I'm having an odd problem that I can't figure out. I have a fairly new iMac (the aluminum one). It originally had Tiger on it, then Leopard came out 1 week later. I upgraded to Leopard once it came out. I then purchased the Snow Leopard upgrade, and upgraded my iMac to SL.
I've been running SL great on it for several weeks now (since SL was released). I haven't had any issues, except with Time Machine. I wanted to do a verify/repair disk on the HD, so I attempted to boot my iMac from DVD.
It did not boot automatically to DVD, so I attempted a "C" during startup to boot from my DVD. After about 5-10 mins of waiting, it dropped me into "Safe Boot". I can not seem to boot it from the DVD.
I rebooted my iMac, and double clicked the install icon from the DVD. It's giving me the following error:
"Mac OS X 10.6 cannot be installed on this machine"
It's claiming that I need v10.5 or higher to install. I'm currently at 10.6.1, so I'm not sure what it's complaining about.
Has anyone had or seen this issue before? All I'm trying to do, is perform a repair disk on my HD...but I can't even boot from my DVD anymore.
Yesterday my screen (30" Apple Cinema) started showing symptoms of graphics card failure, jagged lines across the screen. I rebooted my Mac Pro and it was gone. Then it happened again an hour later, this time the machine didn't boot, I get the Apple logo, and then it hangs up and the screen is shifted to left (I get apple logo on left side of the monitor instead of the middle) and jagged lines all over.
So the first thing I tested was using Target Disk Mode, it works. I can access my Mac Pro's internal HD's by TDM from my MacBook Pro. Then I tested single user mode, it does boot, I can't read what's written since the screen is shifted to left, but if I type (without seeing) reboot and hit enter, it reboots. So I assume the single user mode is working.
What else can I try to 100% make sure it's my graphics card that failed and everything else is ok with Mac Pro? I already ordered a graphics card replacement but I wouldn't like to be surprised if the Mac Pro still doesn't boot when the card arrives. It won't boot from Apple Startup DVD either. Same thing happens, gray logo then kernel panic with jagged lines all across the shifted screen.
In my attempt to install Windows XP via Boot Camp, I accidentally inserted an SP1 disc instead of the SP2 disc that I have. The installation proceeded to the point where it does for most who attempt this: the screen where you are prompted to press ENTER. I could not proceed and therefore restarted the iMac and held down the mouse button upon start-up to remove the CD.
HERE IS THE PROBLEM:I can not boot into OS X because the keyboard shortcuts (those that might allow me to select which partition to boot from and/or reset PRAM) seem to be disabled. Instead, a reboot always ends at a black screen with a blinking DOS-esque cursor, or the prompt: "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key."
I have attempted inserting my SP2 disc at this point, to no avail. My keyboard seems to be disabled, as if the SP1 install proceeded just enough to establish itself as the boot drive without drivers for the keyboard. I've tried using all 3 USB ports, disconnecting other USB devices. Oddly, my bluetooth mouse works to eject the CD on reboot...
So I have been running into a bunch of weird issues lately (got errors on emptying the trash, FCP is acting all crashy, couldn't unmount an internal disk to format it, etc) so I wanted to run the hardware test that is on the installer disk that came with my MP. Problem is, the machine won't boot from the disk. If I boot holding down the D key it boots to a grey screen and a dialog box pops up for a second and then *poof* the computer shuts down. It happens so quick there is literally no chance to read what it says. If I boot holding down option and try to click the install disk I immediately hang, the mouse doesn't respond anymore and I'm screwed and need to hard restart.
So I figured "hey I got a backup, I'll just reinstall OS X". Nope, still won't boot using the "install Mac OS X" from the disk. I click restart and I just get a grey screen again and nothing happens. I hear the drive spin up and then spin down and silence. Everything is disconnected from the computer except for my screen my keyboard and mouse.
Everything is up to date. Zapped pram, repaired permission and ran cron scripts via Onyx so I am at a loss what to do now. This is troubling because even if I have a problem I have no way of reinstalling the OS. I can work because the computer is working almost normally but this worries me.
This is a new MP 2.8.
Everything has been working tip top until this morning.
EDIT - I bought SL for my MBP so I have the retail disk. I was able to boot from that but it doesn't have the hardware test so it still looks like I am SOL for now.
My powerbook was working fine but i shut i down over night and when i turned it on the next morning it refused to boot. All i got was a grey screen with the folder icon which flash between a question mark and the finder icon.
We've got a MacBook that's not booting. It gives a question mark when we turn it on.
I've tried resetting the PRAM and SMC, to no avail.
I've tried booting holding Option to list all bootable volumes, and nothing is listed unless I put the install DVD in.
I've booted from the restore disks, and tried to reimage the MacBook, but no volumes showed up to install to.
I tried Disk Utility off the install DVD, and it listed no bootable volumes.
