WD My Book 1TB directory damaged...

[guiltpop]

I did a really stupid thing.

My 1TB drive arrived formatted in MS-DOS format, so I wanted to format in to mac OS journaled format...

I went into disk utility and I accidentally erased the first drive heading, not the one underneath (not sure what you call it...but I"m assuming anyone who uses disk utility will know what I am talking about...)

I know I wasn't supposed to do that...it was an honest mistake.

But now the drive won't mount.

It detects the drive and "initiates it" but that's it.

Disk Warrior doesn't seem to help.

I don't need any data on the drive (there wasn't any to begin with)

Is there a way to restore the directory on to the drive. I am pretty sure there has been no physical damage to the drive, because before I made my mistake the drive mounted just fine.

I've searched in other places, but can't find an answer.

Any help is greatly, greatly appreciated.

 

[mokeiko]

went into disk utility and I accidentally erased the first drive heading, not the one underneath (not sure what you call it...but I"m assuming anyone who uses disk utility will know what I am talking about...)

I use Disk Utility and still don't understand what you're talking about. Could you provide a screenshot? I just want to make sure we're on the same page before diagnosing the problem.

mokeiko

 

[Zyniker]

Select the drive >> Format (in the right pane) >> choose the number of partitions you'd like >> choose the format you'd like (lower right) >> Apply. You should be good to go after that.

 

[sickmacdoc]

I did a really stupid thing.

My 1TB drive arrived formatted in MS-DOS format, so I wanted to format in to mac OS journaled format...

I went into disk utility and I accidentally erased the first drive heading, not the one underneath (not sure what you call it...but I"m assuming anyone who uses disk utility will know what I am talking about...)

I know I wasn't supposed to do that...it was an honest mistake.

<clip>

First off don't beat yourself up, as that actually was not an error. When you are converting a drive with an existing PC format, the top one is the correct one to choose as you need to change the partition table map which can only be done from the top one. You just didn't go far enough.

I think you will find that you left out one little important detail in your process of preparing the drive for Mac use- and that is changing the partition table map I mentioned above. The partition table map (which affect the whole drive, so that is why you must pick the top line rather than the partition below it) needs to be changed from MBR which is the type used for PCs (the way the drive came) to GUID for your MacBook (if it were an older PowerPC based Mac it would need to be APM for trivia).

Anyway to fix your drive, just follow these steps (in this order):

• Start up Disk Utility
• Select the "top line" of your new drive in the left column
• Click on the "Partition" tab at the top of the screen
• In the Partition window, change the "Volume Scheme:" entry from "Current" to "1 partition" (or more if you want additional partitions)
• Click the "Options" button at the bottom of the screen
• Select "GUID" from the window that appears, then click "OK"
• Give your new drive a name in the "Volume Information" section, and select "Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with the "Format:" pulldown menu
• Click "Apply", then "OK"
• Sit back and wait about 15 seconds or so and your new HD icon will appear on your desktop and the drive will be fully "Macified". Then just go enjoy the new storage space.

 

[guiltpop]

went into disk utility and I accidentally erased the first drive heading, not the one underneath (not sure what you call it...but I"m assuming anyone who uses disk utility will know what I am talking about...)

I use Disk Utility and still don't understand what you're talking about. Could you provide a screenshot? I just want to make sure we're on the same page before diagnosing the problem.

mokeiko

I've attached a screenshot to show what I mean more clearly...

 

[guiltpop]

Thank you!

Thank you Zyniker & sickmacdoc...

This solved the problem quickly and easily.

I really appreciate the fix and the description!