Disk Utility says my G4 iBook hard drive is toast

[Elwood P Dowd]

I accidently unplugged a USB hub that had a Seagate external hard drive and digital camera connected. Went brain dead on that. Now Disk Utility gives me the bad news. The G4 is about 3 years old - 1.33 Gig running OS X 10.4.11. Where is the best place to get another hard drive.....quick?

[Bongo Prophet]

1. Compare and look for bargains at dealmac. Tigerdirect, newegg and OWC are my other go to places...

You could also check the local equivalent of fry's or other local, looking for the sales/rebates if time is that crucial.

OWC has prosoft data rescue for 30% off right now, too - you might be able to get back some data.
Disk warrior or such might be able to bring it back - depends on whethe it's hardware hosed or just data damaged.

[Elwood P Dowd]

2. Thanks Bongo

I've used both Tiger and OWC in the past, so I will check with them first. The iBook is still working as normal today. Wonder how much longer I have with this damaged or dying drive?

[Bongo Prophet]

3. So it's the internal drive that got messed up? Unusual. It might be quite fixable.

First thing I would do is use carbon copy cloner to clone the ibook drive to a larger external, for a safety copy. Then run the best disk utility you can find, to check the diagnostics- if you have applecare, it came with hardware diagnostic cd-rom - just to see if you have an unlikely hardware problem. It is probably just the table of contents that got freaked from pulling the peripherals without letting it know (ibook:"Hey, I was keeeping track of that!")

Usually, it is the external that gets confused by "early withdrawal"...

The good thing-
If you have a successful clone copy, and have determined no severe hardware issues, take the opportunity to either:

wipe the drive and install a fresh OS, or

buy a bigger and faster internal drive -they're cheaper than ever, and you get a bonus of a new tiny external if you buy a cheap case.

then use migration assisistant to pull all your user data and apps, cookies, etc back onto your newer, faster ibook.

That might turn it into a total win for you. :)

[Elwood P Dowd]

4. I just ordered a Hitachi 80 gig /5400 from OWC

That's bigger and faster than the 40 gig that was in the iBook. That will be fine since I'm using less than 30 gigs on the stock drive. It only cost $62.00.

A friend is coming over Tuesday with his DiskWarrior disk and see what that does. I also ran AppleJack and MacJanitor, but as I suspected they didn't help. Booting from my 10.4 install disk and running Disk Utility also said the HD was failing. You know, the HD problem could have started prior to my pulling the plug accidentally on the Hub. I had not used Disk Utility in a few weeks. After my screwup, I had a spinning beach ball on something I clicked on. I restarted, decided to run Disk Utilities, and that's when I saw the red and the HD failing status. I just can't imagine pulling a USB hub plug could kill a drive, but then I'm no computer geek.

I don't have a bootable firewire external drive. It's a USB 40 GB Seagate.My original Tiger Disk is OS 10.4.2. I downloaded carbon copy cloner before I finally shut down the iBook. Will work on that later. Hey, surfing the internet and typing on my old 1999 iMac is like going back to a black and white TV. About the only good thing about it is reading some of those old political and economic articles stored on it from better days.......1999 BB (before Bush).

[Bongo Prophet]

5. Well, if you have maxed out the RAM, you are getting the best upgrade you could

It should fell pretty snappy afterwards, esp since you are spending time with an old imac.
Both actually and psychologically, you will have weights off your feet after the reinstall.

enjoy the surgery...:)

[Elwood P Dowd]

6. I finally got a copy of DiskWarrior

Ran it tonight, and it reported a bunch of stuff that was fixed. DiskUtility is still reporting the HD is failing, but the DiskWarrior says the SMART status shows it is normal. The iBook is still working fine.

Two different Mac geeks I know are giving me two different stories. One says the HD will die any minute, and the other thinks it's some software glitch and not a major hardware problem. Anyway, the OWC replacement HD will be here later in the week, so I will just keep using this thing until it croaks.