damaged and need to be replaced. For information about servicing your Mac, see Find out how to service or repair your Mac.

"Recovery HD" is now empty and unuseable, how can I repair this?

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