I suddenly lost nearly 1 TB data in my MyBook Studio II (RAID 1) after I upgraded to OSX Maverick. The data is VERY IMPORTANT to me, including thousands of photos and my Ph.D. research. This is ironic that the two hard drives are both healthy but ALL the data is GONE.
After I lost the data, I started googling about this issue, and found out that this issue had been reported a few weeks ago. WD should warn their customers once this issue was reported, but WD did not. They should report this issue on the most popular websites, like Engadget, CNET, and even report it on news. Not just sending a email to the registered customers. I was not a registered customer, and so I did not get any notice. Even today, most of WD users don’t know this issue, and the number of victims is still increasing.
I am not interested in knowing the technical problem that causes this issue. The only thing I care is how I can recover my data. I just bought a Seagate external hard drive and Disk Drill Pro to rescue my data. Fortunately, the data is still there and I am able to recover it, however the filename and directory will be disordered. Some files are useless if I don’t know their original filenames and directories.
I am still waiting for the offical response from WD telling us what we have to do in this situation. I was wondering if WD is working on the solution that can recover the data including the filename and directory, or WD is doing nothing, and we should rescue the data by ourself.
So - I was simply able to go to the Applications folder and drag/drop the WD programs into the trash. There were a few others in the Library/Application Support folder, too, which I also deleted.
Well, a cold start due to an iTunes CD burn lock-up wiped the RAID1 status of my two WD MyBook Thunderbolt Duo devices. They were hooked on my iMac 27 (updated for Mavericks) without problems for two days. Although I’m not sure, whether I used them actively after the OS X update.
According to your advice and if you want to be on the safe side, you should have always one device running and the other disconnected. Then, the value of the RAID1 philosophy is somewhat compromised…
So - I was simply able to go to the Applications folder and drag/drop the WD programs into the trash. There were a few others in the Library/Application Support folder, too, which I also deleted.
J
Steps to completely remove WD SmartWare from your Mac:
Run the SmartWare uninstaller application located in /Applications/
Using Apple’s Activity Monitor from /Applications/Utilities quit the following processes:
WDDMService
WD Quick View
SmartwareServerApp
Delete /Library/LaunchDeamons/com.wdc.WDDMService.plist (Entry that causes WDDM to start.)
Delete /Library/LaunchDeamons/com.wdc.WDSmartWareServer.plist (Entry that causes the SmartWare Server to start.)
Delete /Applications Support/WDSmartware (Removes all SmartWare support programs)
Delete /Application/WDSmartWare (SmartWare user interface)
From System Preferences->Users Login Items remove WDQuickview for all users. (Entry that runs WD Quick View when a user logs in. There should be a single entry for all users. Deleting it from one any account should remove it for all accounts.)
Hi, just chiming in as yet another pretty pissed off Apple/WD customer. My issue is that this happened to three drives (so far), one Lacie and two Seagate drives, one USB and two firewire800. They were all wiped and renamed/partitioned into “MyBook” and “EFI.” Unfortunately I have just returned from two months on assignment and plugged in my drives to back them up but never had a chance since they were wiped immediately. So obviously I am pretty interested in a resolution to this problem that restores access to the data on my drives. I have one WD MyBook drive still attached via USB that I use for Time Machine, it has not been affected. I have searched and attempted to purge all WD software, preferences and launcher items. Please let me know what the status is with this issue, and if I need to try and return to an older version of Mac Os X. Thank you.
Hi, just chiming in as yet another pretty pissed off Apple/WD customer. My issue is that this happened to three drives (so far), one Lacie and two Seagate drives, one USB and two firewire800. They were all wiped and renamed/partitioned into “MyBook” and “EFI.” Unfortunately I have just returned from two months on assignment and plugged in my drives to back them up but never had a chance since they were wiped immediately. So obviously I am pretty interested in a resolution to this problem that restores access to the data on my drives. I have one WD MyBook drive still attached via USB that I use for Time Machine, it has not been affected. I have searched and attempted to purge all WD software, preferences and launcher items. Please let me know what the status is with this issue, and if I need to try and return to an older version of Mac Os X. Thank you.
Hello,
I’m really sorry that your devices experienced complications. I have asked someone from our support staff to contact you.
According to the My Book Studio II user manual the “WD Drive Manager enables Safe ShutdownTM” making sure that the drive can’t be switched off during write operations. For example during or after a Time Machine backup you can hear the drive writing or defragmenting files. Switching the drive off in the middle of a write operation would result in damaged files. Now that WD recommends to uninstall WD Drive Manager - wouldn’t that be dangerous? How should I know when is the correct = safe moment to switch off my drive?
I am struggling with tech support regarding my WD 2 TB Raid 1 drive.
I can not get answers to:
I have removed the WD raid software from my Mac. Can I use the drive without it. Several people on MacRumors have stated that they are losing data even though they were not using the WD raid software. I do not know if this is true.
Where do I send a copy of the receipt for the software I was told to purchase to reinstate my drive.
is new software being written to maintain and monitor the WD raid drives?
This seems to be a very widespread problem, affecting a lot of WD customers. It seems that WD did not catch this problem during the several development releases and final golden edition release of Mavericks from Apple. WD seems like a large and responsible company. Was this missed?
There seems to be an ongoing conflict between raid drivers from Apple and those from WD. Which should we use?
I am concerned because I am getting conflicting instructions on what to do.
Is it possible to post solutions somewhere so we can move past this issue?
…What are we to do when we’ve followed your instructions regrading contacting WD customer Service for further assistance AND three days later you have not provided further assistance?
I got very detailed help from WD support, after answering a series of question. I gave rather specific hints with numerous screenshots about the status of my Mac, time of its Update to Mavericks, the details of the WD MyBook software and hook-up (two MyBook Thunderbolt Duo 2x3TB and 2x4TB) as well as about the activity at the time of the RAID1 crash a few days later. It happened during a lock-up while burning an audio CD using the updated tunes 11.1.2.
I have received detailed recommendations on how to proceed with a partner recovery software. This might not be appropriate for all the crashes which are now being reported (crashes with LaCies and USB etc. might have other causes).
I cannot pass through the first step: when I run the uninstaller, the process hangs indefinitely. I then need to force-quit the uninstaller. I tried this repeatadly. Is there a workaround?
My NON-WD hard drive got hosed too because of this. I have a Drobo 5D and thought I was safe, but it got reformatted and replaced with MyBook and EFI partitions. WD better help me recover my data as I have terabytes of photos on that drive.
I have a “My Book Essential” which is formatted as a NTFS drive, under Windows XP.
Soon, I will have a brand new MacBookPro Retina. I know that the MacBook will be able to read the NTFS external drive.
My question :
Knowing that NO SmartWare software will be installed under Mavericks, will it be safe to read the data from the “My Book Essential” drive?
My guess is that OSX cannot write on NTFS drive, so it must be safe. Right?
Later on, when WD will have provided updated drivers for Mavericks, then I would reformat the WD external drive to HFS+.
Please someone tell me if that’s OK. Thanks!
As long as you do not have the following installed on your Mac the drive should be ok. (WD Drive Manager, WD Raid Manager and WD SmartWare software applications).
You can now download the WD Software Uninstaller. This utility will remove Mac WD SmartWare and WD Drive Manager software. You can find the uninstaller under any of the Mac Drive Downloads sections such as the My Book Studio below.
