Cannot find boot folder- HD not in list on utility

I have a macbook which started flashing the folder/question mark on bootup. Finally I was able to remove the CD in the drive and attempt to run disk utilities. The hard drive doesn't show up on the list, only the CDRW drive. I took the steps to reset the PRAM (?)- holding down option apple r p etc and got the second chime, attempt to boot, but nothing.
I'm not sure where to go from here. Any ideas? This is my best friend's computer, and they did not buy applecare.

You will need to reinstall OS X. You may be able to do the following:
How to Perform an Archive and Install
An Archive and Install will NOT erase your hard drive, but you must have sufficient free space for a second OS X installation which could be from 3-9 GBs depending upon the version of OS X and selected installation options. The free space requirement is over and above normal free space requirements which should be at least 6-10 GBs. Read all the linked references carefully before proceeding.
1. Be sure to use Disk Utility first to repair the disk before performing the Archive and Install.
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.) 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, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior (4.0 for Tiger) and/or TechTool Pro (4.5.2 for Tiger) 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.
2. Do not proceed with an Archive and Install if DU reports errors it cannot fix. In that case use Disk Warrior and/or TechTool Pro to repair the hard drive. If neither can repair the drive, then you will have to erase the drive and reinstall from scratch.
3. Boot from your OS X Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When you reach the screen to select a destination drive click once on the destination drive then click on the Option button. Select the Archive and Install option. You have an option to preserve users and network preferences. Only select this option if you are sure you have no corrupted files in your user accounts. Otherwise leave this option unchecked. Click on the OK button and continue with the OS X Installation.
4. Upon completion of the Archive and Install you will have a Previous System Folder in the root directory. You should retain the PSF until you are sure you do not need to manually transfer any items from the PSF to your newly installed system.
5. After moving any items you want to keep from the PSF you should delete it. You can back it up if you prefer, but you must delete it from the hard drive.
6. You can now download a Combo Updater directly from Apple's download site to update your new system to the desired version as well as install any security or other updates. You can also do this using Software Update.

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Install cd won't boot: "Cannot find booted cdrom device"

I have arch (exclusively) on three other machines and am trying to install it on a new Toshiba Portege R500, dual boot with WinXP.
On boot, I end up with a kernel panic message. Here are some relevant lines leading up to the problem:
:: Waiting for usb devices to settle...
scsi 4:0:0:0: CD-ROM MATSHITA DVD-RAM UJ-844S 1.10 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
Driver 'sr' needs updating - please use bus_type methods
sr0: scsi3-mmc drive: 24x/24x writer dvd-ram cd/rw xa/form2 cdda tray
Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20
:: Scanning for boot cdrom device...
Failed to mount /dev/cd/cdrom-sr0
Failed to mount /dev/cd/cdrw-sr0
Failed to mount /dev/cd/dvd-sr0
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Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init!
I have sucessfully booted linux from CD when using systemrescuecd in order to make my partitions.
In searching I found this post and this one, both of which address similar issues but not exactly the same. The first is the most promising but provides no solutions.
Help would be appreciated.

