Disk Utility Can't Fix Hard Drive

[ptaylor9]

Would appreciate any comments please, I dont know what to do next..
Basically, the past couple of days my new macbook Pro (only had it a couple of months) has been really slow to boot, with a grey progress bar that I have never seen before. I googled it, and you all know what i found.
So I ran the disk utility, and selected analyze or whatever the button is, and it said I should load it from the INstall DVD, as the disk needs repairing.
Guess what. The disk cannot be repaired.
An error message about expecting 31 files but only finding 30?
It recommends erasing the disk and reinstalling from scratch.
Now, as far as I can see, apart form the slow boot times, everything else still works. Does this mean that it is just a ticking time-bomb that will break any time, or is just a couple of corrupt files that don't matter?
This is really annoying, I love my Mac, but having to reinstall so soon after purchase?
Apologies if there any other posts on here already, it is late, I am stressed, and would like a nice person to help me out.
This is my first Mac by the way, and loving it so far. Except this bit....
Cheers all.
P.

 

[Darth.Titan]

Mac or Windows, disk problems happen.

It could be something that a third party program like DiskWarrior could fix, or your hard drive may be starting to die.

If you don't want to do a format and reinstall, you'll need a third-party disk utility to solve your problem. Pay attention, because if it happens again it might behoove you to start shopping for a new hard drive.

 

[Jaro65]

I had an HD fail in my MBP as well. I believe it was made by Fujitsu. This stuff happens with mechanical drives. Get a SuperDuper!, load it up on an external drive and have it regularly update its image (mine does it every day). That way, even if your laptop HD fails, you can just boot up from the external SuperDuper! drive.

Good luck!

 

[ptaylor9]

Hi Both,
Thanks for the replies, I did have a quick look at disk warrior this morning, but $100 is a lot to shell out for something I may only use once, and I cant really afford that right now.
I've borrowed an external hard drive so I can do a time machine backup, i'm thinking that reinstalling may be my only option now.
I know disk things happen with Windows and Macs, it's just I hoped it wouldn't happen so soon hahah
Cheers

 

[daneoni]

Have you ran fsck?

 

[King Mook Mook]

Have you ran fsck?

I'm pretty sure that's what happens when you see the grey progress bar (which the OP said happens each time their computer boots up).

King Mook Mook

 

[ptaylor9]

Hi again,
I just want to make sure of my plan here.
I have managed to borrow an external USB drive from work, so I plan to go home and use Time Machine to create a backup.
I then plan to boot from DVD, and erase the disk, and then reinstall Snow Leopard. Once I have this clean install, I will install the other apps like iLife and Garageband off the other DVD.

Once I have got this sorted, I will try and recover my files from my time machine backup on the external drive.

Edit - OK, I cant do this as the disk is windows formatted, and it has other stuff on it i cant delete. So i guess ill do it the old fashion way and just copy the files i want to back up manually to the external hard drive, and copy them back again when i'm done.

Will this restore applications too, and importantly my iTunes library, or am i doing this all the wrong way?
CHeers