Replaced hard drive, now can't boot from install disc to restore backup

Yesterday, my hard drive died (disk warrior informed me, that HD had irrecoverable errors, and my iMac would shut down unless it was booted from the Disk Warriorr disc).
Today, I have a new internal HD professionally installed. And when I brought it home, and installed Snow I got an error at the end of the installation "OS could not be installed, restart or choose start up disk" or something to that effect. However, on licking OK I got the snow music, and welcome movie nd eerything seemed to be working fine.
I can log in normally and have get to my desktop, but on trying to boot from the Snow Leopard disk (10.6), I get to the gray screen with the apple logo and hang. I have tried resetting Pram/firmware and also ran the fdisk command (twice).
It seems too much of a concidence that my hard drive and now my disc drive would die all in span of two days? I can hear the disc noise, but as I mentioned I cant get beyond the gray screen on trying to boot from the disc.
Suggestions?
Late Nov '07 intel iMac. And I did update the OS to 10.6.4. Install disc is 10.4.

Return it to the repair station.

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Just replaced my hard drive. Can't boot from install disc.

Hello all. I just bought a powerbook (1ghz) from a person I work with. The hard drive was not working and she did not want it anymore. I paid her for the computer and bought a new hard drive. With the new hard drive installed, I can not get it to read from the combo drive. I kept trying to boot to the install disc and it kept ejecting the dvd. Then I tried to boot to the hardware test.....still no luck. Then the combo drive started making a very loud noise and now it is not spinning and will not eject my disc. Any thoughts?
thanks in advance.
PowerBook G4 12" 1ghz

As a first step, I would have triple checked all the connections from the optical drive inside the powerbook.. but it's not unheard of for the drives to just die.
You can install MacOS X onto the system via an external firewire DVD drive (Firewire only, not USB2.0), or you can put the system into Firewire Target Disk Mode (hold down T as soon as you hear the startup sound), plug it into another Mac, and run the installer on that system, or you can buy a new DVD drive (such as the Pioneer K06 for around $100, or have a look in the drive compatibility database at xlr8yourmac.com).
I hope you got the Powerbook for a good price...

Replaced faulty hard drive now can't boot from Snow Leopard.

Hi there,
As it says I replaced my internal WD 250gb drive in my late 2006 2.16ghz imac . I followed the tutorials on the net to the tee yet upon trying to boot from Snow Leopard after firing it back up all I get is the Apple logo and the timer . I've tried holding C to no avail . I've held Alt to select the OSX disc yet it still won't boot to get me to Disc Utility . I've even put the old hard drive back in . When I hold Alt on start up it shows the drive and the disc but will boot from neither when selected . I've tried to get the Snow Leopard disc to eject so I can try my originals but it won't even do that . I'm convinced I haven't damaged anything but I'm at my wits end ! Does anybody have any ideas how to get the Leopard disc out so I can at least try from my originals ? The drive I've installed is compatible it's a 1tb WD . I also triple checked all the connections and they all seam sound . Really appreciate your help lads as I wanted to give the iMac to my daughter when we get a new one .

You will first need to prep the new drive using Disk Utility on the original 10.4 Disc or Retail upgrade 10.6 DVD. It needs to be Partition GUID Partition Table and Format it Mac OS Extented (Journaled) before you can install and run OS X on it.
1. Boot from your SL install DVD or Bootable Clone and open Disk Utility.
2. Highlight the new HD in the list of drives and select the Partition tab.
3. Under Volume Scheme select 1 Partition and click on the Options... button.
4. Select GUID Partition Table in the drop down window and click OK.
5. Set the Format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and click the Apply button.
6. Once thats done, then you can do a clean Install, Restore from TM or a Bootable Clone.

Replaced hard drive; now Macbook wont boot from CD (or USB for that matter)

Looking for a genius. I've tried holding down "C" during startup until the option to boot from CD shows up, but my install disk spins, then stops. Does this about 3 times and the Macbook spits it out (I held "C" the entire time). I've also tried holding "alt/option" key with an external drive attached via USB but the option to boot from there never came up either. I tool it into the Apple store earlier today and was told only the hard drive was bad. Now that I've bought, opened, and installed the new HD, I'm concerned I've wasted that purchase. Anyone? Thanks so much.

