Boot from FireWire External Drive WITHOUT mounting internal Hard Drive

Is it possible too boot a PowerBook G4 over FireWire (this part works) WITHOUT mounting the internal hard drive at boot time - i.e. never mount the internal hard drive when booting from FireWire?
There is an Oreilly article at http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/h/341 which discusses using "niutil" but it is not clear how to indicate the internal hard drive should not be mounted.
The boot from FireWire works fine but how do you tell Mac OS X to ignore and never mount the internal hard drive? There used to be an /etc/fstab file where you could specify drives to mount. The /etc/fstab.hd file comments now say "IGNORE THIS FILE.
This file does nothing, contains no useful data, and might go away in
future releases. Do not depend on this file or its contents."
Thanks,

That is not the problem - I have been using the startup manager by holding down the option key during boot-up. I am having no problem getting the PowerBook to boot from the FireWire Drive.
*The Problem* is that after the PowerBook has booted from the exernal FireWire drive, I still see the internal hard drive of the PowerBook on the desktop. I do not want this. Some key points to note:
[1] I can unmount the interal hard drive and remove from the desktop only by using the Disk Utility in the Applications/Utilities folder. There is a button there to "unmount selected volume"
[2] The finder does not have an icon next to the internal hard drive icon to allow the internal hard drive to be unmounted when booted from a FireWire drive
[3] I want the MacOS X kernel to be configured to not automount any hard drive volumes at bootup - this used to be possible by editing the /etc/fstab.hd file but that file does not appear to be used any more per the commennts in the file.
**Remaining Question** How do you configure the MacOS X kernel to prevent it from mounting any other hard drive at boot time? I do not want to use methods [1] or [2]
Thanks

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Booting from an external drive when the internal has died

Hello, I have an older iMac mid 2007 2.4 GHz Intel model. Around 2009 my internal hard drive failed and for the last few years I had a nice work around using an external drive to boot into OSX. I was curious however if anyone knew of an official or well documented method of using this method because for what ever reason the drive is not being recognized. My method is a combination of trial and error until it booted properly but recently it has just stopped recognizing the disc or when installing the OS it will just fail near the end of the install. Tried to hold Option with the disc installed on boot to see if I could boot from CD but it never seems to show up as an option.
I thought that the drive was damaged but I was able to reformat and use it for a few months with my PC so I have confidence it is not that.
The other problem I was curious about is the format of the drive and how I can even go about reformatting to the mac journal. I cant seem to get into disk utility all I get is a white screen.
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Original Information
OS: 10.4.x
Ram: 2g ddr2
I have been able to many time before reinstall using my leopard and snow leopard disks.

Okay just clarifying my INTERNAL hard drive is most likely dead, I am looking to install and boot from my external hard drive. According to this AHT article
Before you begin
Important: If your Mac was released after June 2013, you will use Apple Diagnostics rather than Apple Hardware Test (AHT). See Using Apple Diagnostics for instructions.
Consider doing some preliminary troubleshooting to determine if your issue is related to hardware. You can try to determine if the cause of your issue is related to hardware or software by following Isolating issues in Mac OS X. AHT can help determine which hardware component may be causing the issue.
Before starting AHT, be sure to disconnect all external devices except the keyboard, mouse, display, and Ethernet adapter. Also disconnect any external optical drives.
My goal is to find a way to boot from my external drive.
"Won't matter, as long as you have the Disc.
To make it botable, you will need to set the Partition Map Scheme (GUID Partition Table) and Format it (Mac OS Extended Journaled) before installing OS X."
The disc or the drive? I assume you mean the drive but according to the document that should be removed.

OSX 10.4 not booting from an external drive..

I have an 1 Ghz G4 iMac that is causing some major headaches.
It started by the machine crashing every 15-20 minutes.
A fresh re-install seemed to be the best option.
In order to sort out the problem I decided to install a fresh copy of OSX on an external firewire drive.
The install went without any problems but then I was unable to boot from the firewire drive.
Even holding down the option key and selecting the drive manually didn't do anything.
I then decided to do an archive install on the internal drive. This crashed in mid-installation making the internal drive in-accessible.
Anybody have any tips on how to get out of this mess?
E.