I tried System Profiler off the install DVD, and it said "There was an error while scanning for Serial-ATA devices."
Is this absolutely for sure a hardware issue? this guy seems to have solved almost the same problem without, but I'm not able to reinstall like he did (it gives me no volumes to install to).
I don't have much time and need to know whether to send it in to Apple or not. Being that we're past 90 days, they won't give us tech support over the phone, so if it's not a hardware problem, we're going to get charged, and other circumstances dictate that the computer either be fixed or installed ASAP.
I have mac os x version 10.5.7 running on a macbook pro 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo. And my boot camp version is 2.0.
I installed windows vista via boot camp, then uninstalled it following the procedures in the boot camp help file. However after uninstalling windows, whenever I start my laptop it is unable to boot into mac automatically. And after a while shows a screen showing an error that it could not find a bootable drive. So I have to manually press alt(option) button and select the Mac drive to boot into mac os. There is no other os installed than mac.
Whenever I turn on my computer, I see a flashing folder icon, occasionally interspaced with a globe icon. I read elsewhere that this lasts for several minutes, but it can go on for an hour without pause. I tried booting up from my install disc, but couldn't get the computer to acknowledge it.
I was able to start installing with a 10.5 upgrade disc, but was unable to complete it because the computer did not already have 10.4 or later on the HD (for the record, I was on 10.5.8 before it crashed). I tried restarting it from the Network.
I can't even access my HD through a firewire cable; the HD simply won't show up on the host computer's screen. I'm pretty sure this means that my HD is hosed, but I thought I'd ask to make sure.
I ran the Boot Camp Assistant to partition my hard drive, and it successfully created the "BOOTCAMP" drive. When it asked for my installation CD, I tried loading a Windows 7 installation partition through a USB hard drive, but the assistant would not recognize it as an install disk. So, I closed out of the assistant early, leaving the Boot Camp partition in place but Windows non-installed. Eventually, I rebooted my machine in an attempt to boot directly from the USB drive and resume installation.
However, I found the machine will not boot at all. It powers on normally, makes the startup sound, but after a few seconds I'm left with just a flashing folder and question mark icon. Holding down Option-key at startup does nothing. Trying to boot from my Snow Leopard disc by holding down C or D during startup does nothing. Holding down Command-S does nothing. Holding down Shift-key does nothing. Resetting the PRAM does nothing. I have also tried booting from a Windows 7 install DVD -- the drive spends an extra 20 seconds or so scanning the disk, but then skips directly to the flashing question mark.
What can I do? Is there some way I can access the EFI to make sure the correct startup disk is selected? Why am I unable to boot from my CD drive?
I was using my MacBook pro, it required an update, when the update was finished and it went to restart. It began to restart like normal, the chime went, the fan startedup, it went to the grey screen with the apple, the wheel started turning but that's as far as it gets. It won't go further then this screen, the wheel just keeps spinning.
I have a new MacMini without the optiocal drive. This is a computer that someone tried to put Linux on and left it was a 100gb partition for the MacOS and the rest for the Linux installation. I want to get it back to one large partition.
I know that I need to get the computer to boot from something else because the Recovery partition is on the HDD. To that end I have tried to boot this from an external USB DVD-RW drive and when it starts to boot from the disk it reads the DVD and then goes to the 'circle/slash' screen. I then made a USB drive bootable and restored the dmg file for my Lion disk to it and tried to boot from that. It shows in the options and then immediately goes to the 'circle/slash' screen. I tried to flash the PRAM and got the same result. I tested both items on another MacMini and they work. The test computer was a previous model with the optical drive.
Out of no-where my MBP froze after bring it out of sleep mode. I held down the power button and when turning it on it stuck at the grey spinning circle screen. I tried:
1) reset PRAM
2) booting to recovery partition and repair permissions and disk.Disk repair failed, can't recall the exact error.
3) booting to 10.7 CD that I made from my Lion AppStore download and repairing permissions and disk. Disk repair failed, can't recall the exact error.
I had a spare drive lying around so I opened it up and replaced the drive. Booted to the Lion DVD, formatted the drive and install Lion. Everything installed no problems. After the install I downloaded all of my applications and starting restoring all of my data from a backup drive. After getting almost all of my things set up to my liking the machine hung. I held down the power button and then pressed power again to turn on the machine. After the Apple logo screen the dreaded flashing question mark came onto the screen.
I can take either of these two HDDs and place them into an enclosure and read/write data on the disk without a problem so it seems unlikely that I had two bad (flaky) HDDs. I tried inserting my 10.6 and 10.5 install discs and holding D before the grey screen to start the hardware diagnostics tool but it just boots onto a black screen with a white cursor in the top left corner. I'm afraid to let it sit at this screen too long because the machine gets pretty hot near the display hinge.
