Importance Of Preference Files In Mac

One of the most common reason for unusual behavior on the Mac can be a corrupt preference files. This type of corruption occurs when a program doesn't tends to open or crashes frequently. Preference files store all kind of application-specific information, everything from browser's home page, your default mail font settings, and even something you might have not imagined like your shortcuts kept in Finder sidebar. You can find preferences files by following the written path.

[Your Home Folder]/Library/Preferences for the associated file

After finding the corrupt preference file, usually one must delete them. The next time you launch that fussy application, it’ll recreate a default version of that file and hence your problem will be resolved.

If the problem isn't resolved by that, you can put the old preference file back where you got it so that all of its customized option of that program will return. Another important thing to know is that some preference files live within the /Library/Preferences folder at the top level of your hard drive, but you’ll need to be a bit more careful around them. Preference files stored in that location can affect all users of your machine. If still the problem prevails after deleting the file then you can restore those files if they are unable to fix the problem in same scenario.
One should always create Backup of Preference files!!!


Its very important to take backup of your preferences files including your keyboard shortcuts to import/export, preset plugins and your editing program. Without the proper preference file in place an experienced editor's productivity can completely disappear. This brings me too the focus of the article.

Before discussing about the importance of the Preference file it is very important to understand exactly what these files contains. The content of these files vary from program to program, every preference file contains the program setting and general preferences. Preferences files may also contains presets for new files which are user defined modification. Presets save a great amount of time. Setting them up properly for the first time would definitely, Create something that user want to keep around always.


Preference files sometimes contains effect and style settings, plugins. This means, there is a good chance that any custom work-space, column and window layouts are backed up for you.

How to Take Backup!!!!!!
You can take backup of your preference files in several ways:
  • One way to backup your preference file, is of course, to do it manually . You can explore the finder to make copies of appropriate files and stick them on to an external drive.
  • If you don't want to scroll or browse much then Preference Manager is a simple way to backup your preference file .
Preference Manager works with a variety of different programs. Supported programs include Final Cut Pro, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer, Avid Symphony, Adobe Premiere, Adobe After Effects, and many more. Whether your computer dies, your preference files become corrupted or you just need to work on a different computer, having a backup of these important files can be a lifesaver for your editing productivity.


Software to recover files & fix data corruption on OS X Mac


Data loss and data corruption are two separate instances of data disaster that results in financial loss and loss of time. An equal amount of resources & energy may put into work to recreate data from the scratch.

How Data Loss might arrive on OS X–Though data is pretty much secure on Mac, still their exist plenty of reasons which may result in loss of files & folders. Other than accidental deletion of the file, a data may be lost due to overwriting with a new file. Other drastic situations may arise from formatting of volume, Trojan attacks, and abrupt shutdown of system making the files go lost.  With advent of advanced hard drive technologies, data transfer & storage have become hassle free tasks. But on the other hand, quick corruption in the hard drive technologies have resulted in unmounted volumes. These unmounted volumes go undetected by the OS X and thus data persisting inside the drive is never shown to the user.

An unmounted volume is a result of corruption in directory structure of the drive. Though it is a logical error, disk utility or an advanced volume manager could fix it. Other than logical, a physically damaged hard drive may also fail to mount. Both the situations are drastic, resulting in immediate loss of data.

Tools to get data from an unmounted hard drive:

1.    Stellar Phoenix Mac data recovery ($99)

Claims to recover data from a logical corrupted hard drive (unmounted disk) within 3-4 steps. The software runs on Intel & PPC machines and could perform deleted, formatted & lost volume recovery. In the time, Stellar Phoenix Mac solution has gained quick popularity amongst many OS X users who brought their data back from the ashes.

2.    Disk Drill($89)

Another tool that promises to recover data with simple steps. Disk Drill supports latest Macs and could perform all sorts of recovery including Deep scan of media devices. Supports unmounted recovery of volumes.

3.    Prosoft ($99)

As it sounds, Prosoft Data Rescue does good job rescuing files from a logically defective hard drive.  Apart from this, it follows other conventional recovery options like deleted, formatted and lost volume/data recovery.

Note – All of the above software restrains them projecting recovery of files from a physically damaged hard drive. So, if your hard drive produces strange noise or is sure to be physically damaged then don’t use any of the above software, as it would be of no real benefit.