Since your machine crashed while running from the install disc, it sounds like there is a problem not related to the Operating System on your drive. Have you installed any ram, other than that which came with your iMac? If so, remove it and try to boot from your firewire drive again. (The installation onto that drive was sucessful, right?)If you're successful in booting the computer and it runs with more stablility minus any extra ram, you have a bad ram stick.
My fear here is that since your previous re-install failed I'm not certain that another attempt to install on that drive wil save all your stuff... if you can boot from your external drive, I'd rescue your data, photos, music, etc., to the external before trying to re-install on your internal drive.
Dual 1.8 G5, Powerbook G4 1.5GHz Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Booting From An External Drive in OS 9.2?

I have a G4 with a bad internal ROM drive. I am currently running OS 9.2.
I would like to upgrade to OS 10.
I have an Iomega USB 2.0 external drive connected to my computer via the USB port in the back.
How can I boot from the disk in this external drive?
I tried holding "option"- it only found my regular hard drive.
I tried holding "cmd-opt-shift-del" but my mac got very confused and blinked a ? at me.
How can I boot from the external drive so I can upgrade?
Thanks
O.

Welcome to Apple Discussions!
Mac OS X will not boot from USB drives on a PowerPC.
You need a Firewire optical drive to boot, and an AGP PowerMac G4 at that to boot Mac OS X. To identify your PowerMac G4, see this article:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58418
Once you've identified it, boot the machine into Mac OS 9 on the hard drive and make sure your firmware is up to date:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86117
And then you'll be able to install Mac OS X. Follow these precautions on my FAQ before doing so:
http://www.macmaps.com/upgradefaq.html
If it turns out you have a PCI PowerMac G4, you'll have to replace the optical drive internally to boot Mac OS X or Mac OS 9.
Also make sure your clock battery is under 4 years old before attempting to upgrade the firmware. It is a 3.6 V 1/2 AA battery you can buy from Radio Shack item 23-026.

Elitebook 8440p - recovery disc creation & booting from an external drive

I have a brand new Elitebook 8440p & I have a couple of issues that I cannot seem to resolve.
1. I expected to get some sort of system install, or recovery or repair discs - or the ability to create such disks with this laptop. Nothing came with it, and I cannot find any place to create some sort of system recovery disks, nor is there anything listed for this laptop on the HP site to acquire them from HP. I am not comfortable having no way to recover this computer should a hard disk go south. Any ideas how to create or get an op system disk or recovery discs or something?
2. I have an encrypted company/business hard disc inside the laptop for work. I also have the original hard disk that came with the computer in an external eSata/USB case. I have configured and installed software on the external drive to include my personal software and programs, leaving the company hard disc inside the laptop for business use only. However, I cannot make this laptop boot from the external drive if the company drive is inside the laptop. I have read and tried everything, but if a drive is inside the laptop, it will not boot from the external eSata/USB drive. If I simply remove the laptop hard drive, it boots perfectly from the external drive via eSata and works fine. How do I manage to get this laptop to boot from my external drive without having to remove the internal hard drive?
Any help or ideas someone can offer are greatly appreciated. Thanks very much.

Hi, Rich:
If you live in the USA or Canada, you can get a set of restore disks from HP for $10. I am surprised you didn't get a set but maybe they only come with the business desktops.
Here is how you order them:
1. Write down the part number and serial # on bottom of the computer on the white tag. The model # is an HP-Compaq 8440p, but the part number will be found on that white tag below the serial #.
2. Call HP at 1-800-952-7689, option 1 (ordering restore disks is part of the list in the option).
3. Provide the info asked by the rep that answers the phone. Some just ask for the serial #, some want both, or they will just want the serial number and type of computer (8440p).
4. Have a Master Card or Visa ready for purchasing. They don't take Discover. You will be charged $10.00.
You will receive the disks by First Class Mail or you can pay an additional $10.00 for FedEx shipping.
Sorry, I can't answer your second question. I assume you have already tried hitting the F9 key at the HP splash screen to select the device to boot from?
Paul

Can I boot from an external drive with a "Virtual CD"