Startup your Mac while holding down the Option key. That should launch the Startup Manager window where you can select the startup disk then click Restart.
A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac < includes info for repairing the startup disk
A Windows install disc will not boot your Mac.

New hard drive. Will not boot from install dvd.

Earlier this week, I dropped my computer.
It was probably a 3 foot fall.
Computer froze, so I restarted and got the flashing folder with question mark.
Started in internet recovery, and disk utility confirmed that I had killed my hard drive.
Got a new hard drive and installed. Started in internet recovery, formatted hard drive. Disk utility says it's good to go.
Was given the option to install Mavericks, but keep getting an error message.
Attempted to restart from install dvd that came with the MBP. Tried every startup shortcut there is.
Optical drive recognizes the disk, but I always get stuck on the gray screen with the wheel.
Reset PRAM. Reset SMC. Same problems. I do not have access to another mac or a PC with admin rights.
I'd rather not brave the Apple Store this weekend in the snow in a town that never gets snow (people drive poorly on a good day!).
Any tips?
Got the MBP in 2010, new. Was running mountain lion when I dropped it.
Thanks!

Yiou can't use Internet recovery on a 2010 Mac notebook to install any version of OS X on it. That is why you are getting that error. You have to use the original System reinstall discs that came with it to install OS X on a new drive or use the OS X reinstall disk to restore from a time machine backup.
Since your system doesn't seem to want to completely boot from that disc you should try an external DVD drive that connects by USB port as the built in superdrives are known to fail or partially fail at any time. Don't buy an Apple external Superdrive as they only work on Mac computer that did not originally come with a built in DVD drive. Any Brand external DVD drive will work on your Mac except Apples own external DVD drive.

Can't Boot From Install Disc 1 ?

Holding down "C" at Start Up isn't working.
Most of the time I can't get Preferences > Start-Up to even "see" my Disc 1.
When I can get it to show up in Start-Up, and Select it, and Lock it ... it Still Won't Start Up from the Install Disc 1 ... and in fact usually ejects the disc.
Sometimes when I re-push in the disc, I get the message that a Blank Disc has been detected, "what do you want to do with it."
But, it shows up in Disc Utility, and when I run Verify Disc, it all looks good?!
The Disc has Mac OS version 10.4.8 on it. I'm running 10.5.7. I'm all up to date with my software.
Yesterday I ran the latest version of Disc Warrior. When I run TechTools 4.0 it seems to get stuck running Files. When I run Repair Permissions from Disc Utilities, it shows a fairly massive amount of issues. Running it over and over again doesn't seem to make any difference.
I WANT to run my Install Disc so I can run Repair Disc from Disc Utility ... because I'm having a number of issues ... and I seem to get the spinning rainbow a lot.
SUGGESTIONS ?! ... thanks ...

Disk Utility that can repair a 10.5.7 permissions is only found on the Leopard installer disc. Tiger can't repair Leopard when it comes to permissions, and may also have difficulty with the directory.
Secondly, if your MacBook Pro was purchased after October 26, 2007, it can't boot from any Tiger disc.
If your MacBook Pro was purchased prior, you can use the disk, but you'll want to follow these directions for hardware diagnostics:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303081
Only if your MacBook Pro has Tiger installed, should you use Tiger for the directory or permissions*:
http://www.macmaps.com/directoryfaq.html
Macs can only boot from the operating system that shipped with them, and newer retail operating systems. This means:
1. pre-October 1st, 2007 MacBook Pros can boot off:
- - the discs that shipped with them
- - retail 10.5 discs which look like * that do not say Upgrade, DropIn, or OEM.
2. October 1st through October 25, 2007 can do #1, and also use Upgrade and DropIn discs. Those disks were offered as a limited time mail order Up to date program, some were dropped in the box that came with them.
3. October 26th through November 14, 2007 can boot off the discs that came with them, and retail 10.5.1, 10.5.4, and 10.5.6 discs that do not say Upgrade, DropIn, or OEM, and have a label like the image above.
4. November 15, 2007 through June 29, 2008 can boot off the discs that came with them, and the retail 10.5.4, and 10.5.6 discs that do not say Upgrade, DropIn, or OEM, and have a label like the image above.
5. June 30, 2008 through December 14, 2008 can boot off the discs that came with them, and the retail 10.5.6 discs that do not say Upgrade, DropIn, or OEM, and have a label like the image above.
6. December 15, 2008 and later MacBook Pros can only boot off the discs that came with them.
Presumably when Snow Leopard comes out in September, all of the above will be able to use Snow Leopard because of the specs on http://www.apple.com/macosx/specs.html
- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.
Message was edited by: a brody

