Lost harddisk, please help me...This is important.

[Christian Hede Madsen]

Hi Ewerybody.

I have a problem. I cant get one of my harddisks to open( the one with all my films and editing tools).
When I say "open" I mean that I cannot "see" it on the desktop.
My HD-A ignores my HD-B( which is an external Lacie 120gb disk).
It is really a problem because I have deadlines for productions and a documentary that needs to be cut...

I have disk-warrior, but ofcourse I cant make it work when my disk wont open...Then there is nothing to repair...

Please help me...

If this was too confusing please ask questions...I am a little frustrated and confused...

Thanks

Chr

[Cannon Pearson]

What system are you running?

Have you tried the HD on another computer?

Have you checked the cables or tried new ones?

[Boyd Ostroff]

Disk Warrior will scan for drives connected to your system even if they don't appear on the desktop. I have repaired a damaged drive that wouldn't mount this way. If it still isn't recognized try using a different cable and unplug any other firewire devices. Try plugging it into a different Mac and see if it works. Can you hear the disk spinning? Does it make any strange sounds? You could try removing the drive from the enclosure and swapping it into another enclosure, or possibly into an empty bay inside your computer. But don't attempt this unless you are confident in your ability to take stuff apart and put it back together again! You could end up doing even more damage.

If you do manage to get it working again I'd suggest getting another drive and copying everything over to it immediately.

If the drive itself is defective, there are companies that will rescue the data for you. I have used "DriveSavers" for this and they salvaged pretty much everything from an old 4 GB drive. They aren't cheap though, and I have no idea how much it might cost to salvage large DV files. When I used them they charged per GB saved.

Good luck, I hope it's just a passing glitch!

[Christian Hede Madsen]

My systen is the OSX 10.2.8...

I will try with different cables tomorrow...I hope it helps...

Yes i can hear the disk spinning and trying to plug the disk into other Mac-computers is a good idea, but unfortunately there is no one else with a Mac in my town...
They are all PC users....

But thanks for the help...I really apreciate it...

Chr

[Cannon Pearson]

Have you tried the usual maintenance procedures like repairing permissions and zapping the pram?

[Patricia Kim]

Hopefully Jeff will come online to help you out. I have only one small suggestion if you haven't tried it yet. Shut your Mac down completely and restart. Sometimes various ports seem to lose their way and restarting fires them back up again. (Happened to me yesterday with my mp3 player attached. I was transferring files from iTunes and suddenly it wouldn't work. Everything looked fine, the player showed up as a drive on my desktop and said it was connected by USB cable. No file transfers possible, though. Disconnected, then reconnected and restarted the player. Worked fine.)

[Ted Springer]

Your firewire port could be dead.... either the one on your Mac or the one on your Firewire drive. I've seen that happen often. You could try taking the drive out of the firewire enclosure and mounting it internally.

[Josh Brusin]

try rebooting the drive while it's plugged in, try starting it up and then plugging it in...
Under the apple logo there's the about this mac item and then a "more info" button. With the drive plugged in and on it should appear in the "devices and volumes" tab and a firewire option. If nothing appears connected than it may be a cable issue.

If it isn't mountable (you get the initialize/eject option) try the software below. I haven't used it but it looks appropriate.

http://www.prosoftengineering.com/

the free demo will identify recoverable items...


Good Luck! (((don't initialize without getting your files first)))

[Christian Hede Madsen]

I tried another cable today, but it did not work:(

I am really fustrated now...Can anyone give me step by step guidance to what I could do?

The disk is starting and ewerything, but it is just ignored by my other hard-disk...

Hope you will help...

Chr

[Christian Hede Madsen]

please help!

I have a doc. that is just waiting to be edited and a crew of fifty is waitng for another film...

I apreciate the help I have already got, but some of it doesnt make sense to me...so if you could you put it up, step by step...

thanks

[Glenn Chan]

You could try mounting the hard drive internally. It shouldn't be hard to dismantle the firewire enclosure for your firewire drive (there is an ATA drive inside). Putting it back together may be hard.

Anyways, once you have the drive, make sure you watch out for ESD and read the instructions over at http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=75312. Those should be instructions on how to install a hard drive.

Or you could also try Disk Warrior as others have suggested.