I get the same error, but a slightly different setup leading to it.
My hda died, so I put a new drive in and I'm trying to install from scratch. Since I had linux on this box already, sda and sdb are a pair of 750G drives that I use in a RAID1 software mirror. So my physical devices are:
hda: 160G PATA (probably had some crap on it before, will be re-partitioned and formatted)
hdb: dvd drive used for install
sda: 750G SATA
sdb: 750G SATA
Using 2008.06 ftp i686, I see:
sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 240121728 512-byte hardware sectors (122942 MB)
sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO of FUA
sda: sda1
sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI disk
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] 1465149168 512-byte hardware sectors (750156 MB)
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO for FUA
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] 1465149168 512-byte hardware sectors (750156 MB)
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO for FUA
sdb: unknown partition table
sd 2:0:1:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
done.
:: Running Hook [boot-cd]
:: Waiting for usb devices to settle...
:: Scanning for boot cdrom device...
Failed to mount /dev/cd/*
ERROR: cannot find booted cdrom device, cannot continue...
Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init!
Obviously I can't copy and paste (this isn't a VM), so there may be some typos in there.
There are a couple things that seem strange to me:
1) [strike]I don't have a 122GB device in the system, why does sda claim 122942 MB?[/strike] That's my 160G PATA drive, interesting
2) Why is sdb listed twice?
3) [strike]Where is my other 750G drive? They're SATA, it's not like I got the jumpers wrong.[/strike] In my haste to install the new drive, I knocked one of the SATA power cables out... far too easy to do, that'd never happen with the older PATA-style power plugs
The unknown partition table on sdb is expected... I'm using the raw device for software RAID, not partitioned.
I'd try the USB flash drive route, but I don't have one and I need to get this server fixed today... for now, I'll try some older Arch CDs.
Last edited by TheAmigo (2008-09-20 23:28:47)

I cannot find MobileSync folder under ApplicationSupport after I backup my iphone on iOS 10.9.5

I backup my iphone 5 to my Mac iOS 10.9.5, after backup cannot find MobileSync folder under Library/ApplicationSupport

redwise wrote:
This actually did not help me, but I can't figure out how to delete my response. I don't have a mobile sync folder and I do not understand what is meant by "Go menu."
The Go menu is the 5th one (from the left)
you do have a mobile sync folder
And you can not delete your response.

Solaris 10 x86 b72 "Cannot find boot.bin" booting from SCSI.

Hello,
After several gyrations of installation attempts and dealing with early BIOS PnP issues, I've finally managed to get Solaris 10 x86 installed on an old dual P2 333Mhz system. So far the system is running flawlessly, but I'm still not able to boot directly off the SCSI disk. The primary boot handler is erroring out that it cannot find boot.bin.
I can boot fine off of the IDE CD drive and the floppy (currently pointed to autoboot into the SCSI disk as a workaround). But when I try to boot directly off the SCSI drive, I get the error from the Solaris boot manager that it "Cannot find boot.bin".
I have booted off the CD & Floppy and compared the /boot files from both the CD & floppy, but I cannot find any difference that would prevent the primary boot loader from finding boot.bin. I've even compared files to make sure they were not corrupt, and even force re-installed the boot handlers, and manually partioning, always with the same results. I've also tried both enabling and disabling the DOS >1G translation of the Adaptec SCSI BIOS with no change. I can't find any reason that the boot loader is not seeing boot.bin, or that the file is corrupt in any way (even after several wipe and install attempts).
My System is:
Supermicro P6DLS dual Pentium II 333MHz & 512MB RAM, w/ Adaptec 7880 SCSI-UW and IDE (whopping UltraDMA 33) interfaces.
CD/DVD reader is configured as the secondary master (moved from primary master in an attempt to fix boot problem)
HD is a 16GB UW SCSI disk.
(Other particulars ommited unless someone feels they are relevant to the boot process).
The system came to me with Windows 2000 installed and functioning. I also had Fedora Core 3 installed, both with no boot problems of the SCSI disk. (Although FC3 would not see the second processor even with the canned SMP kernel).
This system is intended to replace a Fedora Core 3 system to be a multi-purpose firewall gateway & proxy server and I'm really liking the performance I'm seeing with Solaris 10 on this system but would like it to be able to go through a normal boot process and not have to depend on a floppy as a boot device to get started.
Anyone have any ideas why the Solaris x86 boot loaders think that they cannot find boot.bin when the full /boot partion is intact?
TIA,
-Troy

