Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Is the time machine worth it? The latest model only gets 2 and a half stars on Amazon.
Help Needed The Dreaded Happened
- Thread starter Julian de'Courcy
- Start date
Pete Askew
Admin
I have never tried the device. I use the software on the Mac and an additional internal HDD on the MacPro.
Paul Lange
Moderator
Hope you get it sorted out in the end Julian. With a bit of luck it is just the circuitry in the USB board that has gone and a replacement case will fix it. I would definitely ditch it for a new one though whether you fix it or not.
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
Thanks all, Brian is correct. sod this digital stuff , but I am a bit of a Luddite and refuse to take on this new invention call film. 
So as always with computers, I got the new case before mid day. I've been here since trying to scan the drive. It takes forever.
The motor works with the new case, but it is showing up as RAW in windows 7, so therefore no access from the operating system. Ive managed to see and find the files using a Linux boot disc with a partitioning and recovery program. It took five hours to scan the disc.
I had to get out to reboot the computer and am praying I do not need the long scan again for it to be recognized. But I have not worked out how to recover the files yet from the Linux OS to windows. The idea is to partion the drive and transfer the files into
the new partition which will be written as recognizable files for windows.
All in all I am not overly worried as said, there are many worse things in life and this is not very important, just a bit sad. I have been backing up and this was the back up, but I did not double back these files. The cloud to be honest is not a viable option, transfering the 2TB of 5DMK2 files, my down load is 20MB but uplaod is only 1.8mb. It would have taken a day or more to transfer onto external hard drives let alone to another server. I am not sure about taking a mirror image of the drive and if I can do that?I'll see. Her anyway is a useful link to the recovery program I have used.
http://html5.litten.com/how-to-fix-external-disk-drive-suddenly-became-raw/
Ok back to try again, and see if the partition worked.
So as always with computers, I got the new case before mid day. I've been here since trying to scan the drive. It takes forever.The motor works with the new case, but it is showing up as RAW in windows 7, so therefore no access from the operating system. Ive managed to see and find the files using a Linux boot disc with a partitioning and recovery program. It took five hours to scan the disc.
I had to get out to reboot the computer and am praying I do not need the long scan again for it to be recognized. But I have not worked out how to recover the files yet from the Linux OS to windows. The idea is to partion the drive and transfer the files into
the new partition which will be written as recognizable files for windows.
All in all I am not overly worried as said, there are many worse things in life and this is not very important, just a bit sad. I have been backing up and this was the back up, but I did not double back these files. The cloud to be honest is not a viable option, transfering the 2TB of 5DMK2 files, my down load is 20MB but uplaod is only 1.8mb. It would have taken a day or more to transfer onto external hard drives let alone to another server. I am not sure about taking a mirror image of the drive and if I can do that?I'll see. Her anyway is a useful link to the recovery program I have used.
http://html5.litten.com/how-to-fix-external-disk-drive-suddenly-became-raw/
Ok back to try again, and see if the partition worked.
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
Rob I would not trust those stars. I was asked to write a review recently, wrote it , then the review company not the seller, contacted me and said I had to say something different as I was to critical. I told my daughter this
and she laughed, telling me how her friend had written a bad review on a product, the selling company then contacted her and offered her a free purchase if she would change the review to a nice one,
.
Pete Askew
Admin
Good luck Julian.
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Ah, so I should write bad reviews in the hope of getting free stuff? Hmm...I'll give it a try...
Your photos are rubbish!
Your photos are rubbish!
Pete Askew
Admin
A free HDD is on it's way I hear @Rob MacKillop ! 
Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Lovely!
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
Ok past 3am and am having to give up for the night/morning. I take my hat of to these computer wizards, especially the linux guys. I have managed to access the files and started to transfer them. I took another page of info. from here http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/for...wing-raw-data-after-removal-without-ejecting/ Invaluable info . I need to get another drive for the space and transfer the rest. Only one slight problem , when i rebooted into windows it did have a blip, lets hope it is not any to be concerned about.
Chris Dodkin
West Coast Correspondent
Fingers crossed for you Julian
Chris Dodkin
West Coast Correspondent
I do the same - speeds the backup and is cheaper (given the Mac Pro has spare slots ready to go)
Pete Askew
Admin
I bought 2x WD Caviar Green HDDs (2TB each). Not the fastest but good enough for TM.