Replace hard drive, now will not boot

Pavilion dv7-6b78us was running windows ultimate
Had to put a new hard drive the factory one died unexpectedly. Had a 700 gig I think. now have a 350 gig. replaced HD and proceeded to run all the test to make sure it was alright. When I tried to install windows I keep getting No bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key. I have tried setting it to boot of the internal CD/DVD, didn't do any thing, tried booting of a flash drive copied the OS to the flash drive and set it to boot from Flash memory, still did nothing. Set it to boot from an external cd\dvd usb drive put a new copy of windows in the drive still nothing. Have been in roxio to make a boot disk and copied windows 7 again still nothing happened. I am a collage student and I need to get this thing up and running, any help would be greatly appreciated

Having same problem! I need help also!

Can't boot from Install Disc while trying to isntall a new hard drive...

So last week my macbook 4 froze. I powered it down and when restarting, got the grey screen and apple logo and spinning wheel underneath. After about 3 minutes the machine would just shut off.
I ran the AHT and got this error: 4hdd/11/40000004: SATA(0,0)
Searched around for a bit and the internet's consensus was that my hard drive has failed. I bought a new one today and can't seem to get up and running again.
With the new drive in and the Install Disc in, regular start up get's me the blinking folder.
Starting while pressing C, while pressing D, while doing any other combination just gets me the grey blinking folder with question mark.
When I start with OPTION key, I can see the boot from CD option but after selecting, I just get a plain grey screen. Not really sure where to go from here? Any advice is appreciated.
Thanks

Perhaps the setting on the replacement hard disk drive is not correct
for the computer configuration you are using it in. There are such items
as jumper-pin settings: Master, Slave, auto-detect; and so on.
If the hard disk drive and the optical drive have a similar setting, neither
one could be in a position to do much.
Since I am unfamiliar with the correct settings for your computer, perhaps
someone who has more information and/or experience will reply to this.
Good luck & happy computing!

Problem: installed new hard drive but can´t boot from leopard dvd

So I just installed a new hard drive in my ibook G4. At first I started up the computer using the leopard DVD I had purchased. Got to Disk Utility and after a few seconds in the spin wheel came up and froze. So, I shut the computer down and when I tried to boot it again from the DVD I wouldn´t even reach the apple screen. Tried it a few times unsuccessfully.
As an alternative I just tried booting the comptuer using the original CD and it did read it.
I am currently at the installer page but I am concern about installing the old CD as I really would like to run the leopard dvd 10.5.
Is it that my ibook g4 can´t be booted from leopard dvd?
Please advise. thanks!!

OK, so I decided to leave my computer resting all night and give it a new try this morning.
This morning I was able to boot from the Leopard DVD, so I don´t really think it is a problem with my superdrive. Started to format at 32 minutes to complete. Then towards the 10th minute the spinning wheel appeared, I heard the fan running, then it stopped and then I heard the superdrive making some reading noises. Then all noises stopped and now the spinning wheel continues..not sure what to do now.
In the meantime, I wanted to share also another problem that I´ve been having for quite some time which I don´t know if it is related to my current problem. It is with the computer power:
- I´ve been experiecing load surges that take my computer from 100% to 1 or 0% and then goes to sleep or shuts down. The same thing happens when I am charging the computer.. it starts charging and showing 2 or 3% charge and then jacks up to 100% in minutes.
- My computer also makes like a slight humming noise sometimes when the ring around the power cable is in orange color, so I move it around until it stops. When I do that sometimes it goes from orange to green eventhough it is not fully charged. There has been times that under green it appears to be charging (battery charging icon on desktop shows up), and other sometimes like right now when it is in green color and the battery icon on the desktop says ´99%´. Weird enough, once I get the cable in a certain position it enables the battery to charge, if I keep it without moving it, the load surges disappear (at least for some days).
Should I try resetting the PMU? I´ve not done it because I don´t know what consequences it may have.
NOTE: When I bought the computer I never calibrated my battery because I was (and still are) clueless when comes to computer technicalities. I tried using a different power adapter and get the sample problem.
Below is the information I get from coconut battery:
My battery is in its 256 load-cycle. current battery capacity 58512mAh (original battery capacity: 4400 mAh).
The last system profiler I was able to pull shows:
Battery Information:
Charge Information:
Charge remaining (mAh): 58320
Charging: No
Full charge capacity (mAh): 58512
Health Information:
Cycle count: 256
Battery Installed: Yes
Amperage (mA): 0
Voltage (mV): 16250
System Power Settings:
AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 15
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 15
Dynamic Power Step: Yes
Reduce Processor Speed: No
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On LAN: Yes
Wake On Modem Ring: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Battery Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 5
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 5
Dynamic Power Step: No
Reduce Processor Speed: Yes
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On Modem Ring: No
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Reduce Brightness: Yes
Hardware Configuration:
Clamshell Closed: No
UPS Installed: No
AC Charger Information:
AC Charger (Watts): 26
Connected: Yes
Charging: No
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks a bunch!!!

