Can't see files on external hard drive. Need help

[Gradanko]

I am trying to use my hard drive I have had for a couple years to back up some files on my computer, but the data I had stored on there already has disappeared. I previously had the hard drive connected to the Time Machine application, but have not used it in over a year when I received an error message trying to backup my computer using that application.

I know the data I already had on there is still on the hard drive because nearly half of the space on the drive is used up, but when I plug the hard drive in to my computer and open it there are no files to be found. I want to back up the current files on my computer, but I don't want to risk losing what I already had on the hard drive, so is there any way I can find and access the old files again?

I'll include my hardware information on here in case that helps to find a solution:

2006 MacBook Pro 15"
Intel Core Duo
Mac OS X 10.5.8

1TB Western Digital My Book: Studio Edition II
Dual-drive Storage System with RAID

Thanks for any help.

 

[spinnerlys]

Open Terminal and enter the following:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
killall Finder

to show hidden files/folders in Finder and check if you can see them now.

To hide the files again:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles FALSE
killall Finder

Have you checked the TRASH yet?

 

[Gradanko]

It doesn't do anything, all I get is this message:

2010-09-21 10:33:08.007 defaults[658:10b] Unexpected argument killall; leaving defaults unchanged.

 

[Hal Itosis]

It doesn't do anything, all I get is this message:

2010-09-21 10:33:08.007 defaults[658:10b] Unexpected argument killall; leaving defaults unchanged.

Looks like you ran those two commands on one line. They were supposed to be run one at a time.

Or, use a semicolon:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool true; killall Finder

I also added the -bool type specifier there, to ensure proper data gets written. (the actual value should be a 0 or 1 to set the state... not a string).

--

Have you verified that external with Disk Utility?

Let's see what these *two* commands say (one at a time):

diskutil list

df -h

 

[spinnerlys]

Looks like you ran those two commands on one line. They were supposed to be run one at a time.

Strangely I can run them both at the same time, meaning I can copy the complete command, including KILLALL FINDER and it looks like this:

 

[Hal Itosis]

Strangely I can run them both at the same time, meaning I can copy the complete command, including KILLALL FINDER

Behavior probably dependent on how one sets the Terminal preference labeled: "paste newlines as carriage returns".

Anyway, i prefer to follow more conventional practices (use semicolons to separate distinct commands, and/or copy/paste them one line at a time, and/or escape by using a backslash \
to continue entering long commands onto the next line).