Back Up Strategy in Mac

It is recommended by all experts to keep backup to protect data. Keeping backup through automatic process is more consistent than manually backing up your files. There are many methods to keep backup like Time Machine which is an inbuilt and free tool available in Mac. Many people love to keep their important data on icloud or other online backup server because CD, DVD, Mac system can crash/destroy any time. Here are some other storage devices to use for different types of backups in backup chart given below:-

Backup

How to backup entire Mac drive:- You can create image or clone of your entire Mac hard drive. If you use Time Machine for backup of Mac data, it will be an incremental backup but not a bootable one. The bootable backup is needed in case when you are not able to load operating system. There are many third party tools which help you to create clone of your Mac data.

Backing up selected files or folders:- If you keep only important data or selected files and folders for backup, it will help you to save important memory space.

How to choose right backup method?

Backing up your entire hard drive requires a different approach than backing up just a few files. You can keep your entire hard drive data through Time Machine. It keeps incremental backup but, it can not clone your data. You need to use any third party tool like Stellar Drive ToolBox. It is a complete pack of 12 utilities and Mac drive clone is one of them.

This tool is very reliable and easy to use. You can clone either entire Mac disk or any selected volume.

Features of Drive clone module of Stellar Drive ToolBox:-

1. It helps you to create clone of your Mac data, by using clone you can boot your system

2. It allows you to resize volume at the time of cloning

3. It supports cloning of MBR partition of windows and DOS drive.

4. It helps to create clone of SSD drive to Mac drive.

5. You can create bootable DVD with minimal system resources.

Mac users should follow above described backup strategy, it will help them to protect their important data.

For more information please visit here:- Volume Clone

Causes of data loss in Mac

Data loss is the most common problem faced by users. There are many causes of this problem. Here are the top most causes of data loss:-

1. Accidental Deletion:- Sometimes we accidentally empty trash without checking it properly. This situation can cause bigger data loss and if some important system files gets deleted by any means , you may face problem to boot your system.
2. Computer virus and Malware:- Every system user should keep virus protection software in their machine to protect data because some virus can lead to data loss and hard drive crash.
   
   
3. Physical Damage:- As we know the hard drives have platters which spin at the rate of thousands of RPMs. It is very sensitive pieces of machinery and the activity like bumps, drops, and other mishandling can lead to physical damage. If you keep hard drives carefully at low temperature then it minimizes the chances of data loss.

4. Logical Errors:- Due to file corruption, software problems, and invalid entries in file locations logical error occurs. It can be the reason of corruption of other files on the Mac drive and lead to data loss. Logical errors can be solved by disk utility in some cases.

5. Power Failure:- It is a common cause of data loss. If power interruption occurs during your work then it leads to loss of unsaved file.

6. Natural Disasters:- Lightning strikes, power surges, flood, fire and earthquakes causes physical damage to hard drives and your system.

   

   Data Loss

   
   

Keeping proper backup will help you to keep your data safe. Stellar Drive ToolBox can help you to solve your backup problem. It has 12 utilities, Mac Drive Clone is one of them which helps you to create clone or image of your Mac.

However, Disk Utility will also help you to create backup, you can create image of your data with Disk Utility but, you cannot create bootable backup. So, Drive clone will help you to create both image or clone for your Mac data. 

Options of Drive Clone:- 

Disk Cloning:- You can create exact copy of your Mac data by using this tool.

Imaging:- It will help you to create image of your Mac data.

Restore:- You can restore your data from clone or image file.

Tools:- You can create the bootable DVD by using this option.

        For more details visit here:-  Clone Mac Drive

Mackeeper - Is it a good tool for Mac users?

If you are facing slow Mac performance and planning to buy any Mac optimization software which can speed up and clean up your Mac then you must check reviews of that software either online or offline. The options available for optimizing Mac are Mackeeper, Stellar Drive toolbox, clean my Mac etc. As far as my experience is concerned, I would like to suggest you to use Stellar Drive ToolBox which is not very popular like other two but very easy to use and perfect with its job. On the other hand, Mackeeper is very popular but, doesn't enjoy too many positive users responses over internet and sometimes has been called as spam, malware or useless Mac tool.

You must be knowing that there is no builtin tool for cleaning and optimizing Mac OS X. Over a period of time, lots of junk files, system files, caches gets stored in Mac hard drive and slow down its performance. Here are the modules which are presents in Mackeeper:-

• Avira Anti-Virus engine
  
  
• Fast one click cleanup
  
  
• Anti-Theft protection
  
  
• File Recovery
  
  
• Update Tracker
  
  
• Data Encryptor
  
  
• Backup Module
  
  
• Disk Usage Module
  
  
• Smart Uninstaller
  
  
• Duplicates Finder
  
  
• Shredder
  
  
• ZeoDisk

Most users have said that the anti-virus program of MacKeeper has terribly slow down their Mac, especially when real time protection is enabled. MacKeeper, in my opinion, is just not worth because it has a lot of negative reputation and PR issues. Many of its users have said that this software is difficult to uninstall and sometimes it installs automatically.