New hard drive but can't boot from disk?

So I dropped in a new Travelstar last night, reseated all the connections, closed everything up, popped in the software disk that came with the powerbook (OS9) and tried to boot from the disk by holding down the "C" when starting up. No dice. The Screen is black, the drive just spins the disk intermittently and I don't hear the hard disk spinning. I'm guessing that means it's not the hard disk that was the problem. The original problem was that it would lock up and when I restarted it would either get stuck on the gray screen or just a black screen and the hard drive wouldn't spin, just the disk drive would spin. This last time it was just the black screen. Any suggestions?

Hi, rickDJ. Have you tried resetting PRAM and NVRAM?
I'm guessing that means it's not the hard disk that was the problem.
It sounds that way, but the clincher would be if you pulled the new drive and tried to start up from the CD without any HD in place, and got the same result. Then you could be sure neither hard drive was at fault.
One possibility is that the hard disk's short connecting cable is loose or has gotten damaged. Others are that the the optical drive's cable is loose or damaged, or the optical drive itself is dirty or damaged. If the problem persists without any HD or HD cable in place, my next (free) step would be to pull the optical drive and open it up, clean the lens with alcohol, put the drive back in place, make sure its cable connector is solidly seated on the logic board, and test again with the bootable OS 9 disc.
If you can't start the computer up from any bootable CD or DVD with or without a HD in place after zapping PRAM and manually cleaning the optical drive, there's not much more troubleshooting you can do. There are other possible causes of the problem, but they're not pretty $-wise, and you can't identify them by yourself under the circumstances.

Replaced hard drive - now can not install an OS - any ideas?

That's right. The iMac was given to me and the "giver" did not give me any CDs etc. (very old iMac).
Anyway, the hard drive was bad, so I replaced it along with 512 of RAM.
I am unable to install any OS because all my OS X versions are upgrades. I just want to see if the thing will work worth anything with OS X before I keep it.
I bet I'm stuck aren't I?
D.

If UR looking for original Cd's - check out your local "quokka' mag - you know, the one that has all the for sale items - furniture, whitegoods, computers etc - here in Perth Australia we have teh 'Quokka'. Anyway,try all the 'imacs for sale' contacts until you find either someone who has original CD's for sale - this could be someone who gets bulk intakes of 2nd hand computers - PC and/or Mac - often they get shipmetns of @nd hand computers form schools and the original software Cd's as well- you could pick up a bargain?!
What colour is your iMac?? Apple has a chart to distinguish it's computer series on its info base - I think (hang on and I'll go find it for U) ...... ah, here it is - http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58669 - will help a little bit in differentiating between models.
Look, Mr Singitloud-in-the-shower, these G3 iMacs are great little beasts - I just love them - even at 55 - and today I've pulled my first one apart - but it's a scrap piece with the CDRW and HD already scavenged - but it's my learn-on machine - now I just need to find where on the web you can find reliable fix-it info so I can learn more repair ideas.
se ya
Gregg

Bad optical drive? Can't boot from install, loss of memory....help!

