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Help! Macbook hard drive fails 3 days before a gig!

sochet

sochet

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 1, 2006
194
4
So last night my computer decides to randomly seize up, I restart it manually (pressing the power button) only to find it won't boot up (I get the chime but then nothing else)

When I booted off the cd and used the disc utility not only was my hard drive calling it something else I couldn't complete the repair disc command. It starts and then stops saying

"Invalid B-tree node size"

Any ideas what that is? How easy is it to just wipe the hd using disc utility and re-install osx?

Like my title says I have a gig in 3 days and I'm kinda freaking out, so any help would be greatly appreciated. :)

Ps. If you live in London and like good electronic music (Dubstep/Breaks/IDM) Come check out future music on Friday 17th October at Scala (Kings cross)
 
Considering that your MacBook booted off DVD while the dead HDD is still in, then you are further along then I was a few weeks ago.

However, more then likely your drive is dead and not recoverable. And I hope you had a good solution for backing up. You can try getting a USB enclosure and some of the mac data recovery software. Or throw it in a PC and try spinrite. But likely, you'll need a new drive.
 
Luckily I didn't have anything I need on it. It's just a giging computer, I have a mac pro (with 2 different external backups) that I do everything on.


My dilemma is now this. Should I borrow my housemates MBP and use that for the gig, then wait until next week when I can try and get the hdd replaced under apple care? Or will they just format it and reload OSX? If the latter is case I may as well just do it myself. /dilema. But thanks for the replies :)
 
sochet said:
Luckily I didn't have anything I need on it. It's just a giging computer, I have a mac pro (with 2 different external backups) that I do everything on.


My dilemma is now this. Should I borrow my housemates MBP and use that for the gig, then wait until next week when I can try and get the hdd replaced under apple care? Or will they just format it and reload OSX? If the latter is case I may as well just do it myself. /dilema. But thanks for the replies :)
Click to expand...

No, it looks like you've got a faulty / damaged HD on your hands, my guess is they'll replace it. I'd take it in anyway, and use an alternate computer in the mean time.
 
Tell them you can load OS X yourself, they should just swap the hard drives, 5 min job.

Unless that is they preload them with OS X.

Whatever, but anyway definitely take it in.
 
Disk Warrior

saave yourself a lot of headache..I have a macbook and got a btree node error..brought it to the genius bar and was told all data was lost and the drive was fried..UI bought disk warrior..ran it and recovered every single file..copied it to an external maxtor 250 gig..bought a new 250 drive at best buy for 80 bucks..reinstalled osx on the new drive and reinstalled everything...The computer runs better than ever..if I stuck with the genius I would be out 400 bucks and lost all my data..this way I spent about 250 but got disk warrior and a new hardrive and a new external
 
I would use DiskWarrior, Drive Genius 2, or Data Rescue II to try to recover the info on the HD. You could also try the freezer trick :p (take out the HD, stick it in the freezer for a coupla hours, put it back in, and try booting from it).
 
SHADO said:
I would use DiskWarrior, Drive Genius 2, or Data Rescue II to try to recover the info on the HD. You could also try the freezer trick :p (take out the HD, stick it in the freezer for a coupla hours, put it back in, and try booting from it).
Click to expand...

Hey now...you might stick your tongue out at the "freezer trick" but it can work on very rare occasions. I have a buddy who did it and it booted! He immediately started copying his files over to an external drive. The hard drive finished copying the files and the frozen hard drive died about 30 min or so after it finished. It wouldn't work after that though. Oh well, he got this files copied and all is well in the world. :)

Anyways, don't diss the trick. It could work.
 
Ov3rlord Falc0r said:
Hey now...you might stick your tongue out at the "freezer trick" but it can work on very rare occasions. I have a buddy who did it and it booted! He immediately started copying his files over to an external drive. The hard drive finished copying the files and the frozen hard drive died about 30 min or so after it finished. It wouldn't work after that though. Oh well, he got this files copied and all is well in the world. :)

Anyways, don't diss the trick. It could work.
Click to expand...

No I know it can work sometimes, but I just think it's kinda funny that you can stick it in the freezer and it might work.
 
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