If you want to make your system fast and keep it optimized then you must use Stellar Drive ToolBox. It has also 12 utilities but each utility has it’s own significance which helps you to optimize Mac OS X. Speed up, defrag, partition, Cloning, surface scan, drive performance, volume repair, drive initialize, drive status, Shield, Raw data editor, wipe and data encryption are the modules of this tool. Even you can search it’s reviews over internet and you will find all good reviews. So, every Mac users should buy it because it is far better than Mackeeper.

Should I keep emptying trash in Mac OS X

Everyday we delete and store many files and folders in our Mac. But, just a simple deletion moves these files to trash. If you are using Mac system then you must know the importance of emptying trash. But, the fact is little for newbies and they should know how to clean up trash and how to delete files completely from the Mac hard drive because these unused files consume a lot of memory space.

There are so many benefits of cleaning up trash. Some of them are:

1. Mac runs faster
2. Every application works properly
3. Cleaning up trash creates more extra space on the Mac hard disk.
4. Computer performance increases automatically

There are many ways to cleanup trash . First method is just do Double click on the trash icon, trash window appears on the screen then you will see lots of files in trash . Here, you have option to keep the required ones and delete the unneeded files by just selecting and deleting.

Cleanup Trash

Second method is just right click the trash icon and select the “empty trash” option without checking any other files. But, in this case you may lose all your data.
Sometimes, during cleaning trash, you may get error message like you can not delete these files from trash etc. This type of errors come due to incorrect file permission. In this case first you need to correct the file permissions.


Among all the third party tools, used for cleaning Mac, Stellar Drive ToolBox is the best with a combination of 12 utilities. The Speed up Mac module of this tool is versatile enough to scan and delete all types of unnecessary files and applications from your Mac. You can clean trash or even entire Mac drive by using this tool.

Significance of defragging Mac drive

Fragmentation occurs in Mac a single file's data becomes distributed across a hard drive. It affects your Mac OS X performance. I would like to suggest Mac users to use Stellar Drive Defrag tool, it is one of the best Mac defragmentation tool.

Go through this video , you will learn how to defrag your Mac and it's significance.

How to find and delete system junks in Mac?

Are you looking for the process of removing junk files from your Mac hard disk? Would you like to know how to clean your Mac drive? If you are encountering slow performance of you Mac then it might be due to loads of system junks, duplicate files, caches etc.. These system junks are responsible for slowing down your Mac performance.

There are many Mac users who does not take care of their Mac from these junk files. After some time they face many problem-

Slow booting process

Blue screen error

Slow performance of Mac

Following steps will help you to clean your Mac:-

1. Open your application folder, removing all unused applications.
2. Remove all language, this can free up to 2GB of space.
3. Open iPhoto and delete duplicate photos.

4. Open iTunes and delete all of the music and podcasts which you no longer need.
5. Go through your Documents, Movies, and Pictures folder and delete all unused data which you are not using.
6. Clear out old email messages.
7. Go to ~/Library/Caches/, and delete all caches.
8. Go to ~/Library/Safari/, and delete the "Icons" folder.
9. You can remove all Xcode installer, located in /Applications/Installers/.
10. Remove unnecessary iChat icons from ~/Pictures/iChat Icons/.

Above described steps are very useful to clean your Mac but it will be a lengthy process so, if you want to save your time then you must use any duplicate Mac file remover for your Mac.  Drive ToolBox is very reliable tool for Mac users. It has speed Up utility which helps to remove all junk files, duplicate files, caches, language files, binary files etc.. in a single click and show you the amount of free space. You can visit here:-

How to check Mac disk issues?

If you want to keep your Mac hard drive out service centre and prevent expensive repair bills then you must check it's health regularly. It is basic essential part of Mac maintenance which helps to keep your Mac healthy. Mac has an inbuilt utility called 'Disk Utility', which helps Mac users to find out what is wrong in hard drive. But, sometimes there might occur many problems which cannot be identified by this utility. In such cases, you need to trust in 'all in one tool' like Stellar Drive ToolBox which has 12 Mac maintenance utilities.

Check the hard drive health with Disk Utility:-

1. Restart
2. Check/fix the filesystem
3. Make sure you're not running out of free space on the System volume
4. Repair permissions
5. Create a new user account, and see if the problem persists there
6. Clear system & user caches
7. Disable Application Enhancer, if you're running it
8. Startup in SafeBoot mode, and see if the problem persists there
9. Reset system firmware
10. Unplug all USB, Firewire devices except Apple mouse

How can I see Mac drive information using the 'Drive Stats':-

1. Start Stellar Drive Toolbox.

2. Click 'Drive Stats'.

3. Select the Mac drive or volume from the 'Select Source' pane.

4. Click on 'General Stats' tab to view summarized information or choose the 'Full Description' tab to view detailed information about the selected drive or volume.