Lesley Jones
Otherwise know as Zooey
This is way above my head, but it seems as though you are making progress Julian. So this is the only back up, but you still have the originals intact? If you have any specific techy questions, then I could ask on your behalf at work. We have some of the best geeks in the country and there are several computer newsgroups. Just let me know 
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
This is way above my head, but it seems as though you are making progress Julian. So this is the only back up, but you still have the originals intact? If you have any specific techy questions, then I could ask on your behalf at work. We have some of the best geeks in the country and there are several computer newsgroups. Just let me know
Thanks Lesley, this guy on-line who has provided the software, plus directions for recovery appears to be one of the best and has helped many people, so generous of him with his time. I need now to get out and purchase another drive. The thing is how many drives can one have, it gets all daft, backing up backups of backups. The cloud is not a viable as said, I save from raw to tiff, which are all 90MB plus per file. Even the Raws coming in at 17-25 mb it is not really viable. I do have jpegs on flickr which is a no limit account. But not everyone of them.
It is not all that important. A lot worse things are going on, if I was to lose them I'd see it as a fresh start. I was thinking last night the best storage for photos are shoe boxes, they take quite a few 6x4 and 7x5 prints, I have a shelve or two dedicated to those, very green, no power consumption. The only objects needed to view them are a pair of glasses and a comfy chair.
Lesley Jones
Otherwise know as Zooey
It sounds as though you're getting there Julian! If it's any consolation, my files end up around 325Mb and those are impossible to put anywhere near a cloud!
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
It sounds as though you're getting there Julian! If it's any consolation, my files end up around 325Mb and those are impossible to put anywhere near a cloud!
I know if you work in and save as Photoshop PSD files they can me endless in size determined my what is recorded. I was chatting to this problem with a guy in a shop yesterday who uses the Adobe CC and he says it crashes all the time and very frustrating.
I've spent another three hours and transferred several more files, 214 GB. So about an 8th. I cannot visually check the files before transfer, so need to transfer the all. if I could see them before hand I could at least delete those I do not want to keep or are
not up to scratch. Now with a nice new 2TB drive I intended to start out keeping it nice and organised, failed dismally already
. Another day. also the wires, leads and drives all attached to the computer. No need for the central heating, just sit next to the computer.Thanks again Lesley.
Lesley Jones
Otherwise know as Zooey
Don't delete Julian - you may regret it later. I have never shot much. However, the quality of a lot of my earlier photographs is dubious to say the least. I've thought about pruning, but those are precious memories. Having said that - now I tend to process the best one or two from a location and delete anything left over. I know some say keep everything regardless, but frankly I don't want to look at it all in Bridge. How do you intend to organise?
Julian de'Courcy
Well-Known Member
Don't delete Julian - you may regret it later. I have never shot much. However, the quality of a lot of my earlier photographs is dubious to say the least. I've thought about pruning, but those are precious memories. Having said that - now I tend to process the best one or two from a location and delete anything left over. I know some say keep everything regardless, but frankly I don't want to look at it all in Bridge. How do you intend to organise?
I have started to delete or prune the ones that I have recovered. Far to many bland shots. Now that question you ask " How do you intend to organise" The question frightened me. I say this as it uncovered a flaw in my make up, be it genetic or environmental, organizing to my mind equates to being tidy. I am the guy who rebels against systems, someone who finds beauty in the chaos, the organised jumble is my way forward in an organised way. Basically I am saying "My way"
I know it is a flaw. In this case I have a file for Photography, which contains various files.
They contain Camera raw files.
Such as 5D,G11, Nex, Olympus,
In these Raw files I hold the Raw converted to TIFF uncompressed which I can return to for printing or processing.
If I go on and proccess the TIFF's ore they are held in folders of Genera, type, subject, as jpeg files. The finished file for uploading.
I do save a copy of that jpeg in with the TIFF folder as well so I have two copies of the Jpeg's
What I may do is to have another hard drive to keep the large TIFF separate. I work in Tiff 16bit from RAW, But thinking about it
again it would be best to keep just the Raw separate as the size is a lot less than the TIFF. Bingo.
Please let me know of a wonderful tidy way to organise. I'll try.
Having a day off from transferring today. May watch the rugby instead.
