PSD files "can't be found"

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
January 27, 2022
4 replies
1110 views

There was too much space on my macbook so I dragged all my design assets and mockups into my 1 TB hard drive. I erased everything on my desktop. However, When I use the hard drive to open a design mockup psd, it doesn't open and when I drag the psd file to photoshop, it says the file can't be found. Not sure what's going on but this is so stressful. Here are some pictures below. I tried to eject and re-do my hard drive, restart my computer, but nothing is working.

macOS

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jane-e

Community Expert

You tagged "macOS" — if you have Time Machine enabled, see if you can restore the files from there.

Jane

T

Test Screen Name

Legend

I notice this is on a WD passport disk, so far as I can see.

Does it actually work if you drag the file back onto your desktop, then open it?

R

rrjbergerAuthor

Participating Frequently

unfortunately it does not. when I do, it shows up like this...

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rrjbergerAuthor

Participating Frequently

sorry here's a better picture

D Fosse

Community Expert

If you can't open the file by (1) finding it in the drive's folder tree and (2) double-clicking it, it's most likely corrupt.

Not what you want to hear, but drag and drop used for file management is a bad habit. It's too unreliable, and if it goes wrong, you can't go back. The safe way is to copy-paste, and then you can delete the original when you have confirmed it's OK.

And then there's external drives, in themselves risky. Cables and connectors get jiggled all the time, they get worn out, and it's very easy to knock the connection out for a millisecond. That's enough. I've lost files that way, and, lesson learned, I never touch an external drive while transfer is in progress. I also replace cables regularly.

Three more words: backup, backup, backup.

R

rrjbergerAuthor

Participating Frequently

dang...I should have known. then are these files just lost? should I forget about them and throw them out since there's no way to save these corrupted files? Any backup resources you recommend too??