Aug 15, 2019 Step 2: Fix the corrupted external hard drive by reformatting. After successfully recovering data from the corrupted external hard drive, you can fix it by reformatting now. Launch Disk Utility. Select the corrupted external hard drive from the sidebar of the window. Click the Erase button on the top of Disk Utility window. Jan 07, 2020 Now that you know what causes hard drive failure, we have for you a list of top 6 best HDD repair software tools that you can use to analyze, avoid, and solve virtually all common hard drive issues. Best Overall Hard Drive Repair Software: Disk Drill. Choosing the best overall hard drive repair software.
Summary: This is a tutorial to repair corrupted, unreadable and unmountable external hard drives on Mac computers, but in case of losing data accidentally, you can recover your files from the external hard drive with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac at first.
- Simple to use Free External Hard Drive Data Recovery software which allows you to quickly restore any type of files that you lost from the external hard drive Like WD, Seagate, Toshiba, Transcend.
- IBoysoft Mac Data Recovery is free external hard drive data recovery software, which can recover lost data from external hard drives that First Aid failed to repair and recover lost data from encrypted APFS external hard drives. What's more, when the disk is corrupted, formatted, unmountable, unreadable, or even erased, this software can still.
- Aug 01, 2013 I am using the newest MacBook Air, Mac OS X 10.7.3. My external drive is a Samsung M2 Portable 3 Media, 500GB. I might have accidentally disconnected the hard drive without ejecting it first. Now when I run disk utility and click Repair Disk it says: 'Disk utility can't repair this disk.
- Five Hard Drive Repair Software for Windows. Windows computer doesn’t contain a built-in diagnostic tool like Mac Disk Utility. But if you searching the keyword “best hard disk repair software for windows” in Google or Google Play Store, you will be able to find a big heal of hard drive repair software.
Summary: Free download external hard drive recovery software for Windows 7/8/10 or Mac to recover data without losing data or recover data from quick format, accidentally deletion, corruption, etc. 'I have a 1TB Seagate external hard drive that I always used to store my favorite songs, movies, photos, etc. But today when I try to save some photos from my computer to the external hard drive.
Nowadays, people have been relying more on external hard drives, either to extend the capacity of primary storage media or to create a backup copy of important data. However, it's common that an external hard drive stops working suddenly, or becomes corrupted, unmountable, unreadable, and inaccessible on Mac. In this article, we will tell you how to repair external hard drives on Mac without losing data.
- Table of contents
- 1. How to repair external hard drive without losing data on Mac?
- 2. How to recover lost data from external hard drives?
How to repair external hard drive without losing data on Mac?
In this part, you will see 4 feasible solutions to repair external hard drives that are corrupted or not detected on Mac mini, MacBook Pro/Air, etc. And the following is a general graphic about external hard drive repair and recovery.
Solution 1: Check the IDE / SATA USB Connections
Sometimes, your external hard drive is not showing up or working normally just because of the faulty connections. Therefore, before you set about repairing this external hard drive, the first thing you can do is to check the connections.
- Step 1: Reinsert the external hard drive into another USB port or to another Mac computer.
- Step 2: Try another USB cable to connect the hard drive to your Mac.
- Step 3: Check if there any software update is available in your APP store in that an outdated driver could make your external hard drive not recognizable.
Solution 2: Repair external hard drives with First Aid
First Aid in Disk Utility is able to repair many disk problems, for instance, multiple apps quit unexpectedly, the file system of a hard disk is corrupted, or an external device doesn't work properly, etc.
- Step 1: Go > Utilities > Disk Utility.
- Step 2: Select the external hard drive you want to repair in the left sidebar.
- Step 3: Click First Aid on the top and click 'Run' to repair this external hard drive.
Solution 3: Repair external hard drives with FSCK command
If Disk Utility can't repair external hard drive and your hard drive is not readable by your Mac computer still, there is an alternative way called FSCK command that can repair your external hard drive. Try it and you may have luck with this command line.
- Step 1: Go > Utilities > Terminal.
- Step 2: Type in diskutil list to list all the connected drives on your Mac currently.
- Step 3: According to the disk information, locate the external hard drive you want to repair in the list, and then find its drive identifier.
- Step 4: Restart your Mac and, before the Apple logo appears, hold down 'Command + S' keys. This will boot your Mac into Single User Mode.
- Step 5: Some white text will scroll by quickly. When it stops, type in /sbin/fsck –fy, then press Enter.
- Step 6: Type in /sbin/fsck_hfs -fy /dev/[drive identifier] (You need to replace hfs with the file system of your external hard drive and replace [drive identifier] with the identifier of the external hard drive).
- Step 7: When fsck is finished checking and repairing the errors in your external hard drive, type reboot into the command prompt and press Enter to restart your Mac.
Solution 4: Repair external hard drives by reformatting
If FSCK command is too difficult to perform for you, another solution is to reformat this corrupted external hard drive. However, reformatting will erase all the files on this drive. Thus, you need to keep in mind that this solution can only be exerted when you don't have anything important on this external hard drive or you have backed up your important files previously.
