Toshiba external drive quit working with Macbook Pro. Now what?

Joined
Nov 19, 2014
Messages
3
Reaction score
0
Points
1
I am having a problem with the following device:

Disk Description : TOSHIBA External USB 3.0 Media Total Capacity : 1 TB (1,000,204,886,016 Bytes)
Connection Bus : USB Write Status : Read/Write
Connection Type : External S.M.A.R.T. Status : Not Supported
USB Serial Number : 20140507001383C Partition Map Scheme : Master Boot Record

I mistakenly deleted all files except those I had stored on this device; and now I cannot retrieve or even “see” the files I know are stored on the device.

Can you help me recover these files? I do not want to reformat or do anything stupid that would destroy/delete the files. I want to save and use these files.

I can write to external disk: just created a Word document and saved it there. But I cannot see any of the other files that I know are there...at least they were last week, before I decided to delete what I thought were useless Toshiba files.

Thank you for helping me solve this “self-inflicted” problem.
 

pigoo3

Well-known member
Staff member
Admin
Joined
May 20, 2008
Messages
44,241
Reaction score
1,452
Points
113
Location
U.S.
Your Mac's Specs
2017 15" MBP, 16gig ram, 1TB SSD, OS 10.15
I mistakenly deleted all files except those I had stored on this device; and now I cannot retrieve or even “see” the files I know are stored on the device.

Just want to make sure I understand 100%.

Are you saying that you deleted these files from your computers internal hard drive…and when you went to this external hard drive (where backups/duplicates of these files were/are stored)…the external hard drive isn't working properly either??

- Nick
 
OP
O
Joined
Nov 19, 2014
Messages
3
Reaction score
0
Points
1
I only deleted files--just a few, maybe three--from the external drive. Did not touch internal hard drive.
 

pigoo3

Well-known member
Staff member
Admin
Joined
May 20, 2008
Messages
44,241
Reaction score
1,452
Points
113
Location
U.S.
Your Mac's Specs
2017 15" MBP, 16gig ram, 1TB SSD, OS 10.15
I mistakenly deleted all files except those I had stored on this device; and now I cannot retrieve or even “see” the files I know are stored on the device.

This is the statement that has me confused from the 1st post:

"I mistakenly deleted all files except those I had stored on this device…"

Very confusing sentance the way it is written.

I only deleted files--just a few, maybe three--from the external drive. Did not touch internal hard drive.

Ok…nothing was deleted from the internal HD.

This external HD…you said that you deleted just a few files (maybe three) from it. Were these all the files stored on this external HD? And are these the three files you would like to recover?

Bottom line: Is the basic problem that approx. three files were deleted from the external HD…and you would like to recover them?

- Nick
 
Joined
Jan 20, 2012
Messages
5,140
Reaction score
498
Points
83
Location
North Carolina
Your Mac's Specs
Air M2 ('22) OS 14.5; M3 iMac ('23) OS 14.5; iPad Pro; iPhone 14
I am having a problem with the following device:

Disk Description : TOSHIBA External USB 3.0 Media Total Capacity : 1 TB

I mistakenly deleted all files except those I had stored on this device; and now I cannot retrieve or even “see” the files I know are stored on the device.

Can you help me recover these files? I do not want to reformat or do anything stupid that would destroy/delete the files. I want to save and use these files.

I can write to external disk: just created a Word document and saved it there. But I cannot see any of the other files that I know are there...at least they were last week, before I decided to delete what I thought were useless Toshiba files.

Hello, as to Nick's question, see the first bolded statement above - you've copied files from your computer (assume MBPro; what OS is installed) to the external HD, and THEN did you delete the same files off of your computer's drive? If so, do you have any other backup, such as Time Machine or a cloned drive?

Second, see the lower bolded statement referring to 'useless Toshiba files' - how do you know these were 'useless' files or crucial to the function of the external HD?

Do you know the file format of the Toshiba drive (e.g. FAT32, MacOS HFS)? If not already done, open Disk Utility and see if the drive can be read and what information is provided - determine if there is more than one partition now? Just for starters - good luck! Dave :)

P.S. Well, Nick beat me to posting next, but seems like we are still interpreting that OP differently - will see what the response may be?
 
Last edited:

chscag

Well-known member
Staff member
Admin
Joined
Jan 23, 2008
Messages
65,246
Reaction score
1,834
Points
113
Location
Keller, Texas
Your Mac's Specs
2017 27" iMac, 10.5" iPad Pro, iPhone 8, iPhone 11, iPhone 12 Mini, Numerous iPods, Monterey
Notice that his Toshiba external drive is using a partition scheme of "Master Boot Record". That means the drive was somehow formatted to FAT-32 or exFAT. Neither HFS nor NTFS use that partition scheme. Recovering deleted files from a FAT drive is tricky because FAT is a non journaled file system.
 
OP
O
Joined
Nov 19, 2014
Messages
3
Reaction score
0
Points
1
Thanks, in advance, for all this help.

I stupidly deleted key files; that's how the problem started, no doubt. But I only deleted files that seems to be associated with the device. I did not delete the key file I'm now searching for.

The folder I want to retrieve was not deleted by me; therefore, I assume, it's still there.

Initially I thought maybe if I re-saved the key files I stupidly deleted back to the external device, then it would allow me again to see the missing folder. So, using another external device by Toshiba, I copied and save the key files to the new device. But that did not solve the problem.

Here's the set of files that I saved anew to the device and what is currently seen on the device:

DownloadForMac_SanDiskSecureAccessV2.0.pdf
Mac Driver
NTI
Pogoplug PC
Quick Reference Guide.pdf
QuickStartGuide_SanDiskSecureAccessV2.0.pdf
SanDiskSecureAccessV2_win.exe
SanDiskSecureAccessV2.0
Setup.exe
test (Note: this is the Word document I created yesterday to test if I could still write to it.)
Tuxera NTFS for Mac.dmg
Warranty.pdf

But saving these files to the device did not solve the problem; I still cannot access the missing folder.

Any and all suggestions will be appreciated.

Truly this OldManNeedsHelp

Thanks
 
Joined
Feb 29, 2012
Messages
122
Reaction score
2
Points
18
The question is what format was the external drive.

It sounds like you never formatted it for the Mac. So is it possibly NTFS?

Have you tried to repair it in Disk Utility?
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top