I was running out of room on my Macbook earlier this year so I moved my photos library to a WD My Passport Ultra External Hard Drive. It worked well for a few months and then the hard drive started having issues - it would be plugged in and vibrating with the light on but the computer wouldn't show it or it would take 5 goes to get it to show. I did some First Aid fixes with Disk Utility and it was fine. However, then it stopped working altogether. I can bring it up in Disk Utility but the First Aid always fails at a critical point saying there was an unrecoverable error. The hard drive (which is not full - it still has 769.65 GB available) is now read only. So, I bought a La Cie Rugged SECURE Media External Hard Drive and have been moving files across from the WD Hard Drive. I have been able to move almost everything except about 20 GoPro videos and the two Photo Libraries: my old photos library (328.2 GB) and my current one (377.18GB).
For the GoPro videos the following message pops up every time:
The Finder can’t complete the operation because some data in “Photos Library” can’t be read or written. (Error code -36)
Although interestingly many other files also said this and then later on did transfer over later on when I tried. These 20 GoPro files still fail every time (many other GoPro files did transfer although I had to transfer most of them one at a time).
For the two photos libraries the following message comes up every single time:
The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -50).
I've also tried compressing these files and that fails with an "unrecoverable error".
I'm really at a loss here. I feel that the files are probably too large to transfer when one hard drive is struggling but there doesn't seem to be a way that I can "open" the file to transfer parts of it at a time. I have 3 years worth of precious photos hanging in the balance (I've been travelling for work for 3 years so photos from all around the world) and because I cannot open photos or transfer it I cannot access them and am afraid I will lose them forever. (FYI: The two photos libraries mostly contain the same photos but not entirely.) It seems crazy that there seems to be no way to open the larger file to transfer bit by bit. I'm currently in Tanzania and on the move so not much chance to get to some good IT help here.
Any suggestions here? I am not an IT genius so please provide easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions in your responses.
Thank you,
Schnooze
PS: Here is the information provided about Disk Utility for each of the Hard Drives:
WD My Passport 0827 Media
2 TB USB External Physical Disk
Location: External
Connection: USB
Partition Map: GUID Partition Map
S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
Capacity 2 TB
Child Count: 2
Type: Disk
Device: [redacted]
XXXX WD Passport
2 TB USB External Physical Volume OS X Extended
Apps: 249.9 MB
Photos: 64.32 MB
Audio: 40.83 MB
Movies: 215.21 GB
Other: 909.75 GB
Available: 769.65 GB
Mount Point: Not Mounted OR /Volumes/XXXX WD Passport
Capacity: 2 TB
Used: 2 TB OR 1.23 TB
Device: [redacted]
Type: USB External Physical Volume
Available: Zero KB OR 769.76 GB
Owners: Disabled
Connection: USB
(note sometimes it shows it is not mounted and has no available space and sometimes it shows it is mounted and has available space)
LaCie Rugged SECURE Media
2 TB USB External Physical Disk
Location: External
Connection: USB
Partition Map: Master Boot Record
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Not Supported
Capacity: 2 TB
Child count: 1
Type: Disk
Device: [redacted]
LaCieXXXX
2TB USB External Physical Volume OS X Extended
Apps: Zero KB
Photos: 251.22 GB
Audio: 43.92 GB
Movies: 314.72 GB
Other 24.42 GB
Available: 1.37 TB
Mount Point: /Volumes/LaCieXXXX
Capacity: 2 TB
Used: 634.16 GB
Device: [redacted]
Type: USB External Physical Volume
Available: 1.37 TB
Owners: Disabled
Connection: USB
And this is what the Disk Utility First Aid says about the WD disk when I run it:
Repairing file system.
Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume
Checking extents overflow file.
Checking catalog file.
Incorrect block count for file Library.apdb-wal
(It should be 1603 instead of 0)
Incorrect number of thread records
Checking multi-linked files.
Checking catalog hierarchy.
Invalid directory item count
(It should be 761 instead of 859)
Checking extended attributes file.
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid node structure
The volume XXXX WD Passport could not be verified completely.
