HELP!! Late 09 Macbook Hardware Problem.

Question

Just got my macbook up and running again from many, many, tries. Without knowing anything of it but information through Apple support page and Google. After 2weeks of failure, Today i happened to have made it work properly as it was before. My macbook was upgraded from snow leopard to mountain lion, and was running very slow and it constantly freezes. So then i decided to do some research and downgraded back to snow leopard (2weeks failure till&#x27; today). Logging back onto Disk Utility app (via the dock main screen/finder), I&#x27;ve notice that my "Disk:          TOSHIBA Media" S.M.A.R.T. Status says ; FAILING. On the left panel where it shows all the disk in Disk Utility, The Disk&#x27;s Name was also in RED not only that but Recovery HD disk isn&#x27;t there either.Im afraid I might&#x27;ve done something wrong (&gt;_&lt;) Name :           TOSHIBA MK2555GSXF Media          Type :           Disk          Partition Map Scheme :           GUID Partition Table          Disk Identifier :           disk0          Media Name :           TOSHIBA MK2555GSXF Media          Media Type :           Generic          Connection Bus :           SATA          Device Tree :           IODeviceTree:/PCI0@0/SATA@B/PRT0@0/PMP@0          Writable :           Yes          Ejectable :           No          Location :           Internal          Total Capacity :           250.06 GB (250,059,350,016 Bytes)          S.M.A.R.T. Status :           Failing          Disk Number :           0          Partition Number :           0And the partition my macbook is currently running is 1 of its partition. It won&#x27;t allow me to verify or repair it. When i click on the disk, It shows amessage saying:This drive has a hardware problem that can&#x27;t be repaired.Back up as much data possible and replace the disk.And that message is starting to scared me since i just got my macbook working again 😟 .Any information relating to this problem would help me alot. Thanks in Advance.PS; This is embarrassing to ask, But can anyone explain with details step-by-step on ways to back up my macbook. lol. Thanks Again!

Dibenkorn · Answer

You did not do anything wrong to break the disk.  They break on their own.  The good news is your Mac is probably healthy, except for the disk.  The disk is on its last legs, barely breathing.  I would first concentrate on data protection (backups) and then replace the hard drive.Good work on fiddling with it until it booted and running Disk Utility and finding the S.M.A.R.T. status shows it is failing.  Now that you know that you should not run Disk Utility to try to repair it.  You want to baby the disk until you have all of its data backed up.If you need more information or any help on any of the steps below just post back.Do you have a Time Machine backup drive?  If so run a Time Machine backup.  Hopefully it is healthy enough to complete a backup.If you are not using Time Machine then there are other ways to back it up.  If you don’t have an empty external disk drive then purchase one.  Plug in an external disk drive that is formatted Mac OS Extended (journaled) and drag as many files as you can from your user folder to the external disk.  If you need help with Disk Utility to format the drive, post back.  You can find your user folder by starting on Macintosh HD and then going to Users and to your-user-name.Once you have backed up what you can then replace the disk.  This is not hard to do yourself with instructions from free online videos.  Alternatively you can have an Apple store or an Apple Authorized Service Provider do it for you.  (Find an Apple Authorized Service Provider https://locate.apple.com/country)  Apple will only replace it with one of their blessed drives so I would not take that route unless you want to.  An AASP will probably put in the drive you request for a modest fee and will perform the procedures below (or similar ones) for you, for a fee.I would take this opportunity to upgrade to one of the new and still inexpensive hybrid disk drives.  Google “Seagate SSHD” to find them.  They cost under $100 for 500 GB to 1 TB and include an 8 GB SSD cache that provides SSD-like fast performance.I would also order this handy $5 toolkit: http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/TOOLKITMHD/ and a USB external disk enclosure.  Google “USB 3.0 enclosure” and select a cheap one ($10 to $15).To install the new drive, put it in the external enclosure and use Disk Utility to partition it as a single GUID partition with the format Mac OS Extended (journaled).  Post back if you need instructions on doing that.  Then boot your 10.6 disk and install 10.6 onto the new drive.  After the installation use the Startup Manager (Boot - Option) to boot from the new disk and when it asks for a source from which to migrate the data point it to the ailing internal disk.  After it has migrated the data then physically swap the internal and external drives.  See the tutorial at ifixit.com for clear instructions on how easy it is to do that.  Boot the new internal disk and run a Software Update…Then your Mac literally will be better than new.  From then on maintain up-to-date backups using Time Machine or some other backup program.Hope to hear from you soon on which approach you choose to take to replace the disk drive.

Eustace Mendis · Answer

But can anyone explain with details step-by-step on ways to back up my macbook. You need an external hard drive. They are not expensive.Here&#x27;s one from Apple http://store.apple.com/ca/product/HB419ZM/A/seagate-1tb-backup-plus-usb-30-porta ble-external-hard-drive-v2-for-mac?fnode&#x3D;5fFirst you connect the hard drive to your computer. If it is not the Apple store drive you will have to format the drive. To do that, go to Applications / Utilties / Disk Utility. Open DU, select the hard drive on the left, Erase on the top line, and set the format to Mac OS extended journaled. Name the drive - the default is Untitled, and click Erase on the bottom.Once that is done, quit DU.At this point your Mac will ask if you want to use the drive as your Time Machine backup. Continue from there.