Booting from Installer Disk

I have an issue with a 12" 867Mhz Powerbook G4.
It was showing the file/question mark icon on boot. Booting from a 10.4 retail DVD and running disk utility confirmed that the hard drive had died. I replaced the hard drive with a new 80GB IDE drive.
Next step is to install 10.4, but it will no longer boot from the disk. I turn it on holding alt and get the option to boot from the disk - the machine recognises that it is a Tiger install disk. When I select it I'm taken to the grey screen with the Apple logo and then it seems to hang. The DVD spins for a while and seems to be in use but then it stops.
Does anyone have any ideas what could be causing this and what I can do to resolve it? I have checked the disk in another mac and it is working correctly.

Yes, it sounds like you didn't connect the new drive correctly, or tripped over the optical drive upon doing so. One thing you can try is the startup manager, instead of the 'C' key, as the 'C' key doesn't always work. The startup manager is used among other things to boot the Hardware test volume, but you can also use it to force boot up the installer:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TA27043?viewlocale=en_US
256 MB of RAM is hardly enough, even though it is the required minimum. And what can happen if you don't have enough RAM, some may be of sufficiently low quality, that it can't get everything it needs into memory. If after upgrading the RAM following specs*:
http://www.macmaps.com/badram.html
you still can't boot the disc with the startup manager, have an authorized service technician determine how badly you might have munged the hard drive installation.
- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.

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G5 wont boot from installation disk?

Any suggestions for a G5 that wont boot from the installation CD? Regular starts fail at the grey screen with the apple logo. I've re-set PRAM and SMU, and replaced the battery. G5 passed the Disk Utility tests and the hardware test run over firewire from a PowerBook. I've tried booting from the CD while holding down the various keys. Runs fine in terminal mode so I've saved all my files. Not sure where to go from here. Any help would be appreciated.

Hi choriocapillaris, and a warm welcome to the forums!
Can we assume it booted from this Install Disc before, or could this be an Install Disc from another Mac?
If it is the right Disc, put it in the PB, boot the PB into Target mode...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58583
Boot the G5 with the Option key held down & see if the Install Disc in the PB eventually shows up as a boot choice for the G5.

Can't create rescue disk nor boot from installation disk

I can't make a rescue disk. Get an error message. As instructed I booted from the Windows 7 install disc and it comes up with no mouse or keyboard support. What is displayed is the choice of languages. Can't get a command prompt. Am I missing
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New HDD installed in PowerBook G3, won't boot from installation disk.

I just installed a new hard drive in my G3 Wallstreet and I can't get it to boot from the original Apple CD.
I've tried holding the C key as well as +⌥+⇧+⌫, but to no avail.
The CD tests fine in my old iMac G4, so maybe the culprit is the optical drive, but then again, I'm not so sure.
Is there a way to either boot my PowerBook or install OSX from my iMac G4?
Message was edited by: rick268 Also, I can boot into Open Firmware just fine.

Thanks for your help.
WeLoveMacs wanted $50, but I just scored an entire topcase on eBay for $15, shipped. We'll see what happens.
Allan Jones wrote:
I maintatined three Wallstreets for a friend for years. They stayed in regular service from new until he replaced them with MacBook Pros last summer!
In the years of keeping the old soldiers almost relavent, I ran into a "won't boot from a system disk" issue on two of them. In both cases, replacing a dead PRAM battery fixed the issue. Don't ask me why but that was the only thing that fixed them.
When I was supporting those, you could still get new Wallstreet batteries from Other World Computing. Today they no longer show them. I'm not sure where to steer your for a new one. USed batteries are like used chewing gum, IMHO.
You can try disconecting the wire from the PRAM battery to the logic board. That might help. Requires some take-down:
http://www.ifixit.com/Device/PowerBook_G3_Wallstreet

Disable booting from installer disk

Is there a way to prevent booting from the intaller disk for security? I need to prevent a user from reinstalling the OS or resetting the password.

Hi Gnarlodious ,
yes, you can do what you want with a firmware password. For detailed instructions read this article: Setting up firmware password protection in Mac OS X 10.1 or later
If this answered your question please consider granting some stars: Why reward points?

