[mseed]

Specs:
6 month old 12" powerbook, Mac OSX.

Issue:
I can usually boot up the machine a couple of times per day, after which, once it dies, it won't work again, till I try much later on...

Clicking sounds are heard when the computer stalls (a hard reboot is required).

I can boot up via external FW drive, but as soon as I access the local drive to perform a backup, it'll eventually stall.

Questions:
1) This sounds like a HW issue. Are external vendors able to extract/restore my data on this faulty drive?
2) Will Apple perform a backup if I send this in (AppleCare warranty).
3) Any tricks on how I can extract data from this faulty drive?

Any help is appreciated. I'm desperate and I can't imagine losing everything.

[cambro]

It would be really crappy for Apple not to take care of this. I'm sure that they will. Data recovery I'm not sure about, though.

Also, why do you boot up so many times a day? Take advantage of sleep...

[jaknudsen]

Try DataRescue from Prosoft: http://www.prosofteng.com/

The only app that recognized my faulty PB drive, even DiscWarrior couldn't find it! Managed to recover most of the data on it. You'll need to run it from another Mac, hooking your PB to the other machine via FireWire.

[Go Bells]

You can also contact Prosoft to send you a bootable CD demo ($10 charge) if you don't have another mac available (or if you buy the product from the apple store, you get the bootable CD..

[mseed]

Here's my update (THANKS ALL FOR YOUR HELP):

Was ready to give up and send my laptop back to Apple for a new HD. Was able to boot up from external FW drive but the internal drive would not mount and any tool like DataRescue or DiskWarrior would set my internal drive in an endless loop (audible clicking sounds that repeat) and the underlying app would just stall (beachball).

Here's the weird part: I decided to turn my laptop on its side (don't ask me why I thought that would help) and re-booted. It worked! The noise disappeared and I was able to run DiskWarrior immediately, which failed to rebuild a new directory in the end, but in the process, gave me a temporary view into the drive--allowing me to backup all the files I needed.

My drive failed the SMART test. I'm pretty sure my drive needs replacement, unless anyone can tell me otherwise?

I'm tempted to re-format just to double check but running DiskWarrior was very slow, and so was my backup process.

BTW cambro: I was booting up serveral times a day because my laptop failed to load MAC OS most of the time (this was before I got my external FW drive). I found if I waited long enough (perhaps for it to cool down), it would work.

[crazeazn]

if its failing smart, the drive is blown.