Unable to find HDD after erase with disk utility

Background id I had installed the Lion OS but then got into trouble with the "flashing question mark " at start up.
After using the recovery option, Lion OS was reinstalled and things were fine for a couple of days. Then the "flashing ?" returned
This time, it appeared the "Cmd R" did not work. So I browsed until I found out it is possible in the reinstallation, the recovery option was removed.
Ok, so then one of the discussion threads suggested to use the installer disc to boot up, use the disk utility to erase the HDD and install in my case Snow Leopard, and thereafter install the Lion OS.
I am stuck after clicking "erase". First there was an error message - "file system formatter failed' then I no longer can see the HDD in the disk utility.
How can complete the HDD erase function so I can proceed to install the OS?

A check in the system profiler - "There was an error while scanning for Serial ATA devices"
Looks like my iMac's HDD is kaput...Or is there a way to fix this?

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HT204347 Unable to Re-install mountain Lion after erasing with disk utility! help

I bought my new Macbook pro retina disply 13 inch last friday. played with it some time and try to restore using a time machine back up of my old Mac Air. It worked well but I didn't like it so I restarted and pressed Command + R to bring the restore utility and from there I used the Disk utility to erase my Disk and then after connecting to net I clicked reinstall Lion. First my machine was verified by Apple, then I entered my apple ID, then the mountain lion licence agreement came and i clicked agree and it started installing. Immediatley below the installation bar it showed 50 hrs remaining to finish installation. it was odd because I used to finish it within 2 hrs. Moreover the time appeared to increase from 50 to 51 and more. I waited all day without any use. it looked as if the disk has some write protection, the software is trying to install but unable to write.
What can i do now? I am now without a OS in my mac.

A new Mac comes with 90 days of free tech support from AppleCare from the date of purchase.
AppleCare: 1-800-275-2273.
Have the serial number of the computer ready in hand and give AppleCare a call.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1559?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US
They will walk you through.
Best.

I've tried to conduct a secure erase with disk utility. I highlight the drive but erase options are not available.

I tried to conduct a secure erase with disk utility. I highlight the drive but there's no place to click "erase."

If you have an SSD, then the best thing you can do it enable System Preferences -> Security -> FileVault, so that any deleted files are just an encrypted jumble of bits to anyone that does not have the encryption key.
And even if you do erase the SSD, it does not work the way you think, and retired SSD zones may have your data, and never see an erase.
This is way keeping the SSD encrypted means retired zones are just encrypted jumble of bits.
If you do NOT have an SSD, is it possible you are trying to erase your boot disk while you are actually using your boot disk? Disk Utility will not allow you to do that either.

Erasing with Disk Utility

I thought I cleared out my external using erase in disk utility, but it says there there are 111.5GB available of an 111.6GB drive, but it's a 120GB drive. What happened to the other 9 GB? Should I erase the free space? Why can't I find what's taking up the other 9?

Hi theJBexperience;
The computer counts in binary which includes 1024 bytes per kilobyte rather then 1000 hence the disk always appears smaller then what it is listed as for size. Plus on top of that there is some overhead that must be created when you format the disk. I don't think you have anything to worry about here.
Allan

Snow Leopard crashed : unable to find the hard drive in Disk utility

Hello,
A few days ago, my computer (running on Snow Leopard 10.6.3) suddently crashed (no recent update, no new software or hardware installation).
Since then, i'm unable to start the computer. It freezes on the start screen with the apple and the loading bar. Sometimes i've got an empty folder with a question mark.
I tried to start with the install CD, and when i select Disk utility, it only recognizes the DVD, not the hard drive (then i cannot even try to repair it).
When i want to re-install Snow Leopard, i arrive on an empty screen on which i'm asked to choose a drive to install on. Of course as i cannot choose a drive, i cannot install.
Finally, when i try to start with no errors (pressing Maj button when starting), i've got a kernel panic error saying "unable to find driver for this platform ACPI"
Can anyone help me ?
thanks in advance.

Your hard drive has had a serious malfunction. It might be that it is software: your partition table may be corrupt. If so, this may be fixable if you take it to a local Apple certified tech. However, it is more likely that it is hardware and the drive itself has failed. I hope you have a backup. If you do, you will need to replace the drive and restore the backup to the new drive. If you don't and you have important data on that drive (and if you have important data, why don't you have a backup?) you will need to contact one of the data recovery services, such as Drive Savers or Rescuecom. Be advised that the price for data recovery starts at $200 and heads upwards really quickly, depending on what the exact problem with the drive is. I have seen data recovery charges of $3000 and more for seriously screwed up drives.
Having a backup is a lot easier and a lot cheaper.

