Can't Boot Tiger from External HD

I just got a new MBP, and I'm having trouble booting Tiger from my external HD. I installed Tiger on my Lacie Rugged HD, so that I can use Avid. I had no problem booting from the drive using my 1.67 PB. But trying the same technique with my new MPB - holding down the Option key as the computer starts - only gives me the MPB HD as a bootable option. The Lacie mounts fine on the MPB, but it just won't appear as an option for a boot disk. I also checked System Preferences > Startup Disk, and I only can choose between the MPB HD and a Network Drive; the Lacie doesn't get recognized as a bootable disk (even though, again, it is properly mounted).
Any suggestions?

Thanks for the points. (I'm only snarky before my morning coffee.)
Yes, you can create three partitions. However, they will all have the same partition scheme, make sense? Since PPC-based Macs can't boot from GUID-partioned drives, you need to use APM.
So, the solution is to use format the drive with Apple Partition Map (not GUID) and create the 3 partitions of the desired size. Then, use something like SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner to clone the PB HDD to one partition and the MBP HDD to another partition. Note that you can install Tiger for the PB from the PB install discs directly to the external HDD, but you can't do that for the MB partition, that you need to clone.
In fact, I have my LaCie d2 external HDD set up just like that. Apple Partition Scheme, 3 partitions, one for my wife's PB, one for my MBP, and the remaining one for general storage. I can boot both of our laptops from the external drive, and all three partitions mount fine as disks on both machines.

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Can't boot Arch from external HDD

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So I put the Arch-CD back in the CD drive trying to boot into my Arch System on the external HDD. So I started typing:
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So this is what I did and I can't boot off my external HDD, neither can I boot into my system on the external hdd from the cdrom.
What am I missing here?

The harddrive you boot from is in my experience always hd0. Could this mean your external disc is hd2?
Have you tried chainloading from the installer cd to your external disc?

Can't boot OS9 from external HD

I have an external HD with OS X4 and OS9 installed on it. Classic will open, but I can't instal an OS 9 app because the app says I need virtual memory. I tried to boot OS9 from the external drive to install the app from OS9, but it is not a start up option in system preferences. I also can't start it from the c key. I have a full retail version of OS9.
Does any one have any suggestions? Do I need to install an earlier version of OS X?

Allan,
Thanks for the response.
When I upgraded my iMac G5 to OS X5 I thought it was time to finally get rid of all of my OS9 apps. I originally had them on an external bootable HD. It's now Thanksgiving and I had a few holiday graphics in Corel Print House 2000 I would like to use (OS9). I thought I would reinstall OS X4 and OS9 on the external HD which I did. OSX4 boots fine and classic opens but I can't get it to boot from OS9. I can't reinstall Print House because it says it needs virtual memory to instal.
Any ideas how I could load Print House onto my external HD or how to open a .cxx file? I wonder how I got this app on the external originally.

How can I boot/run from external HD when internal HD is fried?

Background: I have an original vintage 2002 emac G4 1.25 that I've been messing with for the past couple of months due to slow running and hanging/crashing apps. I upgraded the RAM with an additional 256 MB several years ago and I was running OSX 10.2 without many problems until recently. I was getting messages about the hard drive being full, so I cleaned up and backed up my files to an external HD (USB, of course, since I hadn't found this forum at that time). Freeing up memory didn't help and neither did creating an administrator account, so I ran Apple Hardware Test, which turned up an error code: mem_/2/4 DIMM1/J1601
When I tried to do an erase and reinstall, the erase part went fine but the reinstall wouldn't work because (on the last of 4 discs) the machine returned a "can't write" error and suggested that the hard drive is unusable.
My questions: How can I use an external HD (Firewire, of course) to boot and run my emac when the internal HD is fried and there's no operating system on board? How do I install OSX on the external HD to boot the emac in the first place? Also, will the 384 MB of RAM be enough, or must I upgrade that, too? For that matter, what version of OSX would be best?
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HFS stands for Hierarchical File System. The plus sign stands for extended or extended format.
This is the data system format that Apple uses for their operating systems.
When you buy an external hard drive device, typically they do not come pre-formatted.
You'll need to use the Disk Utility app in OS X in your username/Applications/Utilities folder on your eMac if it's still operational or when you start up your eMac from the OS X 10.5 DVD located in the Applications/Utilities folder.
You use this app to initialize and format the drive once it is connected to your eMac. If you wish, you can also, at that stage, partition the drive into separate variable size sections to make a large capacity HD more manageable.
You need to have a functioning stick of RAM in your eMac in order for it to boot up correctly.
The OS X startup routine looks for all components in your eMac that are necessary for a successful start up.
Your eMac will not boot up, even from CD/DVD, without any RAM installed.
If you have only one stick of RAM in your eMac and it's bad or corrupted, you'll need to purchase and Install a new stick of RAM to start.
You might as well purchase 2 brand new 1 GB RAM sticks for your eMac. 2 GBs
OS X 10.5 Leopard's minimum RAM requirements are 512 MBs of RAM.
Your eMac can max out at 2 GBs of RAM.
The specs for the RAM are PC2700 SDRAM, DDR333, 184 pins.
Here are links to websites I use to buy Mac accessories and Hard drives compatible with Macs.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/
http://www.lacie.com/us/products/range.htm?id=10033

