Word back from my authorized Apple repair site: Yep, the hard drive is toast. Good thing my data was backed up.
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I have a similar tale of woe. My hard drive also expired suddenly a few weeks ago. I was met with an endlessly whirring disk on my screen. (Although I’m told that in these cases, the data is usually recoverable. If you get the dreaded blinking question mark, the data is probably gone.)
I had just bought an external hard drive to back up my data, but it was lying unused on my desk. I’d been “too busy” for weeks to get to it. You can imagine how I felt when the hard drive went down.
Luckily, after paying a small fortune, all my data was recovered. A new hard drive was covered by the Apple warranty.
I can second your recommendation for everyone to back up their data NOW. Also, if you can’t do it right this second, I was glad I had taken the precaution of emailing myself my most important documents. In this way, they were stored in the email system (I subsequently downloaded them to another computer in my house) until I could get around to doing a full backup of everything.
One other small note – for anyone who may have read this far! – an entertainment attorney I know recommended that if you want to record a copyright date for a literary work (without forking over $45 for the Copyright Office), you can simply email a copy to yourself. If you’re on a webmail server, it will be stored there along with the date you sent it.
I have always tried to live the kind of life where losing my hard drive wouldn’t matter too much. Of course I have failed, but living in denial is working just fine for now.
April 11th, 2007 at 6:41 pm
I have a similar tale of woe. My hard drive also expired suddenly a few weeks ago. I was met with an endlessly whirring disk on my screen. (Although I’m told that in these cases, the data is usually recoverable. If you get the dreaded blinking question mark, the data is probably gone.)
I had just bought an external hard drive to back up my data, but it was lying unused on my desk. I’d been “too busy” for weeks to get to it. You can imagine how I felt when the hard drive went down.
Luckily, after paying a small fortune, all my data was recovered. A new hard drive was covered by the Apple warranty.
I can second your recommendation for everyone to back up their data NOW. Also, if you can’t do it right this second, I was glad I had taken the precaution of emailing myself my most important documents. In this way, they were stored in the email system (I subsequently downloaded them to another computer in my house) until I could get around to doing a full backup of everything.
One other small note – for anyone who may have read this far! – an entertainment attorney I know recommended that if you want to record a copyright date for a literary work (without forking over $45 for the Copyright Office), you can simply email a copy to yourself. If you’re on a webmail server, it will be stored there along with the date you sent it.
April 11th, 2007 at 10:19 pm
I have always tried to live the kind of life where losing my hard drive wouldn’t matter too much. Of course I have failed, but living in denial is working just fine for now.