HELP PLEASE: Can't See or Access 31 GB Of Files On Seagate NTFS-3g External Drive

[magentawave]

Hi,

I have a 500 gb Seagate FreeAgent external hard drive. I installed NTFS-3g so I could read the NTFS files on it.

I could access ALL 31 GB of files on the hard drive before today but now I see only 4 little files that I put on there yesterday (only 2 GB).

When I click on 'Get Info' for the hard drive, it says I have 31.4 GB of files in it but I can only see and access the 4 files that comprise only 2 GB of space.

I'm wondering if I deleted something from the hard drive that allowed me to read the 31 GB of files. Perhaps some NTFS-3g file??

Can anyone please tell me how I can see and access all 31 GB of files on my hard drive again? Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much.

Steve

 

[quantum003]

Your files aren't gone, so don't stress too much. You may want to look into a program called Paragon that handles NTFS files on a Mac.

You were able to see all 32GB of files before this NTFS-3g program you downloaded came into the picture, now you can not see them... perhaps remove NTFS-3g from the equation and see if it is contributing to your problem?

For now though, can you post a few screen shots? That would help.

 

[magentawave]

Your files aren't gone, so don't stress too much. You may want to look into a program called Paragon that handles NTFS files on a Mac.

You were able to see all 32GB of files before this NTFS-3g program you downloaded came into the picture, now you can not see them... perhaps remove NTFS-3g from the equation and see if it is contributing to your problem?

For now though, can you post a few screen shots? That would help.

I attached a screenshot of the open hard drive showing only 4 visible files and it also shows the 'Get Info' box which shows that the hard drive actually has 31.4 GB of files but I can only see 4 files that comprise 2 GB. Those 4 files were obviously added AFTER all the other files disappeared on me.

I run VM Ware Fusion with XP Pro on this Mac and the other weird thing is that my backup files for a program called XsitePro2 are being saved as Unix Executable Files and they aren't saved as exe files when I look at the backup files on the Windows XP side. This is a separate issue (and maybe its a non-issue), but do you know why they are being saved like this?

Thanks again.
Steve

 

[magentawave]

Anyone have any ideas or solutions for the issue I posted above? Please?

Steve

 

[Makosuke]

I run VM Ware Fusion with XP Pro on this Mac and the other weird thing is that my backup files for a program called XsitePro2 are being saved as Unix Executable Files and they aren't saved as exe files when I look at the backup files on the Windows XP side. This is a separate issue (and maybe its a non-issue), but do you know why they are being saved like this?

"Unix Executable Files" have nothing whatsoever to do with .exe files. Unix applications have no .something extension associated with them. On the Mac, any file marked as "executable" (that's a specific unix permission) that doesn't have a recognized file type will default to this.

Files off a filesystem that doesn't handle unix permissions (meaning FAT or NTFS, for the most part) will default to execute permissions, so if they don't have a recognized extension (.jpg or whatever), they'll end up looking like that in the Finder. Which is your situation--you can see that the file still has the expected .plg extension, the Finder just has no idea what that means.

Bottom line, it's completely normal and the expected behavior.

As for your original problem, not sure, but:

1) You've got XP working--if you give Fusion full control of that device (not just mount it, but give Fusion control of the whole USB device), do the files show up there? if XP can't see them either, something must've gotten corrupted, and it's time to run a disk utility to see if you can salvage your files.

2) Are you running the latest version of MacFuse and NTFS-3G? If not, update one or both and see if that helps.

3) As already suggested, try Paragon's NTFS read/write driver--no idea if it's better than the free alternative, but if you're desperate it might be worth a shot.

 

[magentawave]

"Unix Executable Files" have nothing whatsoever to do with .exe files. Unix applications have no .something extension associated with them. On the Mac, any file marked as "executable" (that's a specific unix permission) that doesn't have a recognized file type will default to this.

Files off a filesystem that doesn't handle unix permissions (meaning FAT or NTFS, for the most part) will default to execute permissions, so if they don't have a recognized extension (.jpg or whatever), they'll end up looking like that in the Finder. Which is your situation--you can see that the file still has the expected .plg extension, the Finder just has no idea what that means.

Bottom line, it's completely normal and the expected behavior.

As for your original problem, not sure, but:

1) You've got XP working--if you give Fusion full control of that device (not just mount it, but give Fusion control of the whole USB device), do the files show up there? if XP can't see them either, something must've gotten corrupted, and it's time to run a disk utility to see if you can salvage your files.

2) Are you running the latest version of MacFuse and NTFS-3G? If not, update one or both and see if that helps.

3) As already suggested, try Paragon's NTFS read/write driver--no idea if it's better than the free alternative, but if you're desperate it might be worth a shot.

Okay, thanks for the info.