Lesley Jones
Otherwise know as Zooey
I think the best way to organise is what suits you. I know a lot of people let the digital files stay where they fall. Because I started scanning film before I got the Sony, I looked at what I photographed the most. I too have a folder called Photography and under that is Film and Digital. Under those is simply People/Animals, Landscapes, Nature and Miscellaneous. The Film folder also has a Leica sub-folder because I wanted to identify what I shot on an antique. I obviously starting naming scanned film and I saw no reason to change with the files from the Sony. I've only taken 2,500 shots with that over five years and kept far, far less. I can afford to name (and I remember most of them without having to refer to Bridge). I know my way means a small number of folders with hundreds of files, but the other way is hundreds of folders with a handful of files. I don't get calling a folder by the date - unless it is a very significant date, it would mean nothing to me.
Some people go berserk with keywords and I think for those who shoot professionally then there is a great need to be organised. I always do rough location (South East, Peak District, Peru) and then whatever I can see in the image that has meaning. I pinched some keywords off an internet site (abstract, transportation, religion, architecture etc.) and they work very well. I use smart collections in Bridge so I can look at just our wildlife, or the pets, or a particular holiday. I tend to mark up those for editing in advance and I use labels for editing, deletion, revisit, rescan, but they are always removed when I no longer need them. Bridge allows you to filter by so many things like colour profile, lens, exposure and the choices are almost endless. I hide the DNG files within the collections because I don't want to see them.
I save the RAW (converted to DNG) with the PSD together in the appropriate folder. Some time ago different versions crept in because I couldn't make up my mind which I preferred. I pruned those out a few months ago, but I do allow myself a second file as a black and white conversion. Very rarely I need a Part 1 and Part 2 if I want to use Topaz - it falls over with my enormous files, so I have to flatten if I want to use it. I never save JPG files unless I put them in here and that file goes in a folder for desktop background images.
So far, all my files from the Sony and the film scanned so far has almost filled a 300Gb external drive so I think I am working with far less than you, or indeed anyone in here. I think I will buy a 2Tb replacement and that should keep me going for a few more years. In theory my entire collection will always fit easily on a single drive (that is available at that time), so I don't have the bother of splitting. I believe Bridge can't cope with organising across more than one drive, where the LR organiser can. I've never used the latter, so I'm not sure, but it may be more help to you with multiple drives
I obviously starting naming scanned film and I saw no reason to change with the files from the Sony. I've only taken 2,500 shots with that over five years and kept far, far less. I can afford to name (and I remember most of them without having to refer to Bridge). I know my way means a small number of folders with hundreds of files, but the other way is hundreds of folders with a handful of files. I don't get calling a folder by the date - unless it is a very significant date, it would mean nothing to me.Some people go berserk with keywords and I think for those who shoot professionally then there is a great need to be organised. I always do rough location (South East, Peak District, Peru) and then whatever I can see in the image that has meaning. I pinched some keywords off an internet site (abstract, transportation, religion, architecture etc.) and they work very well. I use smart collections in Bridge so I can look at just our wildlife, or the pets, or a particular holiday. I tend to mark up those for editing in advance and I use labels for editing, deletion, revisit, rescan, but they are always removed when I no longer need them. Bridge allows you to filter by so many things like colour profile, lens, exposure and the choices are almost endless. I hide the DNG files within the collections because I don't want to see them.
I save the RAW (converted to DNG) with the PSD together in the appropriate folder. Some time ago different versions crept in because I couldn't make up my mind which I preferred. I pruned those out a few months ago, but I do allow myself a second file as a black and white conversion. Very rarely I need a Part 1 and Part 2 if I want to use Topaz - it falls over with my enormous files, so I have to flatten if I want to use it. I never save JPG files unless I put them in here and that file goes in a folder for desktop background images.
So far, all my files from the Sony and the film scanned so far has almost filled a 300Gb external drive so I think I am working with far less than you, or indeed anyone in here. I think I will buy a 2Tb replacement and that should keep me going for a few more years. In theory my entire collection will always fit easily on a single drive (that is available at that time), so I don't have the bother of splitting. I believe Bridge can't cope with organising across more than one drive, where the LR organiser can. I've never used the latter, so I'm not sure, but it may be more help to you with multiple drives