You can repair Mac volume by using 'volume Repair' module. It has three options- Verify, Repair, Rebuild. Verify option checks the file system error and permissions of the file then repair option helps to correct permissions of files. You can do 'verify' and 'repair' simultaneously via 'Rebuild' option.

How to resolve corrupted File System issue in Mac?

A sudden power outage or system crash can corrupt your Mac files and you may find problems to restart your Mac. When these things happen, people who already have kept backup of all their data, remain tension free , but, what about those who did not keep back up? They should first try to repair or restore the system files else the data in their disk can go inaccessible.

Problem 1:- Unable to load operating system due to corrupted file system

Windows systems are more prone to corrupt system files more frequently, but you can fix this issue easily. You should use 'system restore' which keeps daily backup and you can restore your system to any previous date. You can find 'system restore' in control panel.

Mac - It is a general complaint of Mac users that file system permission issues occur frequently in Mac. But, it can be solved by rebooting your Mac into safe mode. In safe Mode OS checks all error corrections on the file system.

The other option is ' Disk Utility'. You can check Mac disk health easily and repair it via this inbuilt tool. However, StellarDrive ToolBox  is one of the well known Mac optimization software among Mac users. It is a complete pack of 12 utilities and Volume Repair is one of them. Volume repair helps to verify, repair and rebuild Mac system, which corrects file error to some extent.

The Raw Data Editor of Drive ToolBox, helps to repair minor corruptions in file structure. But, if you are an advanced user and you know the offset value of corrupt file, only then you can repair any file. This utility helps you to repair corrupted files but, you should also take precautions by keeping backup. The regular backups keep you unaffected in data loss situations because you have option to recover data easily.

There are many ways to keep backup, Mac has an inbuilt tool 'Time Machine' which helps to keep backup. But, there are some limitations with Time Machine. You cannot make bootable backup via this tool. But, the job can be done with 'Drive Clone Utility' of Stellar Drive ToolBox. You can either make Image or Clone of your data by using this tool.

Optimize free space in Mac drive

Many people believe that Mac OS X is less affected by fragmentation but the case doesn't remain agile for ever. It starts getting fragmented because bulky games, voluminous software that involves plenty of read-writes operations. Due to these read- write operations your Mac drive gets fragmented over a period of time and it causes slow Mac performance.

However, Mac OS X file system has the ability to minimize the chance of fragmentation and keep your Mac safe from getting fragmented easily but it does not work in the case of large files. So , it is suggested by experts to defrag your Mac. Defrgmentation helps to get rid of slow Mac and scattered fragmented data over Mac volume. It keeps all fragmented data together in Mac drive and it increases the processing time of OS.

Defragmentation of free space means just keeping all scattered free space in a continuous way. There are many software available online for defrag Mac like iDefrag, Stellar Drive Defrag etc. These software has great features and working ability. You can create list of all the fragmented files on the selected volume and defrag one or multiple files.

Key Features:-

• It effectively defrags Mac drives and volumes.
• Advance algorithms are used for quick Mac drive defragmentation.
• It helps to defrag individual files as well as metadata.
• It displays block-level representation of Mac volumes.
• It has an option to sends automatic email notifications
• It shows current temperature of your hard drive
• It creates Bootable DVD for defragging Mac boot volume

If you will search online review of Stellar Defrag tool, you will get all good reviews. It is very safe and easy to use.

Solutions to get rid of Bad sectors in Mac

Bad sectors are those sectors in Mac drive which can not be accessed by OS for read/write operations. It occurs due to physical damage in Mac disk. Disk Utility can easily detect bad sectors by CHKDSK or SCANDISK. In such situations, the data present in bad sectors gets lost.

Hard drives are known as storage devices which is used to store your significant information but, if your hard drive gets corrupted or damaged it may result in data loss however data loss occurs in hard drive due to various other reasons like human errors, accidental formatting or re-formatting drive or partition etc. To overcome this problem, it is always suggested by experts to keep backup of entire Mac before leaving it shutdown or sleep.

There are two methods of keeping backup:-

Image - It is copy of data which remains in compressed form.

Clone - It is a copy of your data which is bootable.

Keeping data in the image form is a good idea but you can not boot your Mac with this type of backup however it takes less memory space to store. While clone is the complete replica of your Mac which is bootable. So, experts suggest that always keep clone of your Mac. If you face any disaster like system crash, physical dimage of your Mac then you can easily get back all your data with clone.

Drive clone of  Stellar Drive ToolBox  is one of the most famous Mac back up utility which helps to keep safe backup. This tool has options for both clone and image. Stellar Drive Clone 2.5 is the latest version of this tool which has many advance features:-

1. It helps to create an exact copy of your Mac volume to another Disk/Volume.

2. It allows to create clone with MBR drives formatted.

3. It allows to work with SSD and exFAT-formatted drives.

4. It is possible to easily clone your volume to another volume, folder, or a network drive.