Old MacBook Died I Need Tech Help

[IconicX]

• My 2009 MacBook has the gray screen of death. I need tech help to try to get it running again just enough to download some files from my desktop and some RTF documents into my new Mac Book Pro via external drive. Right now I am dealing with a tech at Mac Cafe. But I am having some problems getting what I want and would like to get an informed second or even third opinion and possible help from them. Do anyone have any suggestions? Do you know of a 'go to' computer expert in CM that I could  talk to? Have you dealt with a place or a person that you were impressed with and could recommend? Thanks.

[RichCor]

Why can't you leave the hard drive in the enclosure, take it home, and look for what you want on your own? Are they having difficulty accessing the drive data, the drive is bad?

 

If they have automated tools that can recover 'some' or 'most' of the data to a new drive, you could then take that recovered data drive in an enclose home and get what you need if it was part of what was recovered.

 

Otherwise, you're looking at forking out a lot of money for data recovery.

[northsouthdevide]

Have you watched this? 

[IconicX]

4 hours ago, RichCor said:

Why can't you leave the hard drive in the enclosure, take it home, and look for what you want on your own? Are they having difficulty accessing the drive data, the drive is bad?

 

If they have automated tools that can recover 'some' or 'most' of the data to a new drive, you could then take that recovered data drive in an enclose home and get what you need if it was part of what was recovered.

 

Otherwise, you're looking at forking out a lot of money for data recovery.

Thanks for responding. They were able to recover some things. But not what I wanted. I wanted what was on my Desktop and in TextEdit and Documents. They transfer what they got to an extra external drive that I provided and I was able to take that home. Then I saw what they recovered. I don't know if they could get more or more targeted data or not. I need to have another conversation with them. I am anticipating a lack of interest to do so. So I am reaching out here for alternatives. 

 

What I get from research is that the the drive or the drive cable might be at fault. I have another computer of the same type and era and I believe the drive CABLE can be switched out. I will know more after talking to them again. I have been pretty good at backing up on external drives the important stuff. But I didn't back up what was on my desktop and textedit. I probably can live without this stuff and might try to.

[IconicX]

5 hours ago, northsouthdevide said:

Have you watched this? 

I will check this out. I have already done some research but this might have some handy info. I appreciate you sending it.

[chesterubi1]

I would go to the official Apple repair center in Central Airport Plaza. If they can't fix it, then guess no one can.

[RichCor]

6 hours ago, IconicX said:

11 hours ago, RichCor said:

Are they having difficulty accessing the drive data, the drive is bad?

They were able to recover some things. But not what I wanted. I wanted what was on my Desktop and in TextEdit and Documents. They transfer what they got to an extra external drive that I provided and I was able to take that home. Then I saw what they recovered. I don't know if they could get more or more targeted data or not.

So you're thinking, or they're saying, the drive contents are corrupted and they're using data recovery tools to look for and retrieve items of interest (and not trying to recover the entire drive).

 

Once a drive is so corrupted that you're stuck grabbing file-by-file as the recovery program comes across them in a linear search, your ability to recover a 'folder' content is lost (unless the recovery program is specifically designed to do just that).

 

Below is a question asked on the Apple Support/Discussions site. The entire linked contents is worth a read as it has several people contributing responses, listing several recovery utilities an their specialities.

 

Q: How I can Recover Mac Data from my Corrupted Hard Drive? (link)

Disk Warrior tries to reconstruct your Disk Directory from whatever is still there, and place a new copy back on the SAME drive. This makes the assumption that your drive is close to correct, and can be brought back to life. A subtle twist is that it will require many blocks to store the new directory, so it will overwrite a portion of the drive. It may not be the best choice for a badly-damaged drive.

By contrast, Data Rescue from Prosoft, can make a foray onto a damaged drive, and attempt to salvage damaged files. But it will NOT write them back to the same damaged drive -- it insists you provide a different drive on which to place salvaged files.

There are other Utilities that specialize in salvaging Photos or Videos off damaged drives. Most also require an additional drive on which to store the salvaged files.

Remember that you may lose file names in this process. And that a bulk saving of the drive could include over 350,000 files that comprise MacOS. Focus on your files, and specifically on the files for which you have no other copies. You can reinstall a perfect copy of MacOS from fundamental sources -- it does not modify itself. And the Mac will boot from any appropriate drive, internal or external.

 

[IconicX]

On 7/24/2020 at 11:08 AM, RichCor said:

So you're thinking, or they're saying, the drive contents are corrupted and they're using data recovery tools to look for and retrieve items of interest (and not trying to recover the entire drive).

 

Once a drive is so corrupted that you're stuck grabbing file-by-file as the recovery program comes across them in a linear search, your ability to recover a 'folder' content is lost (unless the recovery program is specifically designed to do just that).

 

Below is a question asked on the Apple Support/Discussions site. The entire linked contents is worth a read as it has several people contributing responses, listing several recovery utilities an their specialities.

 

Q: How I can Recover Mac Data from my Corrupted Hard Drive? (link)

Disk Warrior tries to reconstruct your Disk Directory from whatever is still there, and place a new copy back on the SAME drive. This makes the assumption that your drive is close to correct, and can be brought back to life. A subtle twist is that it will require many blocks to store the new directory, so it will overwrite a portion of the drive. It may not be the best choice for a badly-damaged drive.

By contrast, Data Rescue from Prosoft, can make a foray onto a damaged drive, and attempt to salvage damaged files. But it will NOT write them back to the same damaged drive -- it insists you provide a different drive on which to place salvaged files.

There are other Utilities that specialize in salvaging Photos or Videos off damaged drives. Most also require an additional drive on which to store the salvaged files.

Remember that you may lose file names in this process. And that a bulk saving of the drive could include over 350,000 files that comprise MacOS. Focus on your files, and specifically on the files for which you have no other copies. You can reinstall a perfect copy of MacOS from fundamental sources -- it does not modify itself. And the Mac will boot from any appropriate drive, internal or external.

 

Thank you for this. I think with this info I am set. Much obliged. 

[torturedsole]

38 minutes ago, IconicX said:

I think with this info I am set. 

God's way of reminding you to backup regularly.  ????

[PeteDaKat]

4 hours ago, torturedsole said:

God's way of reminding you to backup regularly.  ????

I know he's in pain, but you said it before me. No Time Machine drive, not even a flash drive? That really makes for a very bad day. This post got me off my butt to plug in the Time Machine drive to update my backup and make a fresh copy of my Documents folder to my flash drive.