Mac Won't Boot From Installation Disk

After doing a software update, my Mac Pro got stuck on the gray screen after restart (seems like a very common problem recently). I am able to boot into safe mode by holding shift (only works like 10% of the time) and verified permissions. It says I need to repair my disk, but i can only do this by booting from my install disk.
However, I can not boot from my install disk. It gets stuck at the gray screen every single time.
I have done everything recommended in this post with no success: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3353
Am I screwed here? So irritated that this all happened because of Mac's own software update. I have wasted HOURS troubleshooting and it looks like my only option is to pay to have it serviced.
Any help is appreciated.

I don't have a cloned copy. How do I clone to an external disc?
A clone is a copy made from a functioning Mac using clone software like CCC or SuperDuper!. You say you can boot into safe mode#. This is a bit unconventional, but you could try the following; you will need a functioning external hard drive, formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with a GUID partition map. If these details are elusive or vague to you, research this yourself beforehand.
With a functioning external harddrive, see if you can download, and install the SuperDuper applicaton, in the Applications folder and use it to make a copy (ie a clone) of your HD onto the Ext. HD. When all finished restart and hold down the Option key to give you the chance to boot into the external hard drive clone*. If that is possible, then you can run its Disk Utility and perform a Repair Disk on the internal Macintosh HD, and hopefully correct whatever error exists.
#Being able to boot into safe mode suggest there may be some software being loaded in normal mode that is causing the problem, but is difficult to diagnose. What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode?
*if at this point it does not boot, there is not much more to try.
Another variation, more straight forward would be to use Disk Warrior, although expensive, it is a good disk utility that may resurrect your boot process, but it is expensive, and it all depends on whether your Mac can boot into it as well. If it can't see it you would be facing the same problem.
What was the update you did that lead to this?
Message was edited by: roam

Disk Utility broken while booted from Installation CDs??

Situation: I have a Macbook Pro with a 120 GB HDD. I had partitioned it into two partitions, and later desired that I should have only one partition on the drive. I booted the Mac OS X installation CDs and attempted the following three-step procedure:
1. Use Disk Utility to image my system partition into a file on an external USB drive
2. Verify the image and repartition ("Erase") my laptop's internal HDD
3. Restore the disk image from the external HDD to the laptop's HDD.
I made it to step 3 without issue. So currently I have one unbootable Macbook Pro, an 85 GB image of a system partition on a USB HDD, and a perfectly bootable Intel Mac Mini from which I'm writing this post.
Problem: Disk Utility doesn't seem to be able to restore images when booted from the Installation CDs. On the 'Restore' tab there are two fields you must fill in, a 'source' field and a 'destination' field. The source field has a button where you can summon a very helpful file-picker, and it pulls up my disk image from my USB drive just fine. However, the destination field can only be filled in by clicking and dragging a drive from the left panel in Disk Utility.
However, it seems impossible to do this while booted from the Installation CDs. When I attempt to click and drag a disk from the left panel list, all I end up accomplishing is selecting multiple items from the list. To make a visual illustration:
Instead of this, like I get when I try it on my mac mini booted normally:
http://upload.pbase.com/silentplummet/image/72221384.jpg
...I get this, which is a photo of my macbook pro booted from the installation CDs:
http://upload.pbase.com/silentplummet/image/72221397.jpg
There doesn't seem to be any way to actually select a destination drive. If I had to hypothesize, I would guess that the GUI is crippled when you boot from CD and click+drag is deactivated. But that appears to make it impossible to restore images since the only way to select destination drives is by clicking and dragging.
Now I am a college student; I'm not really losing revenue or anything over this, but this is an awful oversight on Apple's part and I am stuck on what to do about it. There is no documentation that says "Restore functionality is crippled in Disk Utility when booting from installation CDs." Here are the steps I have tried for an alternate solution:
-Commandline diskutil. Unfortunately Apple has crippled it and there appears to be no imaging functionality whatsoever.
-Mount the image manually and cp the files back over. Unfortunately I can't make it preserve permissions. I passed the right options to cp but it just won't do what it's supposed to. I tried copying it anyway and using Disk Utility to repair the permissions, but it still wouldn't boot.
-Call Applecare. The support rep was kind and helpful but couldn't offer a solution. The higher-ups fed me some BS about not supporting third party applications, well, I hardly think Disk Utility constitutes a third party application.
My next step is to boot the MBP in target disk mode and use my mac mini to restore the image to the MBP HDD, but I have to buy a firewire cable for that and I don't really want to.
Seeking: acknowledgement that Disk Utility is broken and Apple *****, or otherwise immediate solutions to restore the image to my HDD that do not constitute monetary expenditures on my part.
Macbook Pro 15" 2.0 GHz Mac mini 1.5 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Others have (in the Mac Pro forum) noticed this bug in Disk Utility on the Intel version install disks. Your easiest fix would be to reinstall OSX on you Macbook disk, boot it, mount the disk image from the USB drive, and use the Migration Assistant to copy over all your accounts and data files.