File system check exit code is 8.
Updating boot support partitions for the volume as File system verify or repair failed.
Operation failed…
First Aid process has failed. If possible back up the data on this volume. Click Done to continue.
OS X can’t repair the disk “XXXX WD Passport.”
You can still open or copy files on the disk, but you can’t save changes to files on the disk. Back up the disk and reformat it as soon as you can.
For the GoPro videos the following message pops up every time:
The Finder can’t complete the operation because some data in “Photos Library” can’t be read or written. (Error code -36)
Although interestingly many other files also said this and then later on did transfer over later on when I tried. These 20 GoPro files still fail every time (many other GoPro files did transfer although I had to transfer most of them one at a time).
For the two photos libraries the following message comes up every single time:
The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -50).
I've also tried compressing these files and that fails with an "unrecoverable error".
I'm really at a loss here. I feel that the files are probably too large to transfer when one hard drive is struggling but there doesn't seem to be a way that I can "open" the file to transfer parts of it at a time. I have 3 years worth of precious photos hanging in the balance (I've been travelling for work for 3 years so photos from all around the world) and because I cannot open photos or transfer it I cannot access them and am afraid I will lose them forever. (FYI: The two photos libraries mostly contain the same photos but not entirely.) It seems crazy that there seems to be no way to open the larger file to transfer bit by bit. I'm currently in Tanzania and on the move so not much chance to get to some good IT help here.
Any suggestions here? I am not an IT genius so please provide easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions in your responses.
Thank you,
Schnooze
PS: Here is the information provided about Disk Utility for each of the Hard Drives:
WD My Passport 0827 Media
2 TB USB External Physical Disk
Location: External
Connection: USB
Partition Map: GUID Partition Map
S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
Capacity 2 TB
Child Count: 2
Type: Disk
Device: [redacted]
XXXX WD Passport
2 TB USB External Physical Volume OS X Extended
Apps: 249.9 MB
Photos: 64.32 MB
Audio: 40.83 MB
Movies: 215.21 GB
Other: 909.75 GB
Available: 769.65 GB
Mount Point: Not Mounted OR /Volumes/XXXX WD Passport
Capacity: 2 TB
Used: 2 TB OR 1.23 TB
Device: [redacted]
Type: USB External Physical Volume
Available: Zero KB OR 769.76 GB
Owners: Disabled
Connection: USB
(note sometimes it shows it is not mounted and has no available space and sometimes it shows it is mounted and has available space)
LaCie Rugged SECURE Media
2 TB USB External Physical Disk
Location: External
Connection: USB
Partition Map: Master Boot Record
S.M.A.R.T. Status: Not Supported
Capacity: 2 TB
Child count: 1
Type: Disk
Device: [redacted]
LaCieXXXX
2TB USB External Physical Volume OS X Extended
Apps: Zero KB
Photos: 251.22 GB
Audio: 43.92 GB
Movies: 314.72 GB
Other 24.42 GB
Available: 1.37 TB
Mount Point: /Volumes/LaCieXXXX
Capacity: 2 TB
Used: 634.16 GB
Device: [redacted]
Type: USB External Physical Volume
Available: 1.37 TB
Owners: Disabled
Connection: USB
And this is what the Disk Utility First Aid says about the WD disk when I run it:
Repairing file system.
Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume
Checking extents overflow file.
Checking catalog file.
Incorrect block count for file Library.apdb-wal
(It should be 1603 instead of 0)
Incorrect number of thread records
Checking multi-linked files.
Checking catalog hierarchy.
Invalid directory item count
(It should be 761 instead of 859)
Checking extended attributes file.
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid index key
Invalid node structure
The volume XXXX WD Passport could not be verified completely.
File system check exit code is 8.
Updating boot support partitions for the volume as File system verify or repair failed.
Operation failed…
First Aid process has failed. If possible back up the data on this volume. Click Done to continue.
OS X can’t repair the disk “XXXX WD Passport.”
You can still open or copy files on the disk, but you can’t save changes to files on the disk. Back up the disk and reformat it as soon as you can.