How File Corruption might occur on OS X Mac–An OS update, even an application update might sometimes results into corruption of certain files. While the files are still present (not lost), they may not launch, as they should. Some important part of the file may have been permanently damaged halting the smooth opening of that file.  Other causes of corruption may be partial removal of an application, malfunction of the header files, overwriting of some components of a file etc. What a damaged file requires is a ‘rebuilt’ of lost & broken components.  

A perfect example of a damaged file is an Image file (JPEG) format. Once corrupted, it fails to launch or part of the image file is badly disfigured.

Of course, a Mac is smart but none application possess the power to reconstruct the broken images. This results in arrival of 3rd party utilities –  

Fixing corrupt JPEG files on Mac

·      Stellar Phoenix JPEG Repair for Mac ($39)

While there are plenty of JPEG repair software but most of them exist for Windows OS. Seems like only Stellar Phoenix has the JPEG repair tool for OS X Mac.

Fixing corrupt MOV files on Mac –

·      Yodot MOV Repair ($69.95) – Scan & fixes MP4, MOV files on Mac OS X.
·      Stellar Phoenix MOV Repair ($69) – Find all corrupt .MOV files from Mac hard drive & repairs them.
·      Remo Repair MOV ($69) – Locates MOV files and fixes them in no time.

All above 3 MOV repair tools are powerful enough to find corruption & fix them. However, each one them show a repaired preview of file for unregistered version of the software.

Fixing damaged PDF files on Mac -

Unlike JPEG repair, we have plenty of option to choose from utilities that fixes bad PDF files on OS X.

·      VeryPDF PDF repair for Mac ($29.95)–Good choice for repairing multiple damaged pdf files on Mac. Removes PDF permission passwords.

·      Stellar Phoenix PDF Repair for Mac ($49) – Stellar Phoenix uses it’s well-established brand name & technological expertise, which brings in this repair utility for Mac OS X. It perform repair on bunch of pdf files, though doesn’t support password protected PDF repairs.

 Let us also evaluate back up software for Macs

Way before Cloud came into existence, Mac users widely depend upon 3rd party cloning apps to safeguard there hard drives. This method of data backup is traditional, reliable and user-friendly. Though it does require some cost including cost of data back-up software, an external hard drive or usb to save the data using a backup application. Still, backup software for Macs are huge hit amongst OS X users.  

Some trusted Mac backup software

·      Carbon Copy Cloner ($39.95)
·      SuperDuper ($27.95)
·      Stellar Drive Clone ($39)
·      Disk Utility (in-built)
·      Time Machine (can be in-built)

I would like readers to further contribute their experiences and suggestion related to above mentioned file recovery & repair utilities for Mac OS X. Any feedback in spite of good or bad is whole heartedly welcome. Cheers!!

Alarm: Mavericks Failing To Recognize Western Digital Drives.

Mavericks is the lastest version of Mac OS, It is a free upgrade available all over the Globe. It's a tender evolution of the Mac operating system on which Apple.inc was working for last few years . Whereas Mac is known for its butterly sharp graphical features and Mavericks contains a long list of such features, which make it look and feel like a Mac. But is this Really the future of the Mac?

Unfortunately, many glitches are coming along the new version of Mac OS X such as fair number of bugs in the mail application and in connecting Thunderbolt storage devices. These flaws are being consigned by apple in pending update. Instead of these problems, one serious problem on this perspective is: data loss on Western Digital storage devices.

An Email was sent by Western Digital to its customers regarding the disastrous interaction between Western Digital management software and OS X Mavericks. The collaboration between the smartest OS and the finest external hard drive doesn't seemed amazing at first place initially.
Further, W.D. warned it's customers that users having WD software (WD Drive Manager, WD Raid Manager and/or WD SmartWare) may lose data on their respective drives when connected OS X Mavericks.

According to the company, in most cases the data on the drive can be recovered with a third party software utility, if the user stops using the device immediately. In brief this means that if you are affected by this flaw then you will be forced to use third party recovery software, and this quickfix may also fail.

W.D. has removed some versions of its data mangement software after this disaster of data loss on WD external storage device. The complaints of the users were same i.e whether the drive won’t mount or their data is gone. The problem prevails in WD My Book products, plus storage devices from Seagate and LaCie. USB, FireWire and Thunderbolt connections.

WD is recklessly working to identify and resolve this issue, till then WD have taken those three apps down for now and stated this:

 “Until the issue is understood and the cause identified, WD strongly urges our customers to uninstall these software applications on their systems before updating to OS X Mavericks (10.9), or delay upgrading.”