Can anyone boot Leopard from an external hard drive on an iMacPPC?

Can anyone boot Leopard from an external hard drive on a G5 iMac PowerPC? How?

Allan's answer is irrelevant as he refers to Snow Leopard. He must have isread your post!
Yes, you can and I do. The proviso is that the external hard drive is connected by firewire, as a PPC Mac cannot boot via USB.

Can't connect to LAN when booting MBP from external drive?

In an effort to always work in my computer environment, I backup my Mac Pro main drive to an external firewire drive, plug in to my new Macbook Pro 2.9 and option start off this drive. Result is I'm working off the last backup of my main Mac Pro drive so all my apps, stored mail, etc, is alive and well. I merely track any changes and new files and copy them over or use DropBox to get them on to my Main Mac Pro, my main computer.
Problem is, when booting off my external drive running Lion 10.7.5, my MBP's network won't turn on or recognize my home LAN. Then if I restart off just the MBP drive, it does connet to my LAN automatically.
Could the problem be that since my MBP was set up for Mount Lion, that it won't fully work with a drive with a Lion OS on it? I thought perhaps I had to turn on Airport when on my external Lion drive, since I don't have that turned on on my Mac Pro which uses ethernet. Can't figure this one out. The MBP must have airport as I'm on it now but booted off the internal ML OSX drive.
Thx,
Steven

No not at all. You should have access to your LAN from any version of OS X that is set up correctly. It's still using the same hardware and should be loading the same drivers for that hardware and YES you may have to actually turn on the Airport card.

PB G4 won't start up in Tiger from external drive

My brother has what I take to be a PowerBook G4 (15-inch FW 800). It has Panther installed.
He wants to try using Tiger, so he bought the standard Tiger install DVD from Apple, and I recommended that he install Tiger on an external hard drive. He has tried this with two FW400 drives and a FW800 drive, and in all cases, after installing Tiger on the external drive and starting up from the external drive, the computer freezes in a horrible way. For example, last time, it got to the spot where, after a new installation, it asks for your name; the mouse became unresponsive and the music turned into a repeating BONG BONG kind of sound.
Why on earth would this be? I run Tiger from an external drive all the time.
He has done all hardware diagnostics, including Rember and MemTest and the diagnostic included with the computer, and everything passes just fine.
The very same external FW drive with the very same Tiger on it works just fine with a different computer attached. So we conclude that there is something about his computer that is problematic. But what could it possibly be?

Hi, mattn.
Here's a better idea. Erase the external drive. Clone your brother's internal hard drive to it as a backup. Test to see whether the Powerbook will boot normally to the clone. If it doesn't, stop right there and run a full battery of first aid and repair utilities on the internal drive, then clone it again and test again. If all tests on the internal drive are OK, your external drive enclosure(s) may just not be bootable — some aren't.
If the clone on the external drive boots the PB with no problems, upgrade the internal drive to Tiger so your brother can put it through its paces for a couple of weeks. If he likes it and decides to keep it installed, clone the internal drive again to the external drive, so Tiger and any work done in the interim is backed up. If he wants to stick with whatever older OS he was using, erase the internal drive and clone the external drive back to it. In the latter case, be sure to make a separate backup of any documents that have been created or modified during his trial period, before restoring the older clone to the internal drive.
Note that a Powerbook with Firewire 800 is Aluminum, not Titanium, and there's a separate set of forums for the Albooks:
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=135
Any future questions related to the Powerbook's hardware should be directed there to reach the folks who are most knowledgeable about those models.

Booting up from external hard drive

I'm about to take the plunge and install Leopard. But first, I am backing up all data on an external harddrive. My question is, should the worst happen, how do I use the external as a bootable harddrive? (Am I saying this right?) How do I boot up from the external?
Also, can I keep that and run Tiger after I successfully install Leopard? In case I need to run a classic program, which Tiger does and from what I read Leopard doesn't handle?
thanks for any advice for a mac user and not a programmer!

