[NPMUG] Follow-up, major data loss during 10.6 install

[Dave Sevick]

So ....  "don't it always seem to go,  you don't know what you've got  
till it's gone ...."

My apologies to Joni Mitchell and other Ladies of the Canyon for  
recycling the lyrics  .

===========

The folks I saw Thursday and today have accidentally erased all their  
data while install 10.6.  Several years of photos and music and email  
and "who knows what else .." as I was not able to retrieve anything.

In the state of panic on Wednesday morning, they dug up their Leopard  
10.5.1 CD to do a "complete install"  over a failed 10.6 installation.

I was not their on Wednesday to witness how it was done .... but  
listening to the story  it seems that the Snow Leopard installer  
failed once, failed a 2nd time and then they went back into old boxes  
to find 10.5  installer DVDs to "go back to the way it was ..."

I'm going to spare you the rest of the story ... but I can tell you  
that loss of precious personal data, or financial data or even your  
favorite songs that you have purchased on CDs or over iTunes can  
really be heartbreaking.

Disk Warrior saw no data I could recover.  And since new 10.5.1 data  
was written over the failed 10.6 install, the likelihood of getting  
Drive Savers to get anything back was slim and very expensive.

Moving forward :

1. We installed 10.6 over the newly created 10.5.1 and began anew !

2. A blessing was cast upon us when they remembered that they had  
photos and music on an iPod Touch !!!!!  We got 2375 songs back  back  
with Senuti ( $18 utility ) . That was a great moment amidst all other  
bad news.   Photos did not transfer over ... the Apple Store will look  
into this with them.

3.  Time Machine 1TB drive was installed !

4.  Office 2008 was installed and updated to 12.2.1

5. iLife '09 was installed an fully patched.

6.  Grief counseling and pep talk.


btw ... we installed the 10.6 compatible Epson R320 drivers from  
epson.com  .... they don't work !

Researching the cause this weekend.

I hope this story helps to educate and warn people ....

Dave


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