Hard drive crash...finder not loading

[s_karim16]

Hey. I have a first gen. white Macbook, and after 3 1/2 years of use, I started hearing the screeching sound coming out of my hard drive. The computer started to become more and more unresponsive over the next couple of days, and eventually the finder stopped loading. The computer still turns on, but the finder and all other apps cannot load/open (this happens even in safe mode). I ordered a new hard drive to replace the existing one, but I was not able to make a SuperDuper or CCC clone of my hard drive prior to it becoming unresponsive. However, I do have Time Machine backups and I did a back up a couple of days before any problems starting occurring.

My question:
Is there any way that I can use the Time Machine backups to get my data onto my new hard drive? If so, how can I do this? Also, can I use another mac to make a bootable copy of OS with all my data/settings? I'm kind of lose/confused on how to do all this stuff.

Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[djackmac]

You have a few options.

1. Plug in external HD. Boot to installer DVD and format the new drive. Then go to utilities/restore from backup. Follow the prompts from there to choose the volume etc..In my experience this takes longest, but is the easiest. But also if something goes wrong you are left with few options other than starting over again from the beginning with little or no information provided to you about where any errors occurred.

2. Boot from installer DVD and format the HD. Follow prompts to load the OS. After OS has loaded machine will restart and before creating a user setup assistant will give you the option of restoring from TM backup. Follow this route and you will be prompted to plug in external HD. This option is faster than above option plus gives the ability to be selective regarding what you want to transfer back.

3. Follow instructions from step 2, But instead through setup assistant ignore the prompt to restore from TM backup. Set up a new dummy admin user different from any accounts you may be transferring back. Run all software updates. Then go to applications/utilities to run migration assistant to restore from your time machine backup. This option is good because if there is a failure transferring data, it will usually tell you were it failed. Also with this option lets you set the preferences to not go to sleep to insure the transfer continues unattended and just like in option 2 you can select certain folders. Plus the added benefit if something crashes with your imported user you have the generic user you created to use as a backdoor in case of any issues.

[s_karim16]

Thank you so much djackmac. I'm relieved to find out that data recovery is at least possible. So I'm leaning towards option 2 because it seems to be the most problem free. I'm just gonna go into detail about the instructions you gave just to make sure I understand it correctly.

1. Put in Leopard DVD (even though my system was running snow leopard when it crashed. can I switch the OS at this point without having any data transferring problems?)
2. Take out old HD, put in new HD
3. Restart holding down option key, boot from Leopard DVD
4. When prompted, install leopard on new HD(do I have to partition the HD first using disk utility, and how do I do this?)
5. After restart, instead of setting up new account, restore from TM backup

At this point, will TM basically give me which folders I want to transfer back? How does this part work exactly? Also in option 1, does everything transfer back, including your preferences, settings, etc. and how likely is it that something will go wrong during transferring back?

Thanks again for your time

[djackmac]

Originally Posted by s_karim16

(do I have to partition the HD first using disk utility, and how do I do this?)

As soon as the installer loads choose your langauge. After this you will see the toolbar show across the top of the screen. Choose utilities/disk utility. When disk utility launches choose the format tab. Choose your drive from the left hand pane. Since you are working with a new drive that is never been partitioned/formatted at this point you only need to give it a name, most common is (Macintosh HD) and then hit the format button. After this quit disk utility and continue on with installation being sure to choose your newly formatted HD if its not already picked (should have a green arrow pointing to it).

Originally Posted by s_karim16

At this point, will TM basically give me which folders I want to transfer back? How does this part work exactly? Also in option 1, does everything transfer back, including your preferences, settings, etc. and how likely is it that something will go wrong during transferring back?

Option 1 transfers back the complete contents of what was on your HD including the system folder. Option 2 by default transfers everything back but the system folder since you have a newly installed OS. You do not need to worry about making any special selections unless you don't want to transfer everything back. When its completed it will essentially look exactly as it did including preferences. The only hitch you may run into transferring back is if you have some kind of data corruption in the time machine backup. But essentially if Time Machine was able to copy all the data, it can usually restore all the data. After restoring all of your data make sure you run all the software updates otherwise you could have applications behaving erratically.