“I’ve said it countless times: it’s not a question of if you will lose data, but when,” Kirk McElhearn writes for Macworld. “Media, such as hard drives, eventually fails. Or you can make the kind of mistake that results in deleted folders or erased disks. And files can simply get corrupted. There are two things you need to do to ensure you don’t lose data: back up your files regularly, and use software to diagnose and correct problems before they become serious.”
“Since 1998, Alsoft’s DiskWarrior has been the go-to tool for fixing disk corruption on Macs. It’s been eight years since the last update to DiskWarrior. At the time, I reviewed DiskWarrior 4 and gave it the highest rating, five mice. It has saved my data, and fixed hard drive issues, many times over the years,” McElhearn writes “DiskWarrior remains the essential tool for maintaining and repairing disk problems. For both preventive maintenance and repair it’s a must-have tool.”
Read more in the full article here.
I’ve used it as long as I can remember. It has saved my Bacon many, many times.
Counterpoint: DiskWarrior often allows a drive to be used again, but realistically, it should not be the first line of defense. Newer users can miss this point.
Disk Warrior can NOT fix electronic or physical issues.
If you maintain daily clones updated, taking usually 2-4 minutes a day on multiple external HDs and then weekly or monthly archive of clone dmgs, you can never lose anything but interim file changes.
If you set your backup/update function on a clone to run every hour, you can’t lose more than an hour’s work. Programs like Carbon Copy Cloner are bullet proof in this work. Time Machine has had lots of glitches, but is free.
I want a glitch free set of options as it is cost effective, versus a day lost trying to rebuild a disk. Do you have a spare disk clone ready to boot your Mac today?
But what can fix electronic or physical issues? The answer is nothing, so no matter what you’re using, if you’re suffering from a physical issue with you computer, by extension, no software-based utility is going to do you much good.
And that includes Carbon Copy Cloner. If you’re doing backups, via Time Machine (you speak of glitches, but I have been using it, quite reliably, for years) you’re just as well served in my view.
Check the Apple & MacInTouch boards on Time Machine and its issues is all I can say.
The 2nd issue with Time Machine is that many people use it as their ONLY backup and when the day comes they need it, well, it is one which few have ever tried to recover from to a bootable condition. If it works it can take a Loooong time.
A Carbon Copy Clone can boot your modern Mac in 30 seconds and you are back to work.
The most obvious limitation is when a drive gets full and Time Machine starts deleting your oldest files.
Don’t have to, because I use Time Machine every day, and have had not significant issues. As I said, a clone isn’t going to help with a physical problem with your computer (nor will Time Machine, or any other backup utility, for that matter) until you either address the physical problem or get a new machine–in which case the backup comes into play. And you’re right, Time Machine indeed will delete older backups, but that’s primarily based upon the amount of space in your backup drive.
I generally agree with your emphasis on backups, Ed. But there is another way to lose data – bit rot. And that bit rot will propagate with backups/clones unless you retain historical backups from which to recover.
This is an obscure and fairly minor item, but I just wanted to point out that perfect protection is a myth. That said, Time Machine in combination with regular HDD clones is a great approach. If you store a backup offsite, then you get bonus points. If you combine a remove cloud backup service like Carbonite, then that is about as good as a regular joe can do in this world without going overboard.
Correction: “remote” cloud backup service, not “remove” cloud backup service…
I totally subscribe to your school of thought Ed. I used to run a large Apple Authorized Service Center and used tools like Disk Warrior all the time to recover data for customers.
Since leaving the repair business, I’ve never needed to use a tool like this once. I’m in the media business and I’m dealing with bazillions of large files daily across multiple machines and servers.
Tools like Disk Warrior are great if it ever comes down to that, but Time Machine, Disk Utility, and Carbon Copy Cloner are really the first and likely only step ever needed.
I don’t know anymore. I used to love DW back in the day. But once after using it, it wasted my system drive. I’ve also read recent stories of DW5 trashing drives. So now I’m spooked.
DiskWarrior has no clue about checking for bad sectors on a hard drive. So if you’ve got a drive that’s throwing sector errors, DW will happily write data into these bad spots, which can of course mean horrific results.
Therefore, it’s important to have another utility that checks for bad sectors and reallocates them for you. TechTool Pro and DiskTools Pro are great at it. Just keep in mind that the bigger the drive the longer sector checking will take.
No, a good backup strategy is a must-have. DiskWarrior, not so much.
I have both and I would never give up either.
Don’t do it! DW has screwed more drives than I care to admit! I feel like they are an abusive partner that promises that “this time will be different” but don’t you believe it!
Their software is a total sham that hasn’t really worked since the days of the G-series macs.
I own the latest version of Drive Genius and will probably upgrade to TechTool Pro 8, so I have been considering adding DiskWarrior to my tool chest, though I do find the cost a bit prohibitive.
I’ve used DW3, then DW4 and now DW5 which comes on a USB stick finally. Always works great, a real life saver.