DMG file after partitioning with Disk Utility

For the first time that I know of a file appeared after I partitioned a new external hard drive.
The file is listed in Disk Utility under the grey line
decryptedFile.dmg
Flash Player
It says it is located on the boot drive at:
/private/var/folders/dZ/(long string of alpha numeric)
(Note: Tried to post a screen shot here but I failed that task.)
The file must be an invisible file or my bifocals are cloudy because I did not find same.
Appreciate any info on what and why of this file. Attaching a screen shot.
Thank you

I don't recall ever working on Flash Player but I'll take your word.
Thanks for the help. I'll delete and forget.
BTW, are they invisibles?
Thanks,

IPod classic won't connect to iTunes after erase in disk utility

I think my hard drive is failing on my 120gb classic and so I decided to wipe it and start from scratch. Admittedly I rushed into the process and wiped it in disk utility without doing much research. Now it doesn't show up in iTunes but it is showing up on my desktop. Any ideas on how to fix this issue?

Hi I had a similar issue with my 160gb Classic
Went through many things with Apple on the phone all to no avail.
Took it to the Genius Bar and managed to get it recognised by iTunes and then restore....but when i plugged it into my MBA or IMac it was not recognised by iTunes and just appeared on the desktop..again.
Given that i am using Yosemite and iTunes 12 and reinstalled iTunes, Apple answer was to do a reinstall on my MBA!
Reluctantly i did this and it worked!!!!!!!!
It was recognised by the ancient iTunes9 before updating to 12 again and it was still recognised....
Just got to reinstall all my music, photos, documents.....at least i have my retro 160Gb iPod Classic to load everything on....
hope this helps

USB key unreadable / damaged after formatting with Disk Utility

Hello,
in the previous hours, I have been trying to copy a 5.2-GB file on a FAT32-formatted 8.0-GB USB key. This is impossible, because FAT32 cannot hold files larger than 4 GB.
I formatted the disk using Disk Utility and selected "Compressed NTFS filesystem". However, this was not a good idea: Windows XP (that's the "adressee" OS, i.e. the OS where I was trying to copy the 5.2-GB file) didn't recognize the USB key, asking if I wanted to re-format it.
Useless to say, re-formatting didn't solve the issue.
Any ideas?

Hello,
in the previous hours, I have been trying to copy a 5.2-GB file on a FAT32-formatted 8.0-GB USB key. This is impossible, because FAT32 cannot hold files larger than 4 GB.
I formatted the disk using Disk Utility and selected "Compressed NTFS filesystem". However, this was not a good idea: Windows XP (that's the "adressee" OS, i.e. the OS where I was trying to copy the 5.2-GB file) didn't recognize the USB key, asking if I wanted to re-format it.
Useless to say, re-formatting didn't solve the issue.
Any ideas?

Doing a 7 or 35 pass erase with Disk Utility?

Hi,
Awhile ago my hard drive got rewritten over by WindowXP and a month and a half later I found out that residue was left behind with weird looking things in my Core Services folder.
So I want to do a secure erase. Should I do a 7 pass or 35 pass option?
Also when I put my TIger disk in the my DVD slot for the erase am I choosing the main part where it says 149.10 GB ST13086.... or the indented part where it says Macintosh HD?
If I select the main part 149.10 GB ST 130608 it says untitled for the name, do I leave it like that if I choose this option?
S.

sig,
So I can choose Macintosh HD and then security option and then do the 7 pass erase (not worried about the FBI, just want my Windows stuff completely gone)? Do I need to erase the free space first?
Message was edited by: spiralgirl

Erasing ipod with disk utility is it worth a shot?

My 2G ipod is frozen once again can't get it to mount or show up. just asks if I want to ignore or erase the disk or eject. Have tried all the usual tests and self diagnostics. Even tried the tapping on the right side. I'm running the HDD scan now. Just before this happened when it was still mounting I tried to reset and restore it but got a error and failure several times something about the disk . Has anyone had results with erasing the ipod disk with disk utility and then trying to restore and update.? I went to the apple store and they basically said time for a new ipod . It's well out of warranty but I figure its still worth a try erasing if disk utility might help. I already replaced the HD last year and just got a high output Newer battery for it last week so I don't want to give up yet.
Craig
15 TiBook 1GHZ, I.25 dual G4 MDD,10G ipod Mac OS X (10.3.9)

