Comments on: How to fix the Invalid Sibling Link error

By: SAMUEL

SAMUEL — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 14:52:58 +0000

It works!!! thanks!! I almost gave up and thanks God I found your website! Thank you!!

By: Ivan

Ivan — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 10:22:22 +0000

Thank you so much for saving my data!

By: Dave Frey

Dave Frey — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 20:58:18 +0000

You just saved me a lot of data (3 weeks and 10000 km from my TM backup). Thanks for your clear, careful post. I shot you a paypal donation.

FWIW, I did lose a few iPhoto “events,” photos and all; I’m guessing fsck_hfs does a best effort repair and couldn’t get everything back.

Now I’ve been duly prodded into researching a proper on-the-road backup strategy…

By: David

David — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 08:59:42 +0000

I tried your original suggestion and nothing happened. I then ran fsck -fy and saw that the disk was 05. I then re-ran fsck_hfs -r /dev/disk0s5 and now get the message “The volume Macintosh HD could not be repaired.” What do you suggest? Is any data retrievable? thanks much!
Dave

By: introspectif

introspectif — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 02:48:30 +0000

You’re welcome, Anton and Clarissa :)

By: Clarissa

Clarissa — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 19:19:51 +0000

Thank you SO much. Your instructions were easy to run, but my HD seemed way too messed up. After 15 min and loads of checking and repairing, it finally said UNABLE TO REPAIR.
Thanks to Henrik Christiansen’s comment saying he tried fsck -fy after repair failled, this was what did it for me! So thanks to everyone you has taken the time to post as well. Will definetly keep you bookmarked mahalkita.

By: Anton

Anton — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 09:43:07 +0000

Thanks a lot from Amsterdam! You just saved me a lot of time!

By: introspectif

introspectif — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 23:01:48 +0000

(replied Peter via email)

By: Peter de Beer

Peter de Beer — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 21:08:06 +0000

Something makes me think I am repairing the wrong drive?
**checking Volume Information.
Invalid volume file count
(it should be 781324 instead of 781323)
invalid volume free block count
(it should be 13568147 instead of 13568170)
Volume Header needs minor repair (2, 0)
.
.
.
**The volume Macintosh HD was repaired successfully.

***** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED*****

I know what I was doing wrong. I was repairing the internal HD, which is fine. Using Disk Utility, it says my external HD is disk 2 partition 0 ,

I tried that

fsck_hfs -r /dev/disk2s0

and it says:

cant stat /dev/disk2s0
cant stat /dev/disk2s0: No such file or directory

By: Peter de Beer

Peter de Beer — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 20:34:14 +0000

I Ran Disk Utility, Repair Disk, and it told me ‘Invalid Sibling Link’. I then rebooted and held down command S, and booted into single mode.
I ran the commad you suggested, and it found a problem with the amount of file numbers, and corrected the problem -and said repair successful. Then, I ran the verification to check again, and it was all good. When I rebooted, still the drive did not mount. When I ran the procedure again, it again found files didnt match and corrected the problem. But on reboot, still the drive wont mount. I guess I have a dodgy drive?

By: introspectif

introspectif — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 22:53:44 +0000

You’re welcome, Adam :)

By: Adam Walczak

Adam Walczak — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 18:42:07 +0000

Thank you so much!

My computer had this error while I am out of the country - so I couldn’t get to an Apple Store.

It worked perfectly - saved me from having to go service tech and pay a lot of money.

Thanks again!

By: introspectif

introspectif — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 12:34:51 +0000

You’re welcome, SanMichele and istara :)

By: istara

istara — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 12:19:10 +0000

It has worked! I had to run the terminal command twice: the first time seemed to repair some things, but then had a Bus Error.

However the second time it repaired successfully, and now mounts and can be accessed again.

introspectif: thank you SO much, you have saved my sanity (and my data!)

By: istara

istara — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 11:56:08 +0000

OK I am trying the Terminal command now, so far I have:

** /dev/rdisk1s12
** Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
** Checking Extents Overflow file.
** Checking Catalog file.
** Rebuilding Catalog B-tree.

How long should I wait? eg how long should the rebuilding take and how will I know if/when it has happened or not?

By: SanMichele

SanMichele — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 03:04:04 +0000

Deo Gratias! It worked on my Black MacBook the very first time!!! Thanks so much all of you! SanMichele+

By: introspectif

introspectif — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 06:29:50 +0000

You’re welcome :)

By: Henrik Christiansen

Henrik Christiansen — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 00:36:25 +0000

Wait, nevermind. I ran fsck -fy, and it managed to repair it.
Thank you so much for this guide!

By: Henrik Christiansen

Henrik Christiansen — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 00:35:10 +0000

I had the same problem, but when I ran the first command it had three attempts, then it gave up.
It says that some directories are missing, and then “The volume Macintosh HD could not be repaired after 3 attempts.

FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED”

Any tips are greatly appreciated!

By: Davy W

Davy W — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 22:39:16 +0000

This worked for me too, many thanks I thought it was a lost cause.