How to Recover files on Mac OS X Yosemite

Mac hard drive recovery can be tricky. The good news is, Disk Drill takes a complicated task and makes it simple. When you need to recover files from a Mac hard drive — either internal or external, Disk Drill can help you get your data back quickly.
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How to Recover files on Mac OS X Yosemite
If you’ve upgraded to Apple’s OS X Yosemite, you may have lost critical files either during the upgrade or afterwards. In particular, some Mac users are reporting problems with lost Boot Camp Windows partitions after upgrading. And even worse, Time Machine does not typically back up files on Boot Camp partitions.

While losing data is always scary and frustrating, the good news is that Disk Drill is fully compatible with Yosemite (even the new Core Storage partition) and can help you find your lost data.

#1 Download and Install Disk Drill

If you are recovering from your Mac’s internal hard drive, then save the application to an external hard drive or USB flash drive, in order to avoid overwriting any data. To do this, download Disk Drill to your MacBook as you normally would from the CleverFiles website, double-click the disk image and then drag the Disk Drill icon to your external drive. If you are not recovering files from your internal hard drive, then you can drag the icon to your Applications folder.
  • 1Download Disk Drill
  • 2Drag to Applications Folder
  • 3Launch Disk Drill

#2 Launch the App

Once you have downloaded Disk Drill to your Mac, launch the app to get started. You may be asked what additional options you wish to install. Uncheck all the boxes, as you should not install any additional data recovery enhancements at this time.

#3 Prepare to Scan

After Disk Drill launches, you will see the list of drives (both internal and external). Click on the volume you wish to recover deleted Yosemite files from. If you are looking to recover a lost partition in Yosemite, be sure to select the whole volume, not just an individual partition.

#4 Scan the Volume

Next to the volume you wish to scan, click the “Recover” (or “Rebuild”) button. Disk Drill will do a complete scan of the volume, proceeding with each of its scanning algorithms one by one.
How to recover deleted files on Mac
If you have a partition that has become lost or corrupted, it will use the “Universal Partition Search” function to find and attempt to repair it. If the partition headers have not been overwritten by other data and the disk does not have any physical damage in those sectors, the chances of locating the lost partitions are high. Scan the Volume

#5 Recover Your Partition Data on Yosemite

If Disk Drill finds a lost partition, it will list the recoverable data of this partition in the scanning results, and you just need to choose a destination drive for data recovery Mac Yosemite. Alternatively, if the lost partition can be rebuilt using HFS+ Catalog Rebuild algorithm, the corresponding option will appear in the disk list, and you can go ahead and click the Rebuild button. If the rebuilt file structure looks correct, you can either copy the data by mounting the partition as a virtual disk, or just go on and write the repaired catalog to the source drive.
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To complete recovery, please follow the instructions to upgrade to Disk Drill PRO. If the rebuilt structure does not look correct, click the Back arrow to try other recovery options.

Don't take any chances — protect data now!

Disk Drill offers outstanding protection features that protect your files and prevent any possible data loss. S.M.A.R.T. Monitoring option always keeps an eye on your hard drive for any signs of malfunctioning. Guaranteed Recovery saves invisible copies of any trashed files so that they can be recovered whenever you need. Recovery Vault keeps all metadata save in order to restore files with their names and locations.

#6 Recover Your Deleted Files on Yosemite

If you’re looking for files, not partitions, you can review the list of files that Disk Drill recovered during its scan. The files may not have their correct filenames, so you may need to preview each one by clicking the preview (eye) icon. You can narrow your search by sorting the files by size, date and file type. Once you have found your lost data, you can proceed with upgrading to Disk Drill PRO and recovering your files. Recover Your Deleted Files on Yosemite
That’s all there is to it! If you’re worried you might have to go through Yosemite data recovery on your Apple MacBook in the future, check out Disk Drill’s data protection features: Guaranteed Recovery and Recovery Vault. With these options turned on, you'll recover your files on OS X Yosemite easily.

Disk Drill is super serious about data recovery on Mac OS X Yosemite

It will go deep into details and structures with the help of Deep Scan even when the situation seems hopeless. Disk Drill scans raw data on your hard drive (NTFS, FAT, or else) and is searching for a binary signature of the file. Once the app can collect the found fragments into a structure and file signature is recognized, files like XLS, DOC, AVI, MP4, JPG, etc. are recovered faster.
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Take care of your important files now!

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What other users and professionals say

  • Graham Jones, Sophos
    Disk Drill is the only true Mac-style software for data recovery and data protection. And it’s exactly what I was looking for
  • engadget.com
    Disk Drill does a very good job of what it is expected to do; protect data loss and recover lost files. Steven Sande