I just purchased a Hitachi LifeStudio external hard drive for use as my Time Machine backup. When I plugged it in to my MacBook running 10.6.4, I realized that it had one of those "Virtual CDs" that contained the manufacturers crapware, similar to Western Digital's MyWare or whatever its called. It shows up in disk utility as an actual separate disk and not just another partition that can be wiped.
I reformatted the drive using GUID and and created 3 HFS+ Journaled partitions. One was going to be for the 10.6 installer, one for the 10.6 boot, and one for my time machine backup. I restored a 10.6 install dvd disk image I created using disk utility to the 10.6 installer partition (with erase destination checked) then option booted my mac and the partitions did not show up. The only thing I could see was my internal hard drive.
I have done this many times before and it has always worked so Im trying to figure out what Im doing wrong. The only thing I can think of is that the "Virtual CD" that Hitachi put on this external drive is stopping the Mac from seeing the bootable partitions I created. I even went into system preferences>startup disk and blessed the 10.6 install partition. That didn't work either, the computer just booted to my internal drive.
So my questions are. Is it because of this "Virtual CD" that I can't boot from my external drive? If so, is there a way around it? I already searched their web site and emailed their tech support asking for a firmware update to remove the virtual cd.
Thanks in advance.

Yes, it's a known issue. You've already referred to the issue with WD systems. WD has a long list of products that are either not compatible with Macs or won't boot a Mac.
There are practically no problems with bare drives, but once installed in an enclosure there is no guarantee that the package will function as a bootable device. This is especially the case if the manufacturer uses some sort of "virtual" scheme intended for using the device as a sort of one button backup device.
External drives don't have to specifically say anything about being Mac bootable or compatible. It's up to the consumer to verify compatibility and usability.

How Do I Always Boot From An External Drive

I successfully installed Mac OS X 10.4.8 on an external hard drive. It boots successfully into OS X, but only if you press option on boot and select the drive or if you boot from the drive inside my Mac Mini and go to startup disk and select the external. Is there any way to just always boot from the external drive without doing anything? Thanks in advance for all of your help.
Mac Mini PowerPC Mac OS X (10.4.8)

If booting from a cold start doesn't work but restarting after selecting the drive does work, then most likely the drive isn't ready when the Mac is doing the cold boot.
Try turning the drive on several seconds before turning on the Mac.

How do I boot from an external drive?

I've just Carbon Cloned my 60GB drive to a firewire external drive. I'm about to replace the 60GB with a 160GB drive and the CCC instructions say boot from the external drive I'd just created once the new disk is installed. Then CCC the cloned drive back to the new hard drive.
So, how do I boot from an external drive? Do I have load anything to the new drive? Will the macbook detect the external drive and boot from that? Or what??????
Thanks
Dick

Thanks DWB. Being the rash impetuous guy I am I didn't wait for replies and just switched on the macbook after installing the new disk (which was so easy it was unbelievable - had to go and buy a a little torx bit though) to see what would happen.
Blow me down with a feather if it didn't just boot off the external drive all by itself :-O It did come up with the disk was unverified and I could see it in FINDER and I was prseented with a screen to ERASE/RESTORE etc.
When I went to CCC the external drive back to the new hard drive it didn't give show me the new hard drive so I guessed I'd have to do something to format (?) the hard drive.
I don't know if I did the right thing but I went to disk utilities and chose ERASE in the vague hope it would maybe format the disk in some way.
Seems to work now and the CCC replaced the system perfectly as far as I can see.
Basically very impressive all round. Piece of proverbial to replace the disk and CCC made life so easy.
Thanks again.
Cheers
Dick

Mac Mini i7 (Mavericks) will not boot from the external drive

Mac Mini i7 (Mavericks) will not boot from the external drive with Disk Warroir 4.4. or Drive Genius or Lion.
Not even from the external Firewire hard drive with Mavericks

Does the external HD have a GUID partition table?
Is the external drive formatted Mac OS X Extended (journaled)?
Is this a 2011 or late 2012 Mac?
How was Mavericks installed on the external drive?
Who is the builder of the drive mechanism in the external drive?
Who is the builder of the external enclosure?
What type of interface does the external drive have USB2, USB3, Firewire 400, Firewire 800, thunderbolt?
Is the external enclosure directly connected to the mini?
Have youtried a different interface cable?

Will Mac allow you to boot from an external drive...specifically for windows programs?

Will a new Mac allow you to boot from an external drive...specifically for windows programs?

ps...I've read the threads on Bootcamp.

