Overlapped files?

SGilbert

SGilbert

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Attempting to fix neighbor's iMac. (OS 10.4.11) Won't boot completely. I'm running DiskWarrior as I type. It's been running over an hour so far, and I'm up to 123 overlapped files on step 6 (out of 12)

1) What are they, how do they happen, and how to prevent?
2) Happened once before on son's computer and only way to fix was to archive & install. Don't know if DW can fix it this time or not--won't until DW finishes.

(Have updated # of files several times since I started typing!!!)
 
Overlapped files are just what you might expect - two (or more) files attempting to occupy the same space, or 'overlapped' on the same space. It's as bad as it might sound. One or both files will have some corruption. DiskWarrior is OK with sorting things out, but you will end up with a 'Rescued Files' folder (or something similar) that will have questionable files. You can check in that for anything that you think you want to keep.

This can happen when your directory becomes slightly corrupted, and you may notice that your Mac has a variety of other problems, or crashes one or more times completely.
Let DiskWarrion finish (which can take days - really!) and see what you have left. If you get up to several hundred (or thousand) overlapped files, I think you can expect to reinstall your OS X, using the archive and install option.

How do you prevent your hard drive directory from becoming corrupted? I think you do a disk repair from Disk Utility when you start having problems, before your drive gets too bad. A couple of sudden crashes, or some apps that usually work suddenly starting to fail. There's several other possible warning signals. Try to learn what is normal for your system, and what can make you suspicious about the stability of your hard drive. Unusual mechanical noises are sometimes a warning sign. Maybe others will chime in with their own ideas and experiences....
 
DW ended after 1 1/2 hours with 136 overlapped files. DW said it repaired all files, however, upon restart, NADA! Onward with the archive & install. :(

Basically, I knew, deep down, that that is what I needed, but was still hoping for a miracle.

I'll be giving the neighbor a friendly lecture on the "care & feeding" of Mac OS. :)
 
Yeah, trying to piece back all the scraps that DW finds is a job that one will do only out of desperation.

Make sure he gets a back up disk and some kind of back up SW.
 
OK---NEW Problem.

Restarted with archive & install. I need to log in to it. Password won't work she gave me, so I booted from Tiger install again & changed password. Now the name won't work. I've tried all she gave me to try--NG. I've started it up in Target Disk Mode to my computer, and can get into the HD, but have no idea how to find the "name"

Ideas?

I'm copying her HD over to my computer now in prep to possibly need to reinstall Tiger from scratch without archiving. Hope it dosen't come to that.
 
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