I have an intel iMac (2.4 Ghz C2D) and at the beginning of the year I purchased a Drobo. I have all my data on the Drobo, and decided to move my home folder to the Drobo. I discovered I could not boot as the admin if the Drobo was not connected.
I want to use Super Duper to clone my HD on an external so I can boot from it on my Macbook when I travel. My internal HD on the iMac is 320GB but only 60GB is used (applications). The home folder on the Drobo is 300GB's in size. If I partitioned a 500GB drive say one partition being the home folder and the other partition the internal drive on my iMac would I be able to boot from the external?
I am having trouble loading window XP pro OEM sp2 using Bootcamp on my macbook OSX 10.5.8 It gets through copying all the files and reboots successfully through to the install window and the setup program for windows (where it displays various marketing info and has dot buttons down the left hand side). It says it will take 39 mins to setup but the counter never changes and I have left it up to an hour and nothing happens although once I did get a disk error message (something about cleaning the CD - can't remember exactly). I am doing full installs and have tried FAT and NTFS. At first I thought it was because it was an OEM but it is a Microsoft OEM and other people online seem to have no problems installing and if there is a problem it seems to stall well before the setup window. Is this a dud CD or version of windows or am I just doing something wrong?
I just got my Mac Pro in the mail today. I put two new disks into it, a 80 gb music drive and a 320 gb disk to use for windows.
Whenever I put in my windows disk and it asks me to choose which disk to install windows on and I recieve errors. Please excuse me I am very ill and have an awful headache and have been trying to get this worked out for a few hours now.
The first error I received was this: "Windows is unable to find a system volume that meets its criteria for installation."
There is a workaround page here but it hasnt helped me at all.
I'm trying to install vista on my second disk, a seagate 300gb. The music drive is formatted to fat 32. I've even tried removing my os x and music drive and just boot off the windows dvd.. nothing. Any clue as to why it wouldnt work right? I have read other threads about this but they havent been resolved... it so bogus!
When executing a find (command f) in the finder, it appears the find does not work on any non-boot drive.
For example, in my Mac Pro (10.5.6), the find command works fine for the boot device, but when selecting another internal drive or a connected server in the resulting finder window, the find never returns any results, even if I search for a known file.
I am in desperate need of some help. I own a MacBook running OS X Leopard, I love the mac but I prefer the Windows for its compatibility.
I have a Windows XP Pro disk (But it is a copy) and I partitioned a space on my hard drive. I inserted the disk and it rebooted. Now here is the problem.
When Leopard boots up with the welcome tune, it stays at a grey screen. Only after a while the apple sign starts and it doesn't do anything from there. I left it on for a whole night and still, nothing.
I tried holding down the Option key when it booted up, now this is the only way I can start up on my Leopard OS. Then I tried booting it up from the Windows disk. The screen went black and it came up with this message:
"No bootable devise, please insert the disk and press any key..."
Am I doing something wrong? If I am please answer with a detailed response because I do need detailed steps to know what I am doing.
I have an SSD for my MacBook. It is running Snow Leopard with all the latest updates applied. Everything was great.
I partitioned a 40GB partition for Windows 7 installation by Boot Camp AssistantDisk Partition. It then prompted me to insert a Windows 7 disk and then it restarted.
The tragedy is that when I choose the Windows 7 Ultimate Installation DVD at system boot up, the drive whizzes for a short while and then just seems to hang the system with a grey screen.
No matter what bootable disk I put in the MacBook DVD drive - either CD or DVD, Windows xp or vista neither could work.
how to create a bootable backup of my Macintosh HD on a LaCie 500GB USB external HDD which is 2-3 years old. I formatted the drive with a GUID partition table scheme, with the volume formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), which I believe is the correct setup.
However, when I try to boot from the external HDD by holding down Option key during startup, I do not get the boot menu, instead the computer freezes at a blank grey screen and doesn't boot anything. If I remove the USB drive and do the same, the boot menu appears with Macintosh HD as the only choice (as would be expected).
When booting up normally it goes to a screen with an apple in the middle, and then some kernal panic code comes up:
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x002E1904) unable to find driver for this platform: "PowerMac12,1"
That's the first line of the code.
Anyway, i want to simply format the whole system and start from scratch with the system disk supplied with the imac. However, when i put it into the machine and press C at start up, it goes to an apple screen and hangs on that apple screen and does nothing else.
I've tried pressing the alt key and going into the boot options and booting from the CD there. However, that goes to the apple screen, then a little ajax style loading thing comes up. That sits there for a while until the apple turns to a "stop" style sign. This continues to hang.
I've tried resetting the PRAM and NVRAM by holding the Command, Option, P, and R buttons. Holding theses makes the computer reboot a few times until i let go. Once thats done, nothing changes.
I've tried holding X while loading up, this just goes back to the panic code.
I've tried holding shift while loading up, this again just goes back to the panic code.
