4 Ways to Recover a Failed Internal Mac Hard Drive

A failing or already failed Mac hard drive is a nightmarish however an inevitable course of action. That is why Apple facilitates a built-in Mac backup application called ‘Time Machine’ to keep an updated and exact copy of files from Macintosh internal hard drives.

Our focused topic for today is Mac hard drive recovery after it had failed to operate, mount or accessed on the OS X Mac. [Update – 13 June 2016 Try Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery Free Edition]

4 Ways to Recover Failed Internal Hard Drive

Course of Action for data recovery on failed hard drive

Fix 1) Fix the hard drive with FSCK commandFSCK Repair Macintosh HDD

You can repair Macintosh HD using a non – GUI mode on Mac OS X. To do it successfully, follow the below procedure:

(i) Make sure your Mac is turned off

(ii) Press the power button to startup the Mac and press hold the Command and S button (i.e. Command + S)

(iii) This will bring you the Single User Mode from where you can repair the Mac hard drive and access all files from it

(iv) Now, you must enter the command line – /sbin/fsck – fy

(v) Press Return (Enter)

(vi) The command line will begin analyzing your Macintosh HD volume and will return message as per the action performed

(vii) When the Mac HD is healthy, it will display the message: “The Volume (name) appears to be OK

(viii) When FSCK repairs the damaged volume, it shows the message: “File System Was Modified”. Repeat the FSCK run again, until the file system is corrected and the message in step (vii) is displayed

Fix 2) Target Disk Mode and File Recovery

Target Disk Mode is a potent method to mount and access a faulty hard drive using accessories,

Tutplus

Tutplus

which includes a Firewire or a Thunderbolt cable that connects the 2 Macs (Healthy Mac and Unhealthy Mac) for file transfer. How to connect 2 Macs using the cables?

(i) Make sure uninterrupted power supply is provided to both the Macs

(ii) Use a Firewire 800 or Firewire 400 cable to connect both the Macs through USB ports. You may also use a Thunderbolt for the same.

(iii) Start the Mac with failing/failed hard drive and immediately press the keyboard button “T

(iv) The Mac should boot into the Firewire mode. Once it does, you will see a large Firewire icon the Mac screen

(v) On a healthy Mac, you will see the troubled hard drive icon showing on the Desktop. The ‘Macintosh HD’ will have a Firewire symbol mounted on its icon. In case of Thunderbolt cable, the Macintosh HD will have the Thunderbolt icon mounted onto it

(vi) Once Macintosh HD is mounted, you can perform disk repair and copy files from the hard drive to a healthy HDD or an external hard drive

Mounting, accessing and copying files from an unhealthy hard drive to a healthy disk seems to be a child’s play with Target Disk Mode facility. However, if the disk is unable to mount on the healthy Mac then it will be an impossible task to copy or recover the files from it.

What to do when the hard drive is failing to get the mount on another Mac? [Solution lies in the helpful link section of this article]

Fix 3) Convert Internal Macintosh HD into an External Hard Drive

Wonderhowto

Wonderhowto

Converting the internal Macintosh HD to an external hard drive for recovering files could possibly be an alternative solution of Target Disk Mode. How should you make an external drive out of an internal HDD?

(i) Safely take out the internal Macintosh HD out of your Mac system. There are plenty of D-I-Y videos which can help you remove the Mac HD safely

(ii) Prior to removal of the internal HD, you must also order an external hard drive enclosure from an online seller. Hard drive enclosures these days are cheap and can be acquired by spending $10 or $15

(iii) Open the plastic cover of the enclosure and place / slide your internal hard drive in the matching context. Once done, turn over the hard drive and put in the screws that came up with the enclosure. Tighten all the screws with the help of a screwdriver

(iv) Put back the front-back plastic cover to cover-up the hard drive

(v) Now connect one and the another tip of the USB cable to the ports the hard drive and Mac OS X for mounting and accessing files

A badly damaged hard drive may fail to get accessed on Mac even after being converted to an external hard drive? [Solution lies below in the helpful link section of this article]

Fix 4) Data Recovery Software for Macintosh HD

Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery

Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery

This particular point of the entire article deals with the situation when Mac hard drive recovery is to be done at all costs and above solutions (FSCK, Target Disk Mode, Drive Enclosure) have resulted negatively.

Mac data recovery app to the rescue

Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery is an advanced data recovery software that can help you mount and access a failed / failing hard drive on Mac, Target Disk Mode Mac or the Mac drive that got converted into an external drive. Please refer to the KB article mentioned in the helpful links at the end of this article.

Bootable Media and Recovery

Fortunately, you can avoid all the above steps and save your energy by ordering Stellar Phoenix Mac Data Recovery with Rescue CD. This CD boots up your failed or failing Macintosh hard drives and performs speedy recovery of files from it.

Helpful Links

Comments(10)
  1. Evelia B. Mathewson June 8, 2016
  2. Chad L. Basler June 20, 2016
    • Vishal June 21, 2016
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  4. Shatrick chand July 27, 2016
    • Vishal August 3, 2016
  5. Simon August 9, 2016
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