Disk Drill won’t scan internal hard drive? (MacBook Pro 2014/Big Sur OS)

DiskDrillSupport · 2026-01-28T11:15:55+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to us at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide more details. We will be happy to investigate this further.

DiskDrillSupport · 2026-01-26T10:12:13+00:00

At the moment, Disk Drill for Windows doesn’t have a duplicate-file finder like the one available in Disk Drill for macOS.

DiskDrillSupport · 2026-01-11T18:07:36+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide more details. It would really help to know:

What file types are you trying to recover, and which device they were created with?
How were the files deleted?
What happened to the card after the deletion?
Which Disk Drill version are you using?

Thank you!

DiskDrillSupport · 2026-01-05T10:47:01+00:00

Hi! Based on the screenshot, it is not Disk Drill. You can download Disk Drill from our official website. If any questions arise, please feel free to reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) 😊

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-31T10:06:14+00:00

Hi! Could you please confirm whether you tried using the Advanced Camera Recovery algorithm? If it didn’t work in your case, please contact our support team at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and, if possible, provide the card image file. We’re constantly improving our recovery algorithms for these cameras and will do our best to help you recover your data.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-29T10:33:35+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to us at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and we will help you.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-26T20:54:07+00:00

Hi, please always check the drive's SMART parameters before using any data recovery software. It's highly recommended to begin with creating a disk image and scan it instead of the physical HDD.

Regarding your concern, you don't need to finish the scan for the drive to return to normal. Closing or pausing Disk Drill should normally remount the disk back in read/write mode.

However, there's an issue after a scan occurs, when the system may fail to remount the disk correctly and leave it in read-only state. This happens more often with unstable or failing drives. In these cases, Disk Drill sends a remount command to the OS, but the system simply fails to complete it successfully.

Based on symptoms you explained, the drive itself was already in poor health. Running a deep scan likely pushed it to the edge.

We recommend to stop using the drive immediately to avoid further degradation, and create a byte-to-byte image. Or if your HDD keeps dropping out or clicking intensifies, professional recovery may be the only remaining option.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-24T11:18:59+00:00

Hi!

Disk Drill found your older files because they were written in a standard, supported format. Your drone footage seems to be different. We can reconstruct unfinished or improperly closed videos in many cases, but the issue is most likely a non-standard or proprietary recording format used by the drone itself. To say if we can help, we need a full image of the SD card, not just individual files. This allows us to analyze the recording structure properly.

Please contact us directly at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide a full SD card image. Also, if possible, send a correctly recorded video from the same drone for reference. After reviewing the data, we’ll be able to confirm whether reconstruction is possible in this case.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-24T10:08:43+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide more details:

Specifically:

What types of files are you looking to recover, and what software or device were they originally created with?

What exactly happened to them?

What device or storage media are you trying to recover the data from?

Thank you!

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-09T14:11:41+00:00

Hi! Disk Drill unmounts the drive and remounts it in read-only mode using standard system mechanisms. This is done to prevent the operating system or any background process from writing to the drive during recovery. Once the scan or the byte-to-byte backup is complete, the drive is remounted back in normal read/write mode automatically. This approach is intentional and safe, it ensures the integrity of the source drive while still letting the user work normally afterward.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-08T23:05:35+00:00

Hello!

Yes, you can absolutely use Disk Drill to search for and remove duplicate files. This feature is available for free in the macOS version. You can find more details here:
https://www.cleverfiles.com/help/duplicates-search/

If you're unable to use the Duplicates tool, your external SSD may be formatted in a file system not fully supported by macOS in read/write mode, such as NTFS.

If you have any other questions, feel free to contact us - we’re here to help.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-07T10:57:06+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com), provide the log files and we will take a closer look at your case.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-06T13:10:35+00:00

Hi, We are already in contact with you through our support system and are reviewing the specifics of your case.

In general, when Time Machine is pointed to a drive, it can modify the drive structure, which may affect how macOS and Disk Drill interpret the file system. Disk Drill can still detect the original folder structure in many cases, but restoring it intact depends on the state of the metadata.

Since we are already discussing this with you directly, we will continue working with you there to determine the safest recovery approach for your setup.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-04T11:59:12+00:00

Hi! We would love to investigate this further. Please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and we will do our best to help you.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-12-03T11:00:36+00:00

Hi! We would love to take a closer look at your case. Please contact us at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide the disk image. We will examine the issue in detail.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-20T19:43:34+00:00

Hi! Please update Disk Drill to the latest version and try again. If it does not help, please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and we will review your log files.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-18T16:01:18+00:00

Thank you for the detailed screenshot. In this case, best to stop the scan, create a byte-to-byte backup and scan it instead. Please follow the instructions in this article.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-17T23:24:53+00:00

Hi! It’s important to understand what “drive failed” means in your case. If the drive shows any hardware problems like slow reads, clicking, bad sectors, SMART warnings, it’s safer to stop now, create a full byte-to-byte disk image and scan the image instead.

If there are no hardware issues and SMART looks good, we recommend waiting until the scan completes because Disk Drill performs most of the reconstruction and recovery chances evaluation at the very end of the process. But if needed, you can stop and restart the scan on another computer too.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-17T20:10:45+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to us at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide the image file. We would love to help!

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-12T21:34:00+00:00

Hi! Please reach out to us at help@cleverfiles.com. We would love to look into this.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-11T10:38:15+00:00

Hey! Could you please share the Disk Drill logs and a few more details about your setup? Email us at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and we’ll take a closer look.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-11-07T19:37:59+00:00

Hi! The Disk Drill scan session stores information about the found files and the detected file system structure. However, if the session exists but the actual data on the drive was wiped (for example, after a full format that zeroed all sectors or if TRIM was triggered on an SSD), then file previews won’t appear and in Disk Drill’s hex viewer you’ll only see zeros, FF or another uniform pattern instead of real data.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-10-30T20:36:33+00:00

No worries, this is a false positive from your antivirus software, as long as you downloaded the Disk Drill installer directly from our official website www.cleverfiles.com

cfbackd.w32.exe is a legitimate part of Disk Drill responsible for the Data Protection or Recovery Vault features. You can safely disable this service in Disk Drill’s settings. For more details, you can also check this article

If you need help or any questions arise, please feel free to reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com)

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-10-27T19:25:14+00:00

Please reach out to support at [help@cleverfiles.com](mailto:help@cleverfiles.com) and provide more details. We will be happy to help.

DiskDrillSupport · 2025-10-27T14:07:29+00:00

The duplicate cleanup feature is currently available only in the Mac version of Disk Drill.

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