Presuming that the external has a valid copy of Mac OS X, either through installing from the system disks or Mac OS X install disk or by making a clone of your current boot drive (via a utility like Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper), then you just hold down the Option key while starting, or restarting, the Mac. You'll be presented with a list of bootable drives and you can just choose the external.
can I keep that and run Tiger after I successfully install Leopard?
Presuming you're referring to Tiger on the external drive, yes, you certainly can.
In case I need to run a classic program, which Tiger does and from what I read Leopard doesn't handle?
You are correct; Leopard no longer supports the Classic environment.
Regards.

Help, need help booting XP from external hard drive

Hi all, i can't seem to get XP to boot from my external hard drive.
OK, heres the story. i have an imac. i use bootcamp to run OSX and XP. things are good. but i run out of space, so i buy myself a 2tb bare drive and swap it out. so i put the original internal with OSX and XP into an external firewire/usb enclosure. I install refit. I hold option on startup and it shows that i have a windows and a mac OS i can boot from the External firewire disk. looks great, but when i choose the windows from the Ext disk, it doesn't boot, instead it loads windows7 on my new 2tb internal disk.
i hear its hard to boot windows XP from an external disk. my professor told me it has something to do with the boot.ini file on the XP disk... something about changing the value of the "rdisk" to 1, which i have done.
i am not trying to reinstall xp, rather just boot from it because i have so many applications/plugins that i do not wish to reinstall.
Does anyone know if this is possible?>> Logon to windows7, and create a system image/backup of the system FROM the XP external disk? and then reinstall XP on that disk, then restore back onto itself? that way i won't have to reinstall.
anyone have any ideas?

Hi boi,
you can't start ANY windows OS from external HD...

Can I install Tiger on external drive with OS9 on internal?

I bought and plan to install OS X 10.4.3, but will continue to use OS 9.2.2 about 95% of the time because I can't afford to update all 3rd-party software at this time, so I want to start up in 9.2.2 usually. Can I install 10.4.3 on a partition of my external HD with firewire and leave 9.2.2 on my internal HD, then pick a start-up OS by a key combination or such? How should I do it, and what problems might I encounter? To partition my external HD should I use OS 9.2.2, the original 9.0 CD, or the new 10.4.3 DVD?
I have a Power Mac G4 (AGB Graphics) with an internal 10 GB HD and an almost-empty external 120 GB firewire HD (Iomega). Thanks.

Welcome to Apple Discussions!
Yes you can do that, though I'm not too sure that Iomega's firmware is up to date to do it. Be sure that any data you have on the Iomega is backed up elsewhere before attempting it. Some Firewire drives without up to date firmware from the manufacturer may become invisible and unusable after a software update on Mac OS X 10.3 or later. Also an AGP PowerMac needs its firmware updated while booted from Mac OS 9 before installing Mac OS X 10.2 or later:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86117
That said, if after testing you find it does work, you can switch booting between both drives using the Option key booting as described in the Startup Manager article:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106178
Leave OS 9.2.2 on your internal, and 10.4 on your external. That will be a lot easier than partitioning. Some information I wrote for others which can help you on your migration to Mac OS X is provided in this link below:
http://www.macmaps.com/macosxnative.html
If you really want to partition, be aware that only third party software is available to partition without erasing the entire drive, and you'll want to make sure additional partitions that will boot Mac OS 9 have Mac OS 9 drivers installed as my link above states. Whatever you do, be sure you have at least two copies of your data at all times:
http://www.macmaps.com/backup.html
Disclaimer: Reference to links I make to my Macmaps.com website are a for your information only type reference. I do not get any profit from this page, and it is open to the public.

How do I boot Leopard from external hard drive?

I'm currently staring off into space... my 3 month old MBP seems to have finished its painfully long boot and all that appears the Leopard background. The local Mac guru isn't available until Monday but did tell me I need to boot from my external hard drive. Um, how do I boot from external hard drive?
The cause of the problem: inserting flash drive powering up.
Tried safe boot. Only difference was iCal reminder popped up in space.
Mac guru told me do NOT use install disks!
Help!
AR

Apple support has told me that you cannot boot a MBP from an external drive when Leopard is installed on a MBP.
That is just plain wrong.
1) Hook up your external drive. Use FireWire for better performance.
2) Launch Disk Utility and highlight the actual drive icon at the left. Click on the Partition tab.
3) In the Partition section, click on the Options button. Click on the radio button for "GUID Partition Map". This is the option you must use in order for a drive to be bootable on an Intel based Mac. Click OK.
4) Set up your partitions however you want and click the Partition button at the lower right.
From here, you can either clone your internal drive to the external, or install Leopard on it from scratch.

