backup

It started with a failed time machine backup. I had just bought an Airport Extreme and decided to plug my time machine drive into the USB port on the Airport. About 20% into the backup, time machine failed with Error -8062/Error -36. It failed on multiple files and I had to exclude them from the backup before it would move forward. Wondering what the hell was going on I tried to copy one of these files. Finder couldn’t copy it either giving a rather generic Input/Output error.

At this point I started thinking something was seriously wrong. The first thing I did was verify and repair permissions using Disk Utility. It found errors, and said it fixed them, but when I verified again the errors were still there. Not very helpful. Next I tried the much vaunted DiskWarrior. At $100 it isn’t exactly cheap but it came highly recommended. In order for DiskWarrior to scan your disk it shouldn’t be the boot drive. A bit of a problem since my MacBook Pro’s main drive was the one that failed. Using my other “Mac” (wink wink, nudge nudge) I used the nifty Target Disk mode of the MacBook Pro to mount the drive. DiskWarrior found something and said it was fixed, but I wasn’t convinced.

My paranoia was now in top gear and refused to let me rest after DiskWarrior’s all clear. I decided to buy Drive Genius 2  which offers a low level surface scan (also $100 but offers a competitive upgrade from DiskWarrior for $75). When you buy Drive Genius they give you a link to a bootable DVD image (unlike DiskWarrior that mails you the DVD, seriously Alsoft, get with the times). This DVD allows you to side-step that pesky boot disk problem. Unfortunately my MBP’s SuperDrive was on the blink. Enter my trusty 3rd generation 40 gig iPod. Using Disk Utility I restored the downloaded Drive Genius image onto the iPod and booted up my MBP using it.

Drive Genius started doing its thing and almost immediately discovered bad sectors on my hard drive. It was slow going so I decided to leave it on all night just to see how many errors found. In the morning it was still at only 9% scanned with over 100 bad sectors. Clearly this disk was breathing its last breath.

So, I have a hosed time machine disk because in moving from plugged in to my mac to plugged in to my airport, the old images were wiped off the disk in order to support backup over the air. I have a primary disk that is failing big time and probably not capable of giving me a solid backup.

Luckily for me, this is not quite as bad as it sounds. While time machine is nice and does a decent job most of the time, I don’t trust it too far. I use SuperDuper for real backups and I have had that going fine for a very long time. Push comes to shove, all my data is also backed up on Mozy in case a fire or something happens and everything in the vicinity of my computer dies.

Yesterday my Mac came back from having its drives replaced. I booted it in Target Disk mode and plugged it in to the other Mac. Opened Disk Utility, mounted my SuperDuper incremental backup and hit restore. 3 hours later everything starts up perfectly and I am back where I began. No fuss, no drama.

I love it when things work the way they are supposed to.

It’s been a year and change since I switched to a Mac. Over that period I’ve collected an assortment of software that I use all the time and find indispensable now. I wanted to have a list just in case I needed to get a new Mac up to speed.

It later dawned on me that other people might find the list useful as well. I think all these apps are fantastic, many of them made even more fantastic by the fact that they are from small indy developers. Be warned, some of this stuff needs to be purchased for it to work right. Good software costs good money. Anyway, on to the list: 

1. iWork ‘08 - Microsoft Office can suck it
2. CS4 Design Premium – Tools of the trade
3. Coda - The best damned web site development tool out there
4. VMWare Fusion – Current virtualization tool of choice
5. MacFUSE – Read/Write NTFS (among other things)
6. MozyHome – Cloud backup
7. SuperDuper! – Disaster recovery image creator extraordinaire
8. Logbook – Backpack journal logging client
9. Twitterific – Twitter client of choice + iPhone client
10. CoverSutra – Rate songs in iTunes using keyboard shortcuts, also, looks fantastic
11. MediaLink – Shares my Mac’s media library with the Playstation upstairs
12. Adium – MSN and more
13. Skype – VOIP done right
14. LoudHush – Asterisk IAX client for Mac
15. PodWorks – Copy songs off iPods/iPhones straight into iTunes
16. VLC – Because QuickTime isn’t good enough
17. Perian – Also because QuickTime isn’t good enough
18. Things – Task management + iPhone sync
19. NetNewsWire – RSS reader of choice
20. Firefox (with Firebug and View source chart)
21. PoxNora – Addictive little bugger
22. LaunchBar – Current launcher of choice, Quicksilver/Butler close second
23. OmniGraffle – Flowcharts and diagrams
24. Xtorrent – BitTorrent client of choice
25. Amazon MP3 Downloader – Yes, I buy my music
26. Cha-Ching – Money management
27. Colloquy – When EFNet beckons
28. GoToMeeting – Easy cross-platform conference + VOIP + screen sharing
29. Handbrake (and the replacement icon because I hate pineapples) – Video encoding
30. Transmit – FTP client of choice
31. Proxifier – For circumventing draconian Omani internet restrictions
32. Remote Desktop Connection – Windows RDC for Mac
33. smcFanControl – Currently boosting MBP fans to 4000rpm, India is hot
34. ScreenFlow – Kickass Screencast creator
35. VoodooPad – Wiki notes
36. StuffIt – For those pesky old archives and RARs
37. Sequel Pro (used to be CocoaMySQL) – MySQL manager