[Solved] File System Check Exit Code Is 8

The macOS personal computer is extremely popular with creative, professional, and home users. Mac OS X (and all other mac editions) is built upon Unix, and a Mac computer is normally an incredibly reliable piece of hardware. However, even the Mac can have a bad day and break down, and one of the most problematic Mac drive error messages seen at the Gillware Lab is the “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error message.

There are several symptoms that a Mac user may be experiencing when hitting the “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error:

• An internal Mac startup drive, SSD, memory card, or external hard drive will not mount
• The system directory or file system volume may have suffered damage from a virus attack
• No one can access the Mac computer file system, or users see file system errors and corrupt files
• Disk Utility First Aid is unable to repair the hard drive and displays the error code “File System Check Exit Code Is 8”
• On a segmented hard drive, you may be able to access another partition perfectly, even on the same volume, but you get the “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error on a specific partition
• Users are unable to force erase the disk even if explicit permissions granted in system settings
• The erase button or first aid button is greyed out in Mac disk utility

Logical or Physical Hard Drive Fault?

The “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” is one of the most frustrating file system errors to encounter, and it is difficult to know if you are experiencing a logical or physical fault on the hard drive. There are some checks we can recommend, but short of sending the drive to a data recovery professional, in many circumstances the disk will need to be reformatted to be usable once again, resulting in a total data loss.

This is where Gillware’s data recovery services can help. We are a specialist data recovery company with a lab in Madison, Wisconsin. For many users, the prospect of total data loss is not acceptable, and you might be faced with losing precious data files or valuable business data because of a “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error. But rest easy, Gillware is here to help.

The user must first decide whether the consequence of losing data to a “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error is worth reformatting or a home fix. If the data is of extreme importance, or if you are not comfortable (or technical enough) working on the hard drive, contact the experts at Gillware on 1-877-624-7206 or email gillware@gillware.com. We recommend you immediately stop using the disk and get the device ready for shipping. We will explain this process in detail shortly.

How to Diagnose and Fix File System Check Exit Code Is 8 with First Aid?

Mac OS X contains several built-in macOS utilities designed to troubleshoot file system errors, like “File System Check Exit Code Is 8.” Disk Utility is an intuitive application that is easy to use, but also very powerful when you look under the hood.

Disk Utility is designed to manipulate and manage disk partitioning and mount points on the mac computer.

First Aid is part of the disk utility program, but First Aid is designed to fix logical errors on any kind of attached file system, external drive, or SD Card.

Step 1 – Open the Disk Utility application, select the drive with the file system issue. You may need to click on “View” and select “Show All Devices” before the file system appears in the left pane of the Disk Utility system

Step 2 – With the drive selected, locate and press the First Aid button (left of the erase button) from inside Disk Utility. This process will attempt to diagnose the issue, or it will give some details on the exit code. We expect you will get something like this “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” exit code error message:

First Aid will only fix a logical mac file system error. It will keep reporting the exit code if the disk itself is corrupted (in the example above, a “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error). There is no way to know if your system is recoverable or not. You may get lucky, and First Aid may be able to repair the disk with a “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error, but it’s quite unlikely. In this circumstance, you need to get the disk shipped to the Gillware Data Recovery Lab to recover the data, or you can proceed with a file system format and Mac rebuild.

Contact the Experts at Gillware Data Recovery

Do you need the data back from a “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error urgently? You need Gillware! Get in touch today with the data recovery people. If you do move forward, you approve the price before any recovery work begins. You can raise a case via the Gillware data recovery website.

Upon arrival via our free shipping service, the hard drive will be cataloged so you can check the progress throughout the Gillware data lab. An initial investigation will take place, and the client will be given an estimated cost for recovery. If you decide not to proceed, that’s okay.

Upon diagnosis, the media will travel to the relevant lab, and we may need to rebuild the media in a cleanroom using spare parts from our extensive parts library. However, most Exit Code drive errors, such as the “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error, are logical errors. This is where our proprietary data recovery software, known as Hombre, takes over. You may have tried searching for Mac data recovery software online, but professional data recovery software like Hombre before is only available to data recovery experts.

Hombre uses advanced techniques to reconstruct the data files on the media, and in most “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” error cases, our data recovery software can pull the data off the drive and build a new image. The recovered data is copied to an encrypted drive, with your original folder structure intact, and shipped back to you; the password is sent separately.

Diagnosis and Repair:

How to Fix “File System Check Exit Code Is 8” Error in Single User Mode

Some guides use Single User Mode to start the Mac with the internal drive unmounted and run the fsck command against it directly. We don’t recommend it here. fsck writes changes to the drive, and on a drive that is already reporting exit code 8, those writes can overwrite the very structures a recovery depends on. If the files matter, stop here and talk to us before you try anything else.

If First Aid keeps failing, treat the drive as failing: leave it as it is, don’t run more checks, and contact Gillware Data Recovery at 877-624-7206. Our engineers image the drive first and work from the copy, so the original is not written to again.

Perform a Filesystem Format and macOS Recovery

Erasing the drive and reinstalling macOS will clear the exit code 8 error, but it also destroys the data on the drive, and in most cases that can’t be undone. Don’t erase, reformat or reinstall macOS until you are sure you don’t need anything that is stored only on this drive.

If the files matter, stop before you reach that point. Leave the Mac or drive as it is and contact us first. Once your data is recovered or safely backed up, rebuilding the file system is a reasonable way to get the Mac running again.