I seem to have a series of issues which I noticed today with a drop in hard drive memory. I typically hover around 105 GB and for unexplainable reasons dropped to 76 GB.(I'm getting this number from the bottom of a Finder window) I started to do some exploring (ran Disk Inventory (I couldn't make much sense of it), repaired permissions etc.). Nothing jumped out at me. I decided to do a clean install from my Install dvd (leopard) but the disk won't mount. I get stuck on a grey screen w/ an apple but no spinning gear. Eventually, I get a small folder w/ a scolding frowny face and the the disk is spit out.
I did a Safe Boot and restart. Didn't fix the memory issue OR the inability to re-install. I carefully cleaned the Install dvd. No luck.
I reset the pram.
Then, once I was able to get the Install disk to show up on my desk top but when I click "Install" and the computer restarted - back to the grey screen and the frowny folder.
I then took a home movie DVD-R I had created a while back and the computer spits that out also. It does accept an audio CD.
So I guess I have a few issues here....any thoughts on where my memory/hard drive space may have gone? And any thoughts on what's up with not being able to read DVD's? I have a dvd project due on Saturday of this week....UGH.
Thanks in advance.....Karen

when you saying "install" leopard again.. you booted to the disk and on the screen where it asks you to "select a destination" make sure you click options and then choose from there.

Can't boot from install disc after new RAM & SSD install

I decided to breathe some new life in to my 2007 2.2GHz MacBook by:
-upgrading the RAM to 4gb w/Centon memoryPOWER 2GB DDR2-667 PC2-5300 CL5 SO-DIMM Laptop Memory Module
-replace the HDD with a SSD (Samsung 840 Pro-Series MZ-7PD128BW 128GB SATA 6.0Gb/s 2.5" Internal Solid State Hard Drive).
-Also going from Leopard to Snow Leopard after the hardware upgrade, then possibly Lion/Mountain Lion...
What I've already done:
1. Backed up my hard drive using time machine, did not clone
2. Using the install disc/Disc Utility, I erased my old hard drive completely (Hope that wasn't a huge mistake!)
3. Replaced the previous 2gb (1x1gb) with the new 2x2gb RAM sticks
4. Swapped out the HDD with the SSD
When I went to boot the machine, all I get is a black screen. I can hear the optical drive spin for a while, then stop. Screen remains completely black. I have tried using C while starting as well as Control - same result. So, I put the old (erased) HDD back in and again got the same result. I didn't have time to put the old RAM back in and try again before work this morning and intend to tonight. Based on that, maybe my RAM isn't compatible even though the specs look to be...? But, does anyone know if the components I am using are not compatible? or did I totally screw up by erasing the old Drive prior to confirming this would work? Am I missing something else?
Any help would be MUCH appreciated!

I was finally able to get it done using my old RAM, so that must be the weak link. I'm going to try to return the RAM I bought and try a different brand. Thanks For the response!

Computer doesn't boot. can't boot from install discs

my quicksilver g4 running on os 10.3.9 has been booting up very, very slowly and once booted running slowly as well. so i was able to verify & repair permissions. however then the computer wouldn't boot up from the boot drive at all. i tried booting up from the install discs but when i tell it to boot up from the install disc it keeps returning to the installation menu. none of my installation discs (3) actually say on the label that they can booted from so i'm wondering if they're bootable. i try to run disk utility but it says it reading configuration for a very long time and never goes anywhere. i was able to run the hardware tests and it tells the video ram test failed with error code disp/13/2. can anyone shed some light on this mess? thanks.

Hi! The video card failed test could be the result of the machine having a different card than the stock one that came in it or it could mean it's actually bad. The install discs are bootable by definition "IF" they are the correct ones for that machine. Retail OSX install discs are bootable but machine specific discs are only bootable on specific machines. The slow boot could be a bad hard drive. I would unhook the hard drive and try booting from the install disc to see if it will boot that way. Hold the "c" key down at startup with the disc inserted. Tom

Can't boot from install disc

I have my new Mac Pro setup so now I turn my attention to my old one (1.1). I wanted to reformat by boot drive and do a clean install of Snow Leopard. So, I pulled out my install disc that came with the MP and restart with the "C" held. It acts like it is going to work and then my grey screen turns a shade darker and I get the following message in about 3 or 4 different languages. "Your system must be restarted. Hold down the power key for several seconds." Essentially I was wanting to run Disk Utility to reformat the drive and then install Snow Leopard. Any ideas? Thanks

I punted. Had a newer HD sitting on the desk so I reformatted that one and switched it with my boot drive. Held down C with Snow Leopard in and the installation has started. Still can't figure out why I could not boot to my original install disc though.

Replaced hard drive, now can't boot from install disc to restore backup

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