[DM-MUG] Macbook Air Spinning Wheel

[Jeremy Geerdes]

I had a similar experience about 18 months ago. The problem is caused when power is interrupted while the data is being written to the disk. Essentially, it corrupts the directory structure. I took mine to the Apple Store and had a genius help me, and I can't recommend them highly enough.

That said, you have a couple options. DiskWarrior *may* be able to repair the damage. You may also be able to use Time Machine to go back to right before the shutdown. In my case, neither of these options worked.

In that event, what you need to do is use your system install disk to boot the machine, then go into disk utilities. If you can mount the drive at all, then you can use a terminal utility called ditto to copy much of the contents of the drive to an external disk and save as much data as possible. You will then need to format the drive and reinstall your system.

In my case, I had no backup. Fortunately, ditto did a fairly good job for me. I certainly hope you don't have as much trouble as I did! Also, if you do take it to the Apple Store, you will want to make sure to take an external drive if you have data you want to save. They don't have any loaners.

Jeremy R. Geerdes
Effective website design & development
Des Moines, IA

For more information or a project quote:
http://jgeerdes.home.mchsi.com
jrgeerdes at gmail.com

If you're in the Des Moines, IA, area, check out Debra Heights Wesleyan Church!

On Dec 30, 2009, at 8:36 AM, alan.maupin at gmail.com wrote:

> A few days ago I operated my macbook air until the battery was completely dead.  I plugged the Air in and let it charge untill today.  When I opened the lid a little while ago the Air resumed to the desktop state but the machine was nonresponsive.  I then pressed and held the power button and hard rebooted the machine. The Air then stuck at the grey apple spinning wheel screen.  I let it spin for a few minutes and hard rebooted again. As I write this email on my blackberry the Macbook Air is still stuck at the spinning wheel, dark grey apple on a light grey screen.  Anyone have an idea what's going on?
> 
> Thanks ahead of time -- alan
> Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®
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