[KtC Angel of Peace]

How to describe what's going on, slower start up, applications not running, etc. etc. There's a lot of things going on on this PowerBook G4. Anyways, I went into the disk utility and this is what I saw

Disk Description : Hitachi IC25N060ATMR04-0 Total Capacity : 55.9 GB (60,011,642,880 Bytes)
Connection Bus : ATA Write Status : Read/Write
Connection Type : Internal S.M.A.R.T. Status : Failing
Connection ID : Device 0 Partition Scheme : Apple Partition Map

Mount Point : / Capacity : 55.8 GB (59,877,384,192 Bytes)
Format : Mac OS Extended (Journaled) Available : 46.8 GB (50,291,978,240 Bytes)
S.M.A.R.T. Status : Failing Used : 8.9 GB (9,585,405,952 Bytes)
Number of Folders : 69,970 Number of Files : 256,284

Now, the S.M.A.R.T. Status failing I don't think is a good sign, please, any ideas on what I can do? This is a laptop and I'm working on transferring files over to another computer at the moment. Thanks for any help...

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you are correct,"smart: failing" is not good. Back up your data and start shopping for a new hard drive. Pricewatch.com is my favorite place to start.

When S.M.A.R.T. indicates the drive is going to fail and you could lose your data and corruption is likely.

[silverbeard]

you are correct,"smart: failing" is not good. Back up your data and start shopping for a new hard drive. Pricewatch.com is my favorite place to start.

When S.M.A.R.T. indicates the drive is going to fail and you could lose your data and corruption is likely.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

Erm... but since this is an Apple laptop, and an old one at that, how would I really go about trying to get a new hard drive? I don't even think they sell this laptop anymore =P. In the same token, is there any way for me to see if there is any other reason for why SMART would be failing and test it? Obviously if there is a way to save this computer, I would rather try to save it =P. I have already transfered/backed up all the things I need from this computer, so there really is nothing that I need on this =P. And if my hard drive is going to die anyway, is there anything else to do? (I'll be talking to my friend at the Apple Store and see if there is anything that can work for this computer). Also, may I ask how exactly SMART works?

[silverbeard]

Disk Description : Hitachi IC25N060ATMR04-0 Total Capacity : 55.9 GB (60,011,642,880 Bytes)
Connection Bus : ATA Write Status : Read/Write

This is a standard ATA EIDE notebook hard drive. Today SATA is the standard, ATA drives are still available and not that expensive. It might be a good time to upgrade to a larger hard drive with a 5400rpm rotation speed.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

Thanks, I'll pass that on over to my friend =P. So I've lost everything I have here though right? =P. Just checking again.

[silverbeard]

You might be able to clone the drive, but most of the cloning software I know is for the X86 platform. A google using "cloning a Mac drive" gives several options for the Power PC.

The problem with a failing drive is the possibility of corruption. Though it may work fine that is the risk of transferring bad data will be there and you may see the same issues as are being experienced now.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

So I guess I'll just set up an appointment at the Genius bar at an apple store and see what they can do to help me in getting a new hard drive? =P =).

[KtC Angel of Peace]

Well they say it's about 350 dollars for the new hard drive to be replaced, and perhaps it can be upgraded or something, though they said to try to look around for something else. Is it worth the 350 dollars or should we do as my brother says and perhaps just spend 500 dollars for a new laptop? This laptop still is running, =P =)

[silverbeard]

How about an 80 GB for $58.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

And this is to work with my Mac? I'm still trying to figure it out =P. Would you recommend me buying it and then perhaps asking them to install it? The people at the Apple Store referred me to another place, where apparently along with replacing the hard-drive, they upgrade it as well. Just still trying see what fish there is in the water before I go after a catch =P =). Thanks for all your help by the way =)

[diabillic]

SMART stands for Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology. It reports on several different factors such as latency, seek time, write caches and so forth and once a disk exceeds a set threshold SMART will report it. Pretty much its a prevention device for the drive to prevent data loss.

If you dont know what you are doing, i would HIGHLY recommend that you have a professional take it apart. In the Powerbook G4, and pretty much every Apple laptop, the hard drive is pretty much the last thing that comes out and there are about 5 different types of screws that come out. The drive itself should cost less then $100 to replace, I would suggest searching on Newegg, Tigerdirect, Zipzoomfly, etc for a new ATA drive.

As far as transferring your laptops drive contents, you have 2 options if you need to transfer any additional information. If you have another Mac, the easiest way to do it would be to grab a male to male 6 pin firewire cable and plug it into each machine. Boot the laptop into Target Disk mode by powering the machine off, then hold down the T key while turning it in. The firewire symbol will show up on the screen and the disk drive will show up on the 2nd Mac as a mounted drive. Then you just browse it like you would any other folder and copy what you need.

The 2nd option, if you have a PC or any other non-Mac OS would be to take the drive out, get an external enclosure and hook it up via USB or Firewire to another machine and transfer your data that way.

Hope that helps.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

So really, is it the work that they are putting in that is the quote for like, a few hundred dollars?

I have all the stuff I need, I'm just trying to find a way to really just save this mac. I like the fact that it's a nice and small 12"er . It's nice =)

[diabillic]

Yes, more then likely its pure labor cost. I hate replacing drives in Powerbooks just for the fact that it takes between 30 minutes to an hour to get to the drive and the same amount of time to put it back together once the new one is in. Again, if you are not comfortable with doing so I would have someone else replace the drive. Ask them to just replace the drive since you can reload the OS yourself and save yourself a few $$.

[KtC Angel of Peace]

So then here is the question, all in all I think they said the costs was $350. My brother said he could probably get me like a new dell or some other kind of laptop for $500. Should we just get the new laptop? $150 more for just the new laptop, though at the same time, it is still $150 and this laptop seems to have been working fine ya'know? So yeah... Your thoughts?

[JeffIsHereToo]

So then here is the question, all in all I think they said the costs was $350. My brother said he could probably get me like a new dell or some other kind of laptop for $500. Should we just get the new laptop? $150 more for just the new laptop, though at the same time, it is still $150 and this laptop seems to have been working fine ya'know? So yeah... Your thoughts?

A Powerbook G4 is VERY easy to put a new drive in. You remove the bottom case, a few screws, remove a ribbon cable on the drive, remove 4 hex screws and out it comes. Goes back in just as easy, and ANY 2.5" ATA laptop drive will work. You'll just need your OS X install CD/DVD to initialize the drive. I'm sure if you put an add in Craigslist or something Gig:computers someone will help you out for $75-$100.

Read This:

http://www.pbcentral...e/service.shtml

Good luck!

Edited by JeffIsHereToo, 24 February 2008 - 12:36 PM.