Step 1: Go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
Step 2: Select the external hard drive and click 'Erase' on the top.
Step 3: Provide a name and a format to format the drive, and then click 'Format'.
How to recover lost data from external hard drives?
External Hard Drive Data Recovery Software
The most terrible situation is that you can neither access your important files on this external hard drive nor have any copy of data backup at hand. What's worse, when you try to fix disk errors with Disk Utility, only to be told 'Error: Disk Utility can't repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk and restore your backed-up files.' What to do in this case? Actually, you still can get your files back with reliable external hard drive data recovery software, and iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is such a useful recovery tool.

iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac is free external hard drive data recovery software, which can recover lost data from external hard drives that First Aid failed to repair and recover lost data from encrypted APFS external hard drives. What's more, when the disk is corrupted, formatted, unmountable, unreadable, or even erased, this software can still recover the lost files. This all-in-one recovery tool can restore files from emptied Trash, hard drives, SD cards, memory cards, USB flash drives, etc.
With this data recovery software, you can recover emails, photos, documents, videos, etc. on macOS 10.15 (Catalina), macOS 10.14 (Mojave), macOS 10.13 (High Sierra), macOS 10.12 (Sierra) and Mac OS X 10.11 (El Capitan), 10.10 (Yosemite), 10.9 (Mavericks), 10.8 (Mountain Lion), 10.7 (Lion).
Tutorial to recover lost data from the external hard drive
Step 1: Download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.
Step 2: Launch this program. Select the external hard drive that needs to be repaired and click 'Next'. The program will start scanning this drive for recoverable files.
Step 3: After the scanning process finishes, you can click the found files and preview.
Step 4: Choose what you want to get back and click 'Recover'.
Having finished the hard drive data recovery with Mac data recovery software, you can fix this external hard drive by reformatting so that you can use it again.
If you can't repair the external hard drive by reformatting, probably the external hard drive has been damaged physically. In this case, you have to send it to an expert or replace it with a brand-new one.
Hard disks are an essential part of the computer. Especially given that it stores all the data that we use on our computers, a high level of attention is required when it comes to handling it and in the event that there develops a problem, it is always good to know where to run to.
Related:
Now, hard disk repair soft wares enable us to safeguard the contents of our hard disks especially loss of data.
EaseUS
EaseUS is one of the most prominent hard disk repair soft wares that are available in the market. The great thing about the use of this tool is that it is quite easy to use, and thus you do not have to be a pro in order use it.
PassMark DiskCheckup™
External Hard Drive Repair Tool
PassMark DiskCheckup is a hard drive repair tool that allows the users to assess the SMART properties of the computer from an easy interface. With the use of this software, users get analysis on the status of the hard disk to determine if there is a possibility of a failure in the future.
HD Tune Pro
HD Tune pro is a hard disk utility tool that comes with a number of roles. The software offers an interface that is easy to work with and thus enabling very complex performances even to the average users. The tool has the ability to get the SMART details and thus advise you in case your attention is required.
ActiveSMART
ActiveSMART is a hard disk health tool that offers a number of activities. With this tool, you will be able to conveniently access the SMART properties of your hard disk and from these determine how healthy it is. Also, it offers some remedies when there are problems with your disk to avoid data loss.
Other Platforms
Normally, hard disk repair tools are there to help average users to protect as well as repair issues on their hard disks. Though some of these tools offer utility over SSD, traditional hard disk remains to be the most widely used. Due to this, the use of these tools is limited within the desktop environment.
Stellar Volume Repair for Mac
Stellar Volume Repair is a professional hard disk repair software on the Mac platform. With the tool, you will be in a position to rebuild any damaged directory, repair errors in volumes, and to replace old directories to restore your Mac device. The tool is user-friendly and easy to use.
Puran for Windows
Puran is a hard disk utility tool available for the Windows platform and has a number of functionalities. For private use, Puran is distributed freely though for commercial application a license is required. With this tool users can easily scan for errors in their disk drives and fix them.
Most Popular Software for 2016 – M3 RAW Drive Recovery
M3 RAW drive recovery is easy to use yet powerful data recovery and disk drive repair tool. The tool is capable of recovering data from corrupted, inaccessible, RAW, damaged or even dead disk drives. The tool is also very efficient with other data carrying devices such as memory cards and USB sticks.
What is a Hard Disk Repair Software?
A hard disk repair software is a utility tool that helps in the assessment of the health status of your hard disk and gives you a report on the same. At the same time, it should be able to perform some remedies so as to avert the risk and in the situation that a clash is unavoidable, alert you so that you can perform backups and use an alternative disk.
In some of the cases, these tools have the ability to recover data that might have been lost during the failure of disk drives and this is a very important role.
No matter the platform that you ride on, it is very important to know the health status of your hard disk. With the use of these tools, you do not have to be a professional, and they will assist in ensuring this and even fixing the errors detected.