jwright Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 (edited) I have a Mac 10.6 client that I am trying to back up. The client seems to have a bad disk or file system corruption. The backup starts fine, but after a while, slows down to a few MB per minute. It bounces around and then usually stops with a handful of errors like this: File "Macintosh HD/private/var/db/dyld/dyld_shared_cache": can't read, error -1105 ( improper seek) File "Macintosh HD/Users/person/Desktop/TJC_MIDI files/ShiFolder/Shi_sop.aif": can't read, error -1105 ( improper seek) The machine still runs, but it seems to be having issues. I would love to get one more backup before I attempt a restore. Two questions: 1. Does this seem like a disk issue or a filesystem issue? My guess is a disk issue. Since it is a journaled file system. 2. Is there any way to get a backup? Retrospect keeps stopping because it can't read files, so my guess is "no". Thanks! Jeff Edited February 22, 2010 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted February 22, 2010 Report Share Posted February 22, 2010 Have you tried running Disk Utility standalone from the Install DVD? Have you looked at the SMART diagnostic reports? Have you run Apple's Diagnostics? Sounds like the disk and not the filesystem. You might be able to use ASR to make a disk sparseimage (onto another drive or over the network) and recover all the data that way, and then back up from the sparseimage. But I'd suggest replacing that drive ASAP. Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwright Posted February 23, 2010 Author Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 Russ: I have not done any testing on the client. I am going to try to run the disk utility today. I'll note errors. I found an Apple Server Diagnostics for download. Is there a desktop version? I can't find this. The user will likely want to restore to the same drive unless I can convince him that the disk is bad. So, I will probably be getting a lot of practice restoring Macs soon. :-) Jeff Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 I found an Apple Server Diagnostics for download. Is there a desktop version? I can't find this. Yes, it should have come with the machine. Tell the user it's his/her data and lost time. Whatever. A middle ground might be to get an external Firewire drive, let the machine run off that for a while. That would eliminate possibilities such as a marginal power supply or bad power supply connection in the machine, etc. Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwright Posted February 23, 2010 Author Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 (edited) It turns out the user purchased "Disk Warrior". We booted the system as an external firewire drive on a macbook. Disk Warrior reported the disk as having mechanical problems, so he is on board with replacing it. Now I get to try my hands at a imac hdd replacement, which looks tricky. Btw way, the disk failure explains the errors I was getting from retrospect while trying to read from the drive. That might be an error to keep an eye out for. Thanks again for the suggestions. Jeff Edited February 23, 2010 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 Now I get to try my hands at a imac hdd replacement, which looks tricky. Nah, the hardest part is getting the cover off without breaking the little plastic tabs. Manuals are here: Apple iMac Do it Yourself parts replacement manuals By the way, when you do the restore, easiest (and safest) way is to put the computer into Target Disk Mode, attach it to another Mac (you seem to understand that process because that's how you did the Disk Warrior stuff as an external Firewire drive on the MacBook), restore onto the quiescent TDM drive. That way, you aren't restoring on top of a live OS. Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ramon88 Posted February 24, 2010 Report Share Posted February 24, 2010 I've replaced the PSU from a white Intel iMac last year. It was quite easy when you know what to do. The most fun was to replace the HDD for a faster one from a Mac Mini. Had to use a stripping knife to open the case. Opening current full body aluminum iMacs might be a challenge though. I believe it involves big suction cups to lift the glass plate from the front... Never tried that. Anyway, if you are up to it follow this link and pick the mac in question. then click on the "Hard Drive Replacement" icon/picture and it will show you a step by step guide with pictures. Have fun! :teeth: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwright Posted March 3, 2010 Author Report Share Posted March 3, 2010 I managed the restore, but I did get 11,073 errors! All like this one: File "Macintosh HD/Users/*****/Sites/cps296/Lectures(Old_07)/Lecture09.pdf": can't duplicate to "Macintosh HD/Users/*****/Sites/cps296_s09/Lectures(Old_07)/Lecture09.pdf", error -1101 ( file/directory not found) (Of course I replaced the username with "*****") That means that 11,000 files could not be restored...any ideas? Is this a 7.7 issue? A 10.6 issue? BTW, This one of the late 2008 aluminum imacs. It was not too bad to replace the hdd, but it did require two people. I found one great video on youtube...the only one that came close to how the actual cables were connected inside. You can search for "iMac Aluminum Hard Drive Upgrade Pt 1" on youtube and find it. Jeff Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted March 3, 2010 Report Share Posted March 3, 2010 Are these local accounts or Network Homes? Is authentication by AD/LDAP/OD etc.? What Retrospect Mac client version? Exactly how did you do the restore? Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwright Posted March 3, 2010 Author Report Share Posted March 3, 2010 (edited) All local accounts on the machine. The machine had 6.3.028 on it prior to the restore. To restore the system, I connected it via firewire to another mac server running client version 6.3.028 and did a full restore to the firewire drive. Jeff Edited March 3, 2010 by Guest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rhwalker Posted March 3, 2010 Report Share Posted March 3, 2010 Ah, that might be the problem, then. If they were local accounts, then the UIDs for local accounts with same names for the two machines might be different. Or names associated with the target restore UID might be different on the two machines (same issue, really). Another thing to watch for that might have caused this is if you had "ignore ownership on this volume" checked for the mounted firewire drive when you did the restore. Do a "get info" on the mounted firewire TDM drive, check the "ignore ownership" checkbox at the bottom of the window. If it's the former problem (rather than the "ignore ownership" issue), arguably it's a bug. What happens if, with this error-produced drive, you don't restore the whole thing, but instead restore that local home directory (/Users/******) to some created subdirectory, and then do a piped tar or some such to put the new mess on top of the old? fyi, the magic incantation is, as root (or sudo sh) in Terminal (be very careful, this is dangerous): cd WhateverTheRestoreDirnameIs tar cvf - . | (cd /YourTDM_MountpointName/Users/Your****UserNameHomeDir; tar xvf -) Make sure you read the man pages on tar so that you understand exactly what that is doing, and why. Ask if not sure before executing, and DON'T use any ****** in the command - must use actual name that you hid in your post. Another, less dangerous approach, would be to restore this user's home directory onto some other directory on the target Firewire drive, boot the newly restored machine (won't work on the machine used for the restore if UIDs and GIDs are different), log in as a different user, then, in terminal, do a recursive chown on the restored target home directory: sudo chown -R TheUserName:TheUserGroup TheFolderName Then, delete (or rename, probably safer) the old user homedirectory: cd /Users sudo mv ThisUsersHomeDir SomeTempName sudo mv TheFolderName /Users/ThisUsersHomeDir Clear? Another approach would be to create a new user on the "another mac server" with the same UID, do the restore of this user's home directory subtree again. Russ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwright Posted March 5, 2010 Author Report Share Posted March 5, 2010 Russ: Thanks for the info. I suspect the UID issue was to blame. Unfortunately, before I had a chance to test, the user fumbled through their time-machine backup and ran a full restore. :-/ At least I know we have a working full backup from time-machine..that should hold him until Retrospect works out all of their issues. Jeff Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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