I checked and MacFuse is up to date but doing a search for ntfs-3g on my computer only brings up the disk image and the preferences panel for it. The disk image appears to be the April 4, 2009 version which I'm pretty sure is the latest.

Totally stupid of me, but I vaguely remember deleting a file from my external hard drive the other day, and if I did, it might have had something to do with NTFS-3G and why I can't see those files.

-Do you have any idea why I wouldn't be able to find the NTFS-3G application on my computer?

-Would it be named something besides NTFS-3G? Should I just reinstall NTFS-3G, and if so, I'm assuming I should install it on my external hard drive (which is the drive that has the files I can't access), right?

Thanks
Steve

 

[Makosuke]

-Do you have any idea why I wouldn't be able to find the NTFS-3G application on my computer?

-Would it be named something besides NTFS-3G? Should I just reinstall NTFS-3G, and if so, I'm assuming I should install it on my external hard drive (which is the drive that has the files I can't access), right?

I haven't done that much with MacFUSE or NTFS-3G, but I don't think that's quite how it works.

NTFS-3G is actually a module (not sure what the correct term is) that runs under MacFUSE; if you look at the documentation of NTFS-3G, you'll notice that it says that it automatically downloads and installs MacFUSE so you don't have to get it separately. This is why there's no "NTFS-3G" program on your drive--there are support files that run under MacFUSE, but Spotlight might not even come up with those depending on where they're stored (I expect in a system directory, so it won't find them normally).

When you install MacFUSE/NTFS-3G (or any other non-native filesystem) it doesn't install or do anything on the external drive in question. What it does is add a sort of plug-in to the MacOS itself telling it how to read/write to that type of drive. So, the next time you plug in an NTFS drive, rather than saying "I understand how to read files off of that, but not write", it loads the NTFS-3G code and says "I know how to read and write to that."

So, reinstalling NTFS-3G can't hurt as a troubleshooting step, but you won't be installing it on the external, it will be installed on your boot drive. Also, while you're at it, try checking the "include betas" (I think that's what it says) box in the MacFUSE preference pane, if you haven't already--there's a chance that if there is a bug that it's fixed in the latest beta.

 

[magentawave]

I haven't done that much with MacFUSE or NTFS-3G, but I don't think that's quite how it works.

NTFS-3G is actually a module (not sure what the correct term is) that runs under MacFUSE; if you look at the documentation of NTFS-3G, you'll notice that it says that it automatically downloads and installs MacFUSE so you don't have to get it separately. This is why there's no "NTFS-3G" program on your drive--there are support files that run under MacFUSE, but Spotlight might not even come up with those depending on where they're stored (I expect in a system directory, so it won't find them normally).

When you install MacFUSE/NTFS-3G (or any other non-native filesystem) it doesn't install or do anything on the external drive in question. What it does is add a sort of plug-in to the MacOS itself telling it how to read/write to that type of drive. So, the next time you plug in an NTFS drive, rather than saying "I understand how to read files off of that, but not write", it loads the NTFS-3G code and says "I know how to read and write to that."

So, reinstalling NTFS-3G can't hurt as a troubleshooting step, but you won't be installing it on the external, it will be installed on your boot drive. Also, while you're at it, try checking the "include betas" (I think that's what it says) box in the MacFUSE preference pane, if you haven't already--there's a chance that if there is a bug that it's fixed in the latest beta.

Thank you very much for your clarification.

This is what I have done so far...

1) I clicked on "include betas" in Macfuse preferences (like you said above) and it said that Macfuse wasn't even installed. Don't know why it would say that when it was visible in my preferences so I went ahead and reinstalled it.

2) I also reinstalled NTFS-3G again.

3) I restarted my computer.

4) I started my virtual machine (VMWare Fusion with Windows XP Pro) and changed the shared settings so I could access my external hard drive while running XP.


THE END RESULT: I still can't see or access the 30 GB of files on my external drive. When I click on 'Get Info' it still shows that I have 31 GB of files on there so nothing has changed.

I'm wondering if while running Disk Utility recently that I was STOOOPID enough to have left the external HD mounted and it deleted some stuff I needed??

I really appreciate your help here. Do you have any other ideas for how I can access this 30 GB of files on my external hard drive?

Thanks again.
Steve

UPDATE: For the sake of others that might stumble upon this thread...

After doing everything above I deleted NTFS-3G and Macfuse from my computer. Then I installed Paragon and selected my external HD within its settings and reinstalled Macfuse. Dang! It still didn't see my 30 GB of files. So then I opened the Disk Utility and clicked on 'Verify Disk' and it showed a bunch of weird problems. Then I clicked on 'Repair Disk' and guess what? Hal-uh-freakin-you-la and huzza-wuzza - ALL 30 GB of my files are now there to read and write! ASK ME IF I'M STOKED - YES I am stoked!

Thanks again for all your help because without it I would not have any idea where to start!