macbook HD fail

[Aegelward]

well, last night my macbook was making strange clicking noises, and i decided to shut it down just incase.

well, when i turned it on this morning, it came up with the startup screen, and nothing but a flashing folder with a question mark in it...

any way to recover the drive without buying a new one, or will i have to install a new drive.. or at least install os x on an external hdd?

 

[mad jew]

It can't find the system. Try booting form the OSX discs and if it an, then attempt an Archive & Install. You could well end up with no data loss, however even if it works you should back all your data up. A machine such as yours shouldn't be behaving like this and it'll probably need a new drive.

By the way, if you have another Mac you might be able to recover your data with Target Disk Mode.

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

How old are your MacBook? How long warranty do you have?

If the disk doesn't show up in Disk Utility when booting from the DVD, well then - with those symptoms - there's a good chance the disk is gone for good.

Both my boss' and my own MacBook had their BTO HD fail after ~half a year (and replaced under warranty). And there has been others here at MR reporting the same... There seem to be a not unsubstantial number of HD failures with the MacBooks... maybe Apple got a bad batch of (120 GB?) disks, or something?

You did have backup, right?

 

[lesbarn]

Multiple Hard Drive Failures

We have 48 MacBooks 1.83GHz first run (received last week May 06) and I have replaced five hard drives so far. All of the drives I replaced have been Seagate 60GB drives. Apple has replaced all the drives with another Seagate drive with the exception of one which was a Toshiba 60GB drive.

Les

 

[mad jew]

It's not just the MacBooks. I've noticed quite a few more hard drive-based problems popping up 'round here since the switch to Intel, although it may have been the switch to SATA at roughly the same time...

 

[Aegelward]

the drive is a 60 gig fujtsu. i've been considering buying an external hdd too attempt to recover data. the system is still under warranty. any idea how long the period for it to be replaced is, or would they do that in store?

i do backup fairly reguarly, but my nas is pretty full, i need to buy a larger one really...

its not showing up in the installer's disc utility at all, and is making repeating clicking sounds.

 

[ajhaji]

If you want to maintain any hope of recovering the data, I would turn it off and keep it off. Those clicking sounds might be from the heads scraping against the platters, destroying them.

Some people have reported success putting their hard drive in the freezer overnight and then attempting a recovery the next day. YMMV, but unless you're willing to pay the money for professional data recovery you don't have much of a choice.

 

[filmgirl]

The freezer thing will work in some cases (though I wouldn't leave it in over night -- 30 minutes max), assuming the motor hasn't completely died -- I've managed to salvage a number of clicking drives using the freezing trick, so I'd try it -- but you'll want to connect it as a slave to another hard drive, not try to actually boot from it -- so you might need to get a external housing (or you can just get a connector that'll go from SATA or IDE to USB 2 or firewire -- any local computer shop will have them, they run about $10). Connecting it as a secondary drive will be your best chance at recovering data -- so you might want to spend money on another 2.5" drive to put in temporarily (if you get an external housing, you can use that drive as a bonus drive after Apple replaces your dead HDD), load OS X and then try to access the file system on the clicking drive.

Best of luck. Even if the platters are ruined, you CAN get data recovery, it's just expensive as all get out and not really worth it unless you have something you absolutely must have.

 

[plinden]

the drive is a 60 gig fujtsu. i've been considering buying an external hdd too attempt to recover data. the system is still under warranty. any idea how long the period for it to be replaced is, or would they do that in store?

i do backup fairly reguarly, but my nas is pretty full, i need to buy a larger one really...

its not showing up in the installer's disc utility at all, and is making repeating clicking sounds.

That sounds exactly like my wife's MacBook - the drive (another 60GB Seagate) was totally dead with no chance of recovery (although, as filmgirl mentioned, if there's something you really need of it, the freezer trick does often work).

Apple replaced it instore, but stores normally don't have the drives in stock so it will have to be ordered. It took about five days from the diagnosis till Apple replaced it (at the Burlingame store). But my wife didn't have to go without her laptop. I installed OS X on an external drive and we kept the MB at home until the store called to let us know the drive was ready. Either USB or firewire will work (we have both at home), but booting is noticeably slower from a USB drive compared to firewire, or the internal drive of course. But either isn't noticeably slower in use.

Edit: Macintouch did a reliability survey in August 06 - this is the table showing the results.

It shows < 2% hard drive failure rates, but that's 2-3 months after the MB was released, so it's likely (i.e certainly) to be higher.

Historically, early revisions have had high HD failure rates (from June 2005). See the G4 iBooks.

Edit 2: More data. Google did a report early this year - http://209.85.163.132/papers/disk_failures.pdf. On page 4 there's a table showing the age of different drives when they failed. Page 5 shows there's little correlation after 3 months between drive usage and failure.