I've cleaned the system CD and it makes no difference.
There is a strange thing happening with my iMac. I have a Core Duo 2.0 GHz with 2GB of RAM. I'm now using the most recent Apple USB keyboard with the chicklet keys.
I no longer can boot off a DVD or CD using this keyboard. Let's say I insert the install disk or the restore disk and hold down C or D, whichever is appropriate. Instead of starting off the disk, it simply reboots.
I also can't zap PRAM because of this nor can I start off an external HD. I have tried a Logitech diNovo keyboard and some goofy iHome keyboard and the same thing occurs.
Computer: Macbook Pro 15" 2.66GHz i7 / 4GB DDR3 Model #: A1286 (Mid 2010) OS: SL 10.6.8
Having some issues with MBP (slow performance, Oulook issues, etc.), attempting to resolve by repairing disk permissions and repairing disk. Disk Utility returns the following: Incorrect number of extended attributes(It should be 390460 instead of 390459) The volume Macintosh HD was found corrupt and needs to be repaired.Error: This disk needs to be repaired. ...then use Disk Utility to repair this disk. Disk Utility stopped verifying "Macintosh HD" This disk needs to be repaired. Start up your computer with another disk (such as your Mac OS X installation disc), and then use Disk Utility to repair this disk. So, I was unable to find my OE cd's. I purchased the SL Replacement Install DVD from apple and attempted to boot from it. Holding c or option during startup to attempt to boot from DVD were unfruitful. Computer hangs on Apple logo, allowed to sit for 20+ minutes with no progress. DVD spins up and can hear it, then stops. SuperDrive works fine when booted and can read DVD no problem. Reset PRAM during startup successfully, hold c or option and no luck - still hangs. What more can I do?
I am trying to switch from MS to apple so I decided to buy a used MacBook online as a test. I got the MacBook only to discover that the buyer didnt give me the admin password, I thought "ok I got disks I can just redownload Mavericks and install" ... well I ended getting a 10.6 install dvd but was unable to boot from it because of another password.
I asked the girl I got it off about this and she claimed they didnt know and bought it like that aswell(still useable but cant install anything). Is there anyway I can get it to reinstall or atleast create another user acc. or did I get ripped... it is a MacBook 2009 5,2
I have an aluminum macbook, from made around January 09. The issue is I need to repair the hdd using the osx install disc. The problem is that when I try to do so, boot using the disc, it just restarts to the hdd, it will not boot from the disc. I try holding c and I have tried setting the disc as the startup disc and it just goes in this never ending circle of restarting and restarting. I've never seen this before.
I've created a Snow Leopard boot disk using this method link. I created it on a 16GB CF Disk. I've tried it twice. First time I formatted the disk as eXfat with 1 partition. Next time I used Mac OS Extended for a 7Gig partition and fat32 for the rest.
Upon boot I get the normal install stuff like I do with the DVD, but then no hard disk shows up. I thought it was because of the eXfat which is why I tried again. I looked into the system profiler and I can see my seagate hard disk, but under disk utility it doesn't exist. My Sata DVD drive shows up though. If I boot off of the DVD I can see and install to my hard disk.
I'm trying to make a USB Disk because I'm planning on getting a SSD and I will be removing the Dvd drive.
Late last night, I ran into some problems with my iBook G3. It's the 700 Mhz model, with 384MB of RAM. Nothing else special in terms of hardware config (unless an Airport card is special). OS X 10.2.8.
Basically, the computer seemed to hang and I did a hard reboot, and upon starting up I got a folder with a flashing ? .
I can't seem to find my Install disc 1 to run Disk Utility or just boot up - hopefully I will find that when I go home tonight (or maybe I left it at my parent's place), but I checked using the Hardware Test CD and it didn't detect any problems.
I am having problems opening the CD drive, so I've had to open it using a paperclip. Sometimes it doesn't appear to be using the CD.
I also have run the Micromat test CD that came with Applecare (of course this machine is almost 4 years old so that's finished...) and it detected a problem with the Read Buffer last night, but then I guess the battery ran out while it was on the last test.
This morning, I ran the Read Buffer, Write Buffer, and Volume structure tests and the first two passed very fast (unlike last night), but the Volume Structure test failed. I'm not surprised since I've been aware I have issues with this before. I tried to repair before going to work but at one point it seemed to hang so I gave it another hard reboot.
Last night, I would sometimes get the apple logo with the spinning "clock", and sometimes I would get the ? but it would never get to the login screen.
i would like to reserve my 4th bay for windows only drive and a software raid will be used for these.
what would you think is a better set-up,
3x internal drives (all of the same model, probably WD 640's) set in raid 0 (both serve as boot drive and scratch disk) occupying bays 1, 2, and 3. In this set-up, everything (DVD's, music, photos, final cut media) would be stored on this array.