DiskWarrior is the best. Period. If DiskWarrior can’t fix it, it can’t be fixed. Like others here, I’ve used this program for many years.
I never go without DW, now 5. I have never heard of any version that wasted a drive. What I have seen happening is clients asking me to take a look at a drive that died then and there. It happens. Most of the time DW can still mount the drive read-only so you can still get to the data. Excellent tool. Of course one should have a backup strategy, but that is an entirely different discussion.
I’ve been using Tech Tool Pro 7 and have been debating on weather to get Drive Genius or Disk Warrior.
Yep drives fail, I’m using a June 2012 MacBook Air with an OWC Aurora 480 SSD. When it came out I paid $600 for it.
Well yesterday it died, and I shipped it back. This is the third one that went out on me. At least it’s under warranty.
One time I took the cover off the bottom of the MacBook Air and a Heat Sink was stuck to the bottom cover. Pulled itself right off the drive.
I used Time Machine on two external 1TB drives for backup. I just switch them every day, and sometimes use a third to take home with me.
I’m off Drive Genius. I’d complained to the developer for years about problems with version 3. I have not moved on to Drive Genius 4 because the review I read indicated no significant improvements.
TechTool Pro 7 has its own clunk factor. Its disk optimization/defragmentation feature can be DEADLY slow. It doesn’t know how to use anything above a dual-core CPU. But I’ve generally found it to be a great companion to DiskWarrior. When I want a third disk utility, I’ve lately been using DiskTools Pro (formerly SpeedTools), which has proven to be reliable.
How ’bout we just do away with the spinning hard disk and go straight to all SSD’s. Maybe then we shouldn’t need Disk Warrior.
When SSD’s start coming in 4TB+ sizes at affordable prices, I am right there with you.
disk warrior once saved my hide after a problem with some kind of corruption
I ran the program and it cleaned up the problem and I was able to boot the computer successfully from then on
This article seems weirdly familiar. Didn’t we already go over this?
About bloody time it was updated. DiskWarrior 4 was oblivious to trackpad touch scrolling. It made me wonder what else was languishing in their code. It also wasn’t perfect at repairs. I was astonished to fine TechTool Pro finding further errors that DiskWarrior 4 was not.
So: Welcome version 5! I hope you’re worth the wait.
Utilities that install in your system and run in the background are useful just to slow down your system and eat voraciously your Mac resources. Many times I’ve experimented a severe drop down in my system performance due to these hidden utilities’ processes running anonymously. Worst of all, it’s very difficult to uninstall them, check Apple forums. The benefits are not worth it.
You don’t know what you are talking about. This is DISK WARRIOR. It isn’t meant to run in the background and DOESN’T run in the background!
It doesn’t install in your system – as you seem to think! In fact it cannot do a full disk check on the start up drive from which it resides. You have to start it up on a back up system/drive to effectively check the main drive.
Difficult to Un-install? Again you don’t know what you are talking about. This is DISK WARRIOR, not that other app that you are thinking of!
From the article:
“DiskWarrior can also check files for damage and check drives for their SMART status, even automatically in the background, alerting you to any problems. And it will work with FileVault encrypted drives; click Unlock on the DiskWarrior window and enter your FileVault password so DiskWarrior can read the disk.”
It DOES run in the background.
DW’s now incorporates otehr features now but its Primary Purpose is still “Directory REbuilding”.
The Directory cannot be rebuilt on the Start-up disk.
The Directory cannot be rebuilt on the same drive from which DW resides. A drive CAN have DW on it, but it cannot operate that DW App and check on itself. It has to be from a back-up drive. In this case, backbackground running is moot!
Very interesting discussion. Both of my Macs (a late 2012 Core i7 Mac Mini, and a mid 2013 13″ MacBook Air) have SSDs inside (256 gig Samsung 840 Pro in the mini, and (I believe) a 251 gig Samsung 840 EVO in the Air). And, I have two Seagate 1 TB external drives I use for 1) backups, and 2) storing large files/folders. For my disk cleanup/maintenance/repair and backup tasks (once a week), I use Onyx, TechTool Pro V8.0.3, and SuperDuper!. That combination (along with my daily cleaning up) works very, very well. I also have v4 of Disk Warrior, and I do run it once in a while.
For my SSDs, as I’m sure most folks know, Volume Optimization does not apply, and thus I only need to use the File Optimization feature of TechTool Pro.
Like Carbon Copy Cloner, I can boot either Mac from their respective SuperDuper! backup, but it takes longer than 30 seconds. Both of the Seagate drives spin at 7200 rpm, and the connection to the Mini is via Firewire 800, and for the Air, it is Thunderbolt-to-Firewire 800. I am starting to look at purchasing a 512 gig SSD (preferably a Samsung 850 Pro, although an 850 EVIO would be OK), but I cannot find a slim, 2.5″ external case with a Firewire 800 interface. Most of them are USB, and very, very few (and expensive) have a Thunderbolt interface. If anyone can recommend one with a Firewire 800 interface, or an inexpensive Thunderbolt one, that would be appreciated.