Cannot boot from installed disk on Intel Xserve

I have an Intel Xserve.
I have had it for some months,it has been working fine, it is a standby backup machine to others and is used as a testbed.
I have just installed from the supplied DVD 10.4.8.
The installation goes smoothly, however after the first reboot. The system is trying to install from dvd again.
I have tried installing a known working Intel boot disk, and this just gives a folder with the flashing question mark.
I have tried formatting the disk and partitioning making sure to use GUID partition and it doesn't boot.
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Welcome to the forum!
You're missing the first disk which is "Rescue and Recovery", followed by CDs 1-7.
Make sure to re-align the partitions before or after OS installation in order to get the proper utilization of that SSD.
Good luck.
Cheers,
George
In daily use: R60F, R500F, T61, T410
Collecting dust: T60
Enjoying retirement: A31p, T42p,
Non-ThinkPads: Panasonic CF-31 & CF-52, HP 8760W
Starting Thursday, 08/14/2014 I'll be away from the forums until further notice. Please do NOT send private messages since I won't be able to read them. Thank you.

IMac crashed! Only get partial boot from OSX disk one

Booting from OSX disk 1, goes as far as a blue screen with no icons or menu. Boot with D key for hardware test. Test ok.
At a loss what to do next.
David

Does Seem so, or the Internal Drive is so messed up it's interfering, try this...
Does it boot to Single User Mode, CMD+s keys at bootup, if so try...
/sbin/fsck -fy
Repeat until it shows no errors fixed.
(Space between fsck AND -fy important).
Resolve startup issues and perform disk maintenance with Disk Utility and fsck...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214

Win 7 pro installed on hp touchsmart 320-1030, the machine cannot boot from installation DVD. Assist

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I want to reboot the machine with the same DVD after completing the installation, to test for possibility of reimage in case of crash. Although in bios, I specify cd\dvd as firts boot media, the machine cannot boot from installation DVD. I have 20 machines that behave this way. Can anyone assist?
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Hello,
So, you installed Window 7 Pro with a DVD, you boot with it to install the O.S, and now it does not work?
Have you tried to load the BIOS default values or even updating the BIOS?
If it had work before, cant understand why it does not work now...
Let me know.
Thanks,
I work for HP! Please remember to provide and if this helped click ON

Can't boot from hard disk or from windows 7 recovery dvd

I have a 970A-G46 motherboard.
I can't boot from hard disk or from a windows 7 recovery dvd.
If I move the hard drive to another PC, it boots fine.
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This machine will boot from an Ubuntu dvd and I can then access the HD directories and the recovery dvd.
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Help and thanks

"I can't boot from hard disk or from a windows 7 recovery dvd."
What is that DVD from? Is it from a previous computer of some kind? Same question for HDD and the OS on it.

Though the root disk is mirrored, server is unable to boot from alternate disk (mirror disk)

Hi PPl,
It happened second time in a row. Though the root disk is mirrored, server is unable to boot from alternate disk (mirror disk)
When the disk was found faulty, still unable to boot the OS from alternate disk, it says it still probe/look for other disk
Here are the console log when I tried to boot the OS
sc> console
Enter #. to return to ALOM.
WARNING: /pci@0/pci@0/pci@2/scsi@0 (mpt0):
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WARNING: /pci@0/pci@0/pci@2/scsi@0 (mpt0):
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WARNING: /pci@0/pci@0/pci@2/scsi@0 (mpt0):
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You can't boot from systems earlier than that shipped with the computer. For example, early 2008 Mac Pros come with 10.5.1 and can't boot 10.5
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Several questions.
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Power Mac G4 Mac OS 9.2.x

Hi Big Brad;
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New MacBook won't boot from external disk

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Thanks

Ian Patterson wrote:
golferx,
Will any other Intel Mac boot from the drive? If not, it's possibly because the drive uses an Apple Partition Map (bootable for PowerPC Macs) instead of a GUID Partition Table (bootable for Intel Macs).
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-i-
I can boot an prev gen MacBook and also my iMac (current gen). I took it to the Genius Bar and he could not get it to boot a new MacBook either and didn't have a solution.

Booting from Installer Disk

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