Disaster strikes due to a mistake

I was really tired working at my computer when I was helping a friend who asked me to help fix their jump drive. It needed to be formatted.

Well it just wasn’t working at first. After a few tries I finally formatted it and since I was use to just clicking the drive and clicking go in a moment I accidently formatted my external hard drive instead.

Panic struck as realized what I had done and what I potentially had lost. The only good news was I had just put this new 2TB hard drive into service a few weeks ago.

The worst case scenario was I lost images that I had not posted to my cloud servers, which was all the camera RAW files. I just post JPEGs once I finish running them through Lightroom and keep the RAW files in a couple places.

Everything was gone and I hadn’t had a chance to create a backup on some of the files.

Frantically I tried to use my PhotoRescue software, but due to the newer Mac 10.10.1 operating system it wouldn’t work.

I then found Data Rescue 4. I had to run a deep scan and it took a good 24+ hours to scan the 2 TB hard drive. 95%+ of the hard drive was recovered. The only thing is the folder and organization wasn’t as I hoped, but all the RAW files and JPEGs were there.

Couple of points that you need to know to recover the most. First, if you make a similar mistake I made stop and immediately do not use the hard drive until you have recovered your files. Formating is bad, but even worse is shooting more images and writing those to the hard drive. 

On the Mac open system preferences and then click on Energy Saver.

Change the Computer Sleep to never when running the program. Put it back when you are done. I made the mistake of not doing this so when I set it to run over night after about 15 minutes the computer stopped running and had gone to sleep.

While I would love to say the moral of the story is to never do this, there are times you too may be so tired and not thinking straight and make a mistake as bad as I just did. There are solutions and this is one that worked for me.

Tips for photographers who use Macs

Computers and cars have one thing in common—every so often you need to do some routine maintenance to get the best performance.

With cars about every 5,000 miles you need to take the car in for routine maintenance. I would say that once a month you need to also do some basic maintenance for your computer.

For the Mac owner I recommend just a couple of things that will improve your computer’s performance.

Disk Utility

Performing disk maintenance using Disk Utility that is included in the Mac OS X.

You can also use this even when your computer starts just fine but you want to check the disk for possible file system issues.

1. To launch Disk Utility go to your Applications Folder>Utilities>Disk Utility.
2. Click the First Aid tab.
3. Click the disclosure triangle to the left of the hard drive icon to display the names of your hard disk volumes and partitions.
4. Select your OS X volume.
5. Click Repair. Disk Utility checks and repairs the disk.

You should see improved performance when this is done.


NVRAM

Your Mac stores certain settings in a special memory area even if it is turned off.  On Intel-based Macs, this is stored in memory known as NVRAM.

Information stored in NVRAM includes:

1. Speaker volume
2. Screen resolution
3. Startup disk selection
4. Recent kernel panic information, if any

How to reset your NVRAM

1. Shut down your Mac.
2. Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command (⌘), Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
3. Turn on the computer.
4. Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys before the gray screen appears.
5. Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
6. Release the keys.

After resetting NVRAM, you may need to reconfigure your settings for speaker volume, screen resolution, startup disk selection, and time zone information. If issues persist, your Mac's logic board battery (not a portable Mac's rechargeable battery) may need to be replaced. The logic board battery helps retain NVRAM settings when your computer is shut down. You can take your Mac to a Mac Genius or Apple Authorized Service Provider to replace the battery on the logic board.

If you have never done this you will notice major improvement in your computer.  The Disk Utility may take some time to run that first time. Running Disk Utility once a month takes less than five minutes unless something unusual has happened.

Parting Comment

I still recommend buying DiskWarrior and using this utility. It does more than just the Disk Utility.  However, just using the Repair Permissions in Disk Utility when it makes changes does improve your performance. 

Photographers: Diskwarrior and Reimage Keeps Your PC or Mac Like New

I want to help you fix all those quirks that eventually will happen with any computer.  Here are my two recommendations as must haves for your computer.

Both of these software solutions are helping you with your operating system. 

For the PC

Reimage is a unique repair service fixes your Windows Operating System - it reverses the damage already done with a full database of replacement files. Only software of its kind. It sells for $69.95 and for $30 more you can install it on three computers.

This chart does a great job of showing you what it can do. There are two things on that chart that make a huge difference: Repair at any time and private. I recommend this before taking your computer to a repair shop. The cost of the software will be less than the shop and if it works you saved yourself the trip.

If it is a hardware problem it will let you know and well you can replace something or then take it to a shop.

Some of the problems I was having with Windows 7 was the print spooler was not launching, I could not empty the trash can and when I clicked on the control panel under start I got error messages. Ran reimage and now it is as good as new.

Now I use VMware Fusion 5, which lets me run PC programs on my MacBook Pro. The only program I use this for is Quicken Home & Business to help with book keeping for my business.

The Quicken Home & Business sells for $99.  Great program for invoicing and keeping up with all my expenses.

VMWare Fusion 5 sells for $49.99.

Reimage needs a good internet connection because once it finds the problems it will download all the fixes and replace those registry and other files that have been corrupted to the factory settings.


For the Mac

DiskWarrior is the software I use to help improve the performance of my MacBook. It sells for $99. 

You will launch the program from either a DVD or from an external drive when you turn on your computer. I have it on an external drive and when I turn on my MacBook Pro I just hold down the "option" key and it gives me the option to start the computer from my external drive that is a complete copy of my laptops hard drive.

The reason for DiskWarrior to launch remotely is this is the only way for you to repair problems with the operating system at the root.

• DiskWarrior recovers your files including your photos, music and videos.
• DiskWarrior cures those cryptic errors reported by Disk Utility.
• DiskWarrior uses a different approach to disk directory repair than other programs.
• DiskWarrior is the only product that finds all of your data.
• DiskWarrior is the highest rated and wins more awards.

There are two other programs on your mac that you can also use: Recovery and Disk Utility.

Recovery
 
OS X Lion or OS X Mountain Lion includes a built in set of utilities in the Recovery System. Restart your Mac and hold down the Command key and the R key (Command-R), and keep holding them until the Apple icon appears, indicating that your Mac is starting up. After the Recovery System is finished starting up, you should see a desktop with a OS X menu bar and a "Mac OS X Utilities" application window. Note: If you see a login window or your own desktop and icons, it is possible that you didn't hold Command-R early enough. Restart and try again.

In order to reinstall OS X Lion or OS X Mountain Lion, you will need to be connected to an Ethernet or Wi-Fi network. The Wi-Fi menu item is in the upper-right corner of the screen. Click the icon to display all available Wi-Fi networks. Click your preferred network name and, if needed, enter a username and/or password.

Disk Utility

You can access it the same way by restart your Mac and hold down the Command key and the R key (Command-R), and keep holding them until the Apple icon appears. This will let you choose the Disk Utility.

Another way is to go to Applications folder>Utilities and select the Disk Utility.  Click on first aid and choose disk repair. This will improve performance as well.

The advantage of DiskWarrior is it goes deeper by letting you clean the hard drive at the lowest level.