Erasing seems to hang from the beginning in Disk utilty. I tried zeroing all data which takes longer but I've gotten disk utilty to get the progress bar to go about three quarters of the way and then it hangs. I also checked it with techtool pro and it was finding a lot of bad blocks in the scan.
One time I got ipod updater to say it was restored but it wasn't really and I couldn't get the software updated. So I'm back at square one with trying erase with disk utilty but after more than a dozen attempts I'm beginning to think this is a lost cause for resurrecting this ipod HD . This is of course after I received a new extended battery for it last week made by Newer which is only good for 1G and 2G ipods.
frustrated, Craig

Disk Utility shows incorrect free disk space after erasing hard disk

Hello.
A few days ago, I tried to re-install my Mac OS and both Snow Leopard and Lion got the same problem. Before the re-installation, I erased the hard disk of my MacBook (late 2009) and the SSD of my MacBook Air (late 2010) - but after erasing the disks, the disk utility continued to show more or less 5 GB of used disk capacity, although the disks should have been cleared entirely I think.
After installing Snow Leopard or Lion, Finder showed as much free space as I usually expected it would, but Disk Utility still stated 5-10 GB less. For example:
MacBook: Finder shows 17 GB free, Disk Utility 6 GB free
MacBook Air: Finder shows 26 GB free, Disk Utility 19 GB free
There are 2 problems:
1) I need the original disk capacity. Think everybody agrees with that wish.
2) More important: The MacBook should still get a Bootcamp partition (unfortunately, that's necessary for my university's software.. :s): With 17 GB free space, it would work - but 6 GB doesn't.
I would be very pleased if somebody could help me. I searched the web many times so far but didn't find any real solution.

The available disk space reported in finder is totally wrong.
Even if it accounts for the local snapshots. In my macbook air it shows 120 Available in finder which is just 1GB less than my SSD capacity.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4467217

My External HDD doesnt shown in disk utility or in finder

My External HDD doesnt shown in disk utility or in finder
tried everything possible checked everywhere this happened when i used disk utility to repair the HDD ?
please help

Do you have your Finder Preferences set to show external drives?
And, exactly what did you do with Disk Utility? If you repaired your internal hard drive, were you booted from the external?

Seagate External HDD is lost due to repairing with Disk Utility, Why?

Hi to all,
I have been struggling with my external harddisks for a few days now. And there is something that I really wish to find out why. I will really appreciate any ideas or help, thanks in advance.
I have two Seagate Freeagent external harddisks. With both, I have had problem while trashing the items that I deleted. They didn't go away. So I first verify the disks with disk utility and then repair them. One of them was safe and sound after repairing. The trash was empty. But the other one was totally gone! Empty! Like formatted! Right now I am using Seagate File Recovery software to get my data back. (And by the way, mostly works like a charm. But I have nearly 2 days to wait for the scan.)
- Is repair disk not supposed to JUST repair disk and not format the whole drive? Or am I lacking information?
- What is the problem here?
A small note: Both harddisks are working on Mac and Windows environment. They are not formatted and used as Mac Journaled or so.
I hope that I can get reply to this topic. Thank you very much.

Hello! The drive's directory structure (the raod map to every bit of info on the drive) is severely damaged. If the disk utility won't repair the damage then your next best shot is to purchase DISKWARRIOR or possible TechToolPro. Diskwarrior is the best utility for directory repair. There are cases where Diskwarrior can't repair the drive. A file recovery only app is DATARESCUE II. This is the time where you need multiple backups. I would encourage you to maintain more than one backup to increase your chances of successful recovery of your data. Personally I always try to maintain 3-5 backups. Tom

I'm using matchbook pro and I'm unable to find iPhoto after upgrading to Maverick os

I'm using matchbook pro and I'm unable to find iPhoto after upgrading to Maverick os

Open the Mac App Store application and see if iPhoto is under your "Purchases" tab.
Clinton

I'm trying to backup a my harddrive with disk utility but I'm getting an error Unable to create Backup.dmg" (input/output error). Is there any other way to save my data? I believe my hard drive is failing or corrupt file. I can't boot up. Grey screen

I'm trying to backup a my hard drive with disk utility but I'm getting an error Unable to create Backup.dmg" (input/output error). Is there any other way to save my data? I believe my hard drive is failing or corrupt file. I can't boot up. Grey screen and spinning wheel. I've tried everything https://discussions.apple.com/message/20580424#20580424
any help will be greatly appreciated.

Check here. Also have you done a TimeMachine back up?
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2570

Unable to find HDD after erase with disk utility

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