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From a MicroMat has notified TechTool Pro owners that "...we're pleased to announce that our new product, Drive 10, will be shipping on July 18th. This is a fantastic new drive utility for those of you who are using OS X. We are currently reserving copies of this new program. We also offer a special side-grade price for those of you who own TechTool Pro 3. Reserve yours at our online store."

Drive 10 will be the the first dedicated commercial drive utility for Mac OS X. Sporting a sleek Aqua interface, this advanced disk repair and recovery product has been designed exclusively for Mac OS X. In addition to repairing drives and recovering data, Drive 10 offers the additional benefit of providing automatic, regular backups of important volume structure data. This feature can make data and drive recovery far easier and more reliable.

Clent Richardson Apple Computer Inc.V.P. Worldwide Developer Relations, commented:

"Mac OS X users are going to be delighted by our next generation operating system's combination of simplicity, reliability and power. We're thrilled that Drive10 will be available for Mac OS X from day one, giving our users immediate access to one of the best disk and file analysis tools on the market."

There are a variety of invisible files, settings, and parameters that the OS X file system uses to locate files, free disk space, and for other maintenance and management routines. These are known collectively as the Volume Structure. The Catalog and Disk Directory are parts of the volume structure. Damage to these and other critical structures can result in lost or damaged data that could require a complete reformat of the media. Reformatting a drive destroys ALL data on the media.

Drive 10 will be able to scan your drives and repair problems related to the numerous structures that are necessary for the volume to operate correctly. If problems are found, Drive 10 can often repair these problems and bring your drive back to life in only a few minutes. When Drive 10 finds a problem, it will build a new set of volume structures instead of patching the old structures like other utilities do. This is the surest and safest method of recovering your valuable data.

While Drive 10 is a new product, it is derived from TechTool Pro, Micromat’s proven diagnostic and repair utility. Using TechTool’s time-tested routines as well as some new routines developed exclusively for OS X, Drive 10 offers many tools for checking and repairing any drive on your system (see test list for details).

Drive 10 Test List:
• Unit Ready
Ascertains the drive's ability to receive commands.
• Supply Voltage
Checks the power supply voltage level that powers your drive!
• Self-Diagnostic
Runs manufacturer's self-test on the drive.
• Rezero Unit
Determines the drive's ability to resynchronize and rezero the read/write heads.
• Format Check
Establishes whether the drive was properly formatted during initial setup.
• Spare Sectors
Checks the service tracks to isolate whether there are enough spare blocks for block repairs.
• Surface Scan
Checks entire media surface for defects that could cause read or write errors. Blocks are repaired by remapping.
• Random Read
Used in conjunction with the Random Write test, reads data from a random memory location.
• Random Write
Used in conjunction with the Random Read test, writes data from a random memory location.
• Seek
This test checks the ability of the initiator to position the device heads in preparation for access to a particular logical block.
• Linear Read
Used in conjunction with the Linear Write test, reads a linear set of blocks from the drive.
• Linear Write
Used in conjunction with the Linear Read test, writes a linear set of blocks to the drive.
• Read Buffer
This test is used in conjunction with the WRITE BUFFER command as a diagnostic function for testing the drive's buffer cache and bus integrity.
• Write Buffer
This test is used in conjunction with the READ BUFFER command as a diagnostic function for testing the drive's buffer cache and bus integrity.
• Volume Structure
Tests and repairs critical volume structure elements like Volume Header, Extents File, Catalog File, Attributes, etc.

System Requirements
• OS X Compatible Macintosh
• OS X Final Release 1
• 64 Megabytes RAM
• CD-ROM or DVD Drive

For more information, visit:
http://www.micromat.com/drive10.html

Charles W. Moore

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