FV2 and booting from an external drive

Hi,
When Lion came out I decided to enable filevault as I take my laptop everywhere.
Periodically I take a full SuperDuper backup of my hard drive just in case the worst happens.
I have read that its best to remove the FileVault protection before entertaining an upgrade so I have removed FV and took another full superduper backup.
Part of my upgrade plan is to test the backup by booting my MBP from the external drive so that I know I can get back to my old machine but I am finding that I can reboot my MBP and select the backup drive from the bootable selection and I get the apple logo and the spinning cog but it doesnt go any further.
I think this has happened since enabling FV as I have never had an issue before booting from an external drive.
I have formatted the drive and started a fresh SuperDuper backup and this hasnt made a difference either.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Gavin

They all are formatted Extended and with Guid partition map. So I am good that way. I will have to experiment I suppose. Thanks for your response.

Booting from an external drive 10.3.2 with new i7 mac mini

How to boot from an external drive with 10.3.2 using a new i7 mac mini. Seems to be a build problem?

Your Mac is incapable of running 10.3.2. The version of OS X 10.3 is PowerPC only and your Mac has an Intel processor.
Why do you want to do that?
Allan

How do you boot from an external drive when internal drive is dead?

The internal drive is dead, but I have a complete dupolicate on my fire-wire external drive. I think I remember reading that there is a combination of keys to press down when starting to allow one to choose which drive to use as a startup volume. As it is, the thing won't start up at all.
So I know it's supposed to run from the external drive, but how do you get it to boot from it without having designated it as the startup when it was last running?

Hold down the Option key when booting the computer.
When I asked the question I was working on my daughter's ibook.
Now I'm back home and I have a firewall external drive, so I tried pressing option when I started and icons for startup drive come up BUT there is only one icon -- that being for my internal drive. I know that the external drive, which has a duplicate of the internal, is capable of starting it up ok, because when I go ahead and , after starting it up on the internal drive, then pick the external drive to start and then restart it, it goes to the external drive ok. But again, if it has been preferrenced to start on the internal drive and I do the thing by pressing with option when I start, it doesn't give me the option to use the external drive. (The external drive is partioned, and the duplicate startup is in one of the volumes, but I don't think this should have anything to do with anything, since it can start up using the appropriate external hard drive volume when I have selected it in my preferences.)
G4 tower Mac OS X (10.3.9)
G4 tower Mac OS X (10.3.9)

How can I boot from an external drive?

I am unsuccessful trying to have the external backup drive to boot the Powerbook. I tried first a USB Lacie Mobile Disk, then thinking USB was the problem I got a FireWire Little Disk of the same brand. None will boot even if the disk appears in the startup disk control panel. When I boot with option key, the choice is no longer there. Maybe they require a power supply other than the USB power lead? Any experience?

USB drives are not bootable for PowerBooks. FireWire drive usually needs to be used with the power supply since it consumes more power than the USB
Right! So there is no way to boot from an external without a power source.
Thanks Arnie.

Booting from an external drive over usb

Hey, has anyone else had any problems booting from an external? I have an external lacie drive that I keep a clone backup on (using superduper) and usually have it connected with firewire400. I know it works because i've accidently booted using it before, but recently the firewire port on it died so i've been using usb instead.
Now the problem, holding option on my macbook starting, I get no options to choose from. If i have the mac osx dvd in, it pops up so I know it's not a problem with my macbook. It is possible to boot from usb correct? Everything i've read has said it's possible... I'm not sure why my external drive isn't coming up. I know it works over usb because I've used it alot since the firewire port died on it. I checked in the disk utility and it does say it's bootable, and afterall it's cloned using superduper like i said before...
I have 2 partitions on the drive, is that a problem? It never was before, I've booted off it many times before using firewire though. Can someone help me out here? Very annoying as I'm replacing the HD in my macbook and neeeeeeed to get on my external.
When I asked the guy at the genius bar awhile ago he just said it was probably a problem because my old internal HD died and he said sometimes it causes the macbook to not even be able to get as far as the point to boot from another source. Well now I have a new working drive in it, so I know that's not the problem. It just doesn't show up to boot from anymore, ugh.

Sounds like your clone isn't bootable. Have you tried the following:
Repairing the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger and Leopard.) After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer. Now restart normally.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior (4.0 for Tiger, and 4.1 for Leopard) and/or TechTool Pro (4.6.1 for Leopard) to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.

Boot from FireWire External Drive WITHOUT mounting internal Hard Drive

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