Can't Install Tiger on External HD

I'm simply wanting to erase and install on 2 FW drives. They're good with Oxford and all. I have Panther, but want to do a fresh install. When I try and install from disk, the computer starts to restart and then freezes. I can never get to a point to even choose the drive. Now that I think of it, this is the first time doing this with Tiger. In panther, there wasn't even a restart, you could pick the drive right away. Any help is appreciated

First, do the FWHDs show up on the Desktop? If so, did you erase and format them? If I understand correctly, your machine is running 10.4.3 and you're trying to install Tiger on the FWHDs that currently have Panther installed on them, but the install disk can't see them, Can you boot with either FWHD?

Can't boot up from bootable clone drive. Why?

My PPC PowerMac G5 computer HD is backed up on an external Lacie bootable drive. The computer recognises the Lacie as a bootable drive but fails to boot up from it. What could be the reason?
The external drive has always functioned properly and continues to function normally - I can access it, and read and write data to it through the Finder. However, if I try booting up from it (via System Preferences -> Startup Disk) it only offers a grey screen. I've tried a number of times. A grey screen with the Apple symbol in the middle - nothing else. One time, instead of the Apple symbol, it featured a circle with a diagonal inside it.
The Lacie is connected via a Firewire 800. Its Partition Scheme is 'Apple Partition Map'. In Info 'Ownership & Permissions', "Ignore ownership on this volume" is checked (not be me) . I've tried booting up with it unchecked too.
Any ideas as to what the problem might be?
Thanks,
iHope

My question was:
The computer recognises the Lacie as a bootable drive but fails to boot up from it. What could be the reason?
Having investigated further I've found the answer: the volume won't boot if the "Ignore Ownership on this Volume" is checked (in the Get Info pane for the volume). If this was checked when creating the clone, unchecking it doesn't help.
This is another example of a problem created by a hidden default. Bad programming, bad attitude. They should be banned! ALL options should be selected by the user so that there is complete transparency.
Apple have just wasted a great deal of my time! I made the clone using the Restore Option of Disk Utility. There was absolutely no mention of this crucially important option. Thank you Apple.
iHope

Booting Linux from External Harddrive

I recently installed Kubuntu 8.04 on an external USB hard drive... all self contained. I can go to any PC, hit F-whatever for the boot menu, and boot right to my external hard drive.
However, the hard drive doesn't show up when I plug it into a Mac and hit "Option" for the boot options. I have a MacBook Intel Core 2 Duo with Mac OS X 10.4.11.
Any ideas? I'd like to make minimal changes to the Mac (otherwise it would defeat the point of my self-contained Linux install)
Thanks!
Erik

I have booted Debian from a 2GB USB stick on my intel Macbook Pro. When I hold down the option key at startup I see Mac, Windows (bootcamp), and Windows (the usb stick). No problems.

Booting Windows from external drive

Hi all. I recently got an external Firewire 400 drive for backups, and it's just occurred to me that I could possibly run Windows off of it and reclaim some 60GB of internal hard drive space. I would like to know if this is possible. Yes, I know that Windows supposedly cannot boot from an external drive, but I have read reports of people booting it off of USB drives, and wonder if a similar tact can be tried for Firewire for greater I/O speed. I also know that OS X can be booted from Firewire, so it seems it should be possibly for Windows.
My guess as to how to do this would be to. . .
- use dd to do a bit-by-bit copy of the Windows partition on my internal drive to a partition on the external drive
- modify the boot.ini on the external so that it points to the correct location
- modify a .cfg file to load Firewire drivers earlier in the boot process (?)
The first step is trivial, and the second will be easy since the Firewire drive will appear in the same place unless I have another external or CD attached. What I'm not sure how to go about doing is the third - which .cfg? I can probably figure out the drivers otherwise.
Finally: has anyone else done something like this? If so, links/hints? Thanks.

i recommend looking into rEFIt:
I've looked at rEFIt before (because I really didn't want to go through all that hacking), but I think the problem still exists: Windows XP does not support EFI (and neither will Vista), so there's still the problem of USB/Firewire drivers loading at boot time. From
http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/t-224050.html
some people got rEFIt on the external drive, and that helped to dual boot on that drive, but it still required hacking the Windows CD (it's the registry, that I think goes into the installation itself, that's hacked). It's a Window's problem.
you should be able to do this using esata external
drives with a esata express card for native speeds.
If the expresscard includes drivers that support booting, it may work (hence the mention of the Nitro AV card). I know that not all cards do, and I haven't heard anyone had success with it. But, it would be cool if someone decides to get such cards and try ; )

Can't Boot Tiger from External HD

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