If not then you should probably try re-capturing your footage. Right click your clips and select reconnect. If you logged everything right FCP can recapture off your source tapes. Backup your FCP project file a few times (especially onto CD-R) in case you mess up.

You can also try a drive recovery service, but they are... expensive. About $500USD or so per recovery (that's not a very exact figure).

[Don Berube]

Do you have AppleCare? If you do, you probably qualify for "in-home" service. Not sure if they do that in your area, but they do in the states. If you are having trouble understanding the suggestions laid forth before you so far, you should probably be a little more practive and bring your Mac and the drive to an authorized Apple repair facility.
http://applefn.infonow.net/bin/findN...AGE=DNK_DANISH
http://www.apple.com/dk/support/products/overview.html
If you have AppleCare (everybody should always buy at least 2 years of AppleCare) then it just might cost you next to nothing. Stop torturing yourself!

First Shut Down your Mac. Make sure that your alledged "dead" hard drive is connected to its' own FireWire port on the back of your Mac and not connected to the "Loop Out" of some other FireWire drive. This will be helpful in seeing if your Mac recognizes your alledged "dead" drive. Now, restart your Mac and:
1) Click on your Main Hard Drive, open the Applications (OS X) folder, click on "Utilities", click on APPLE SYSTEM PROFILER
2) Click on "Hardware" (left side menu), click on "FireWire"
3) Check to see if it shows that your FireWire drive is connected to the port you plugged into in the back. If it shows that some type of hard drive is connected, you are in luck. Proceed to open "DiskWarrior" to diagnose and resolve the issue.

NOTE: It does not make ANY sense to NOT store your disk repair utilities on a backup CD, complete with serial # written on the CD... You need to become a more responsible editor and follow workflow 'best practices' as far as backup and archiving goes - your filmmaking associates will appreciate you a lot more if you do so.

Alas, there is still hope for you. If you can access the web, download "DiskWarrior" from the Alsoft web site. If you did not write down your serial # (uggggh...) and if your deadline is close by, then re-purchase the program, write down the serial # and back off a copy of the program to CD - Chalk up the cost of re-purchasing as a lesson for you to be more proactive and responsible as an editor in the future. You need to realize that ALL hard drives ultimately fail, that is why you need to be proactive and mirror your important data to a backup drive and learn how to backup and archive properly. Right now you are in "reactive/ why me?" mode! Not good.

4) IF, while in Apple System Profiler, you do NOT see anything being shown as connected to your FireWire ports, then you most likely have a faulty FireWire interface on your external hard drive. Contact the LaCie Technical Support Team in Denmark at http://www.lacie.com/dk/support/request. If you happen to know who your local LaCie Regional Representative in your area is, then contact that person and ask for help. Worst case scenario: I would ask LaCie for permission to break the seal on your drive *under the understanding that you will be sending it in for service*. This will allow you to try one more diagnostic: (as Glenn Chan suggested) install the drive internally on one of the available internal IDE busses of your Mac. You'll need to look at the termination decal on the drive and follow the instructions on terminating the drive as a slave. (Do this with the Mac completely powered down, of course) If the drive does not show up on your desktop or via Apple System Profiler under your IDE bus, then you do indeed have a problem.

Since it sounds like you are a bit too unfamiliar with this kind of stuff - I recommend you bring your computer and drive to an authorized Apple repair facility and have your issues resolved professionally. That just may, in your case, end up being your quickest solution!

Good luck and do keep in touch and let us know how you make out,

- don

[Christian Hede Madsen]

Thanks for the help...

I am 17years old and this is my first mac...But shure it was stupid not to do a backup... I will try your advice when I get home...thanks...

I will get back to you all...

[Christian Hede Madsen]

I am not trying to be a brat and appoligize for me not being responsible or anything... I have just had to learn all I know about macs by myself because no one I know uses macs...

[Don Berube]

Hello Christian,

I just would hate to see you learn the hard way the way many of us did a good 15 years ago when 1GB easily cost well over a thousand dollars. These days, hard drive storage is so cheap!

Keep us informed about your projects! I'm impressed that you are so committed to learning about filmmaking. Keep at it and you will realize your goals. Persistence is key. :o)

- don