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Resolved Barracuda Strangness - Lost All Data

crjackson2134

crjackson2134

macrumors 601
Original poster
Mar 6, 2013
4,850
1,958
Charlotte, NC
Strange thing happened today, I booted my MP and found that my Barracuda 1TB drive (mounted internally on sled 4) vanquished all of my archived files. To include several hundred apps., data files, photos, misc. documents, etc...

I ran the DU and found nothing wrong with the drive. TechTool7 and DiskWarrior report no problems with the drive.

When I powered the MP down last night, everything was fine and the drive contents were undisturbed. When I powered up today, it took longer than normal (slightly), and when I was looking for a file, I found the whole drive was empty. It's as if someone deleted EVERYTHING (but of course that didn't happen).

Luckily (not really luck), I have multiple backups of all my drives, so it's just a matter of putting it all back. I just can't figure out how this could happen without any indications that the drive or file system is failing.

Restoring 599GB now...

EDIT: There is no stalling, access issues, or SMART errors prior to this incident, or after replacing the data. I'm still going to replace the drive though.
 
Last edited:
crjackson2134 said:
Strange thing happened today, I booted my MP and found that my Barracuda 1TB drive (mounted internally on sled 4) vanquished all of my archived files. To include several hundred apps., data files, photos, misc. documents, etc...

I ran the DU and found nothing wrong with the drive. TechTool7 and DiskWarrior report no problems with the drive.

When I powered the MP down last night, everything was fine and the drive contents were undisturbed. When I powered up today, it took longer than normal (slightly), and when I was looking for a file, I found the whole drive was empty. It's as if someone deleted EVERYTHING (but of course that didn't happen).

Luckily (not really luck), I have multiple backups of all my drives, so it's just a matter of putting it all back. I just can't figure out how this could happen without any indications that the drive or file system is failing.

Restoring 599GB now...
Click to expand...
Make sure to replace that hard drive. I would not use it; if it's dropping blocks and causing file system corruption, it's time to go in the trash.
 
^^^^I agree once a storage device screws up, it's best to just chuck it and replace it. The prices to storage devices are so reasonable now that trying to bring use any HDD, SSD, or SSHD that has caused past problems is just not worth it.

What I do with my old drives, rather then spend the time zeroing them out, is just to erase them, then I take it out to the garage and drill a hole through it.

Lou
 
flowrider said:
^^^^I agree once a storage device screws up, it's best to just chuck it and replace it. The prices to storage devices are so reasonable now that trying to bring use any HDD, SSD, or SSHD that has caused past problems is just not worth it.

What I do with my old drives, rather then spend the time zeroing them out, is just to erase them, then I take it out to the garage and drill a hole through it.

Lou
Click to expand...

I prefer the .40 Cal S/W target practice method. It's on the list of things to do next month. :)

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xraydoc said:
Make sure to replace that hard drive. I would not use it; if it's dropping blocks and causing file system corruption, it's time to go in the trash.
Click to expand...

Funny thing is, it showed no file system corruption or other disk trouble. It's like some either formatted the disk fresh or just deleted everything.
 
xraydoc said:
Make sure to replace that hard drive. I would not use it; if it's dropping blocks and causing file system corruption, it's time to go in the trash.
Click to expand...

flowrider said:
^^^^I agree once a storage device screws up, it's best to just chuck it and replace it. The prices to storage devices are so reasonable now that trying to bring use any HDD, SSD, or SSHD that has caused past problems is just not worth it.

What I do with my old drives, rather then spend the time zeroing them out, is just to erase them, then I take it out to the garage and drill a hole through it.

Lou
Click to expand...

crjackson2134 said:
I prefer the .40 Cal S/W target practice method. It's on the list of things to do next month. :)

----------



Funny thing is, it showed no file system corruption or other disk trouble. It's like some either formatted the disk fresh or just deleted everything.
Click to expand...


I agree completely if there's some reason to suspect a disk problem. (S.M.A.R.T. showing errors, random 30 second hangs in the week before the event, ...)

However,...

It would be very rare for a disk error to cleanly wipe all of the filesystem metadata without leaving any trace of corrupted files. Extremely rare.

I can't disregard the possibility that this was a software event - the disk is fine but malware or the system (or user error) zapped the drive.

Dying drives leave lots of evidence - they almost never zero all of your data without some warning.

If there are no S.M.A.R.T errors or other hardware errors - you might be blaming an innocent disk, while leaving the real problem active and waiting to get you.
 
AidenShaw said:
I agree completely if there's some reason to suspect a disk problem. (S.M.A.R.T. showing errors, random 30 second hangs in the week before the event, ...)

However,...

It would be very rare for a disk error to cleanly wipe all of the filesystem metadata without leaving any trace of corrupted files. Extremely rare.

I can't disregard the possibility that this was a software event - the disk is fine but malware or the system (or user error) zapped the drive.

Dying drives leave lots of evidence - they almost never zero all of your data without some warning.

If there are no S.M.A.R.T errors or other hardware errors - you might be blaming an innocent disk, while leaving the real problem active and waiting to get you.
Click to expand...

I agree with this. A clean wipe format smells of malware or malicious/erroneous acts. Only other thing that jumps to mind is a catastrophic directory mis/write. So as the machine is writing out changes as it goes to sleep or shutting down, and it just obliterates the file directory. Like a power outage at just that right moment. I think the odds of that are way more unlikely than a malicious act of some sort.

I'd wipe the main drive and do a clean install and move user data back manually to be thorough.
 
crjackson2134 said:
Luckily (not really luck), I have multiple backups of all my drives, so it's just a matter of putting it all back. I just can't figure out how this could happen without any indications that the drive or file system is failing.

Restoring 599GB now...

EDIT: There is no stalling, access issues, or SMART errors prior to this incident, or after replacing the data. I'm still going to replace the drive though.
Click to expand...

I think i may do daily backups of my mac now!
 
ZombiePhysicist said:
I agree with this. A clean wipe format smells of malware or malicious/erroneous acts. Only other thing that jumps to mind is a catastrophic directory mis/write. So as the machine is writing out changes as it goes to sleep or shutting down, and it just obliterates the file directory. Like a power outage at just that right moment. I think the odds of that are way more unlikely than a malicious act of some sort.

I'd wipe the main drive and do a clean install and move user data back manually to be thorough.
Click to expand...

Is there an "undelete" utility for Apple OSX? (e.g. http://award-undelete.freeware.filetransit.com/ )

These utilities scan the disk for meta-data, and can recreate the directory structure even if the normal links to the directory structure are deleted.
 
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