I'm getting the same problem trying to install
Solaris 10 in VMware from DVD.
It brings up the Solaris Primary Boot Subsystem, so
it appears to be reading fine, but the only thing
that happens is I get the Cannot find boot.bin
error.Hmm, the "Cannot find boot.bin." message comes from the
CD/DVD's boot code, which is contained in the first 16 sectors
of the media.
The boot.bin file is supposed to be read from the Solaris UFS
slice, which starts at 512 byte block #5151360 (or 2048 byte
dvd sector #1287840). This a byte offset of ~2.6 GBytes.
Maybe an issue with your system's bios not being able to read
DVD media > 2GB, during DVD boot?
Or a problem with burning the DVD media? Maybe some
"smart" PC DVD burning software has decided only to record
the 2.6 GB ISO filesystem, and the 100 MB Solaris UFS
filesystem that follows the ISO filesystem is missing on the DVD?
Or a 2GB filesize issue while burning the DVD?
Do you have a pc / windows utility that can print some information
about the S10 DVD media, especially the size of that DVD?
Maybe your CD/DVD recording software?
The original S10 GA x86 DVD image has a size of 2732195840
bytes, or 1334080 2K DVD blocks.

Toshiba/x86 -- Cannot find boot.bin

I am trying to install Solaris 10 on a Toshiba Satellite A10 laptop, I insert CD 1, and it goes to Primary Boot, and then says "cannot find boot.bin". I tried to boot from the other 3 disks, but unsurprisingly, it did not work. I read every posts about "boot.bin" on here, but was not able to find anything that worked.
I looked in my BIOS but there isn't any settings that would change anything.
Thank you.

Hey,I have the same issue.
I got a installation DVD,but it reported "cannot find boot.bin".What can i do now?
I'm waiting for the answer,if you got it,tell me the correct method please.
Thank you for all your help.

Cannot find boot device, cannot continue.

Im trying to install arch linux on my eeepc but im running into problems, i choose arch linux from the installer menu and then as it goes on it suddenly stops saying 'Cannot find boot device, cannot continue... Falling back to interactive prompt' and im pretty sure thats not meant to happen so what do i do?

I am getting this error as well using the archlinux-2009.02-core 64 bit iso image.
Same exact error
Something about a searching for SCSI sda device
Scanning boot...
Scanning cd...
Scannng USB...
'Cannot find boot device, cannot continue... Falling back to interactive prompt'
then I get a $ prompt, and cannot use keyboard, I have to manually push the power button to restart.
I'm booting from a Sansa Clip 4gb
Also, my computer has no optical drive...yet
Last edited by Anonymo (2009-04-04 16:05:54)

Every time I open iPhoto a window opens telling me that there are 3 photos that have not been imported. Recovered folders are opened with no photos and I cannot find which photos have not been imported. Help please!

Every time I open iPhoto a window opens telling me that there are 3 photos that have not been imported. This happens twice. When I answer yes then nothing happens and if I answer no then a recovered folder is opened with no photos in it. These recoverable folders keep opening with no photos in them. I cannot find which photos have not been imported. Can anyone assist please?

Go to your Pictures Folder and find the iPhoto Library there. Right (or Control-) Click on the icon and select 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open with the Library exposed.
Look there for a Folder called 'Import' or 'Importing'.
Drag it to the Desktop. *Make no other changes*.
Start iPhoto. Does that help?
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I want to copy my iPhoto library to an external drive but I cannot find the folder on my Mac Air. When I open Finder there is no Picture folder showing so I cannot find the iPhoto library.

I want to copy my iPhoto library to an external drive but I cannot find the folder on my Mac Air. When I open Finder there is no Picture folder showing so I cannot find the iPhoto library.

Choose Go to Folder from the Finder's Go menu and provide ~/Pictures/ as the path. If that doesn't work, control-click a photo in iPhoto, show it in the Finder, and Command-click the folder's name in the window's title bar to find the path.
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TS3274 Cannot find utilities folder to fix java preference. Where is it located?

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Have you tried the pogo games app : https://discussions.apple.com/message/18647219#18647219 ?

I am running Mountain Lion.I have searched in utilities and finder,no luck and cannot find boot camp

I cannot find Boot Camp on my Mountain Lion. Tried utilities and finder no luck.

Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
Press Command and Space keys and type Boot Camp Assistant. If it doesn't work, press Command and R keys when your Mac starts and install Mountain Lion

Cannot find Safari folder in Library in Time Machine backups

Hi, In preparing an older MacBook Pro for kid use I deleted all of the Safari bookmarks, not realizing they were synched in iCloud. Therefore, it deleted all Safari bookmarks across all of my computers! Ugh! I'm trying to go back into the Library/Safari folder in Time Machine and restore the bookmarks file (Bookmarks.plist) from a TM backup this morning. But in Time Machine I cannot access the Safari folder in the Library folder in any Time Machine backup except for the more current one.
If I enter Time Machine via the Library/Safari folder I cannot go back in time at all (and that's exactly what I need to do). If I enter Time Machine via the Library folder the Safari folder disappears from all but the most recent backup.
Why is the Safari folder not showing up in previous TM backups? Does this have anything to do with iCloud synch? If so, can I go back in iCloud similar to Time Machine and "resynch" the Safari bookmarks file from this morning?
This is in Yosemite 10.10.1 on a newish 15" MBP.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Thanks Sparkleberry, but it's more complicated than that. I quit Safari, unsynched Safari from iCloud, but nothing changed. Then after about 15 minutes I could access ~/Library/Safari in TM, but only for some of the backups. I Restored from a bookmarks.plist file from December 22, 2014, but it was the wrong bookmarks (completely different from the bookmarks I had on my MBP). I Restored the empty bookmarks file again.
The trouble is, ~/Library/Safari is not available for most of my previous backups, and there were many between December 22 and this evening.
The net problem is that ~/Library/Safari/bookmarks.plist simply don't seem to be available beyond the most recent backup (and the random December 22 file).
I read somewhere that you can backup from iCloud backups, but I try as I might I cannot find how to do that, if it can be done.
Thanks!

IMac cannot find system folder.

I purchased my iMac in March. By June I had it back at the Apple Store for repair.
They replaced the mother board. Now it is doing the same thing again. At start-up it cannot find the system folder most times. If it does start up and I let it go to sleep, when I wake up the iMac, it locks up and upon restart it cannot find the system folder.
I have tried reformating the hard drive and reinstalling the software. It only helps for a while.

I don't know if there's a question in there or not but if it's 'doing the same thing' then take it back. It's still under warranty. We can't fix hardware.

Cannot find mobilesync folder on my mac os

I've backed up my iphone several times and followed instructions on finding the sms backup files but cannot find the mobilesync folder for the life of me... It is simply not there it appears, not under the only user on the mac (both user name and the "shared") or in general Library folder...
Attached is a screenshot of the folders. Any ideas..?
Thanks for any help you can offer, I'm fairly novice Mac user having used PC's most of my life

Yo 'nycetouch'
In my perspective, I beleieve you are opening the Finder App from your Dock and seraching for /Users/<your user name>/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup
Its imperative that you should be seraching in the GO option on the top.
If you are not able to find GO on the top. Quit all the opened applications to find the GO
or
Doulbe tap or double left click into the Desktop screen to find GO
Under GO click on Go to Folder, in that paste
/Users/<your user name>/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup
In my case,
/Users/Boo/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup.
It took me a while to find the GO option. I must work. Im eager to know how you are going.
JimHDK,
You are a life saver. Your instructions were really helpful.
Thanks again mate!!

Cannot find FlexNet folder in /Library with Photoshop CS5.1

Hi,
I'm running the trial version of Photoshop CS5.1 on Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2, however, I cannot find any FlexNet related folder in /Library/Preferences or /Library/Application Supports. Do latest Adobe products such as Photoshop or Acrobat remove FlexNet licensing?
Thanks.

Thanks Sparkleberry, but it's more complicated than that. I quit Safari, unsynched Safari from iCloud, but nothing changed. Then after about 15 minutes I could access ~/Library/Safari in TM, but only for some of the backups. I Restored from a bookmarks.plist file from December 22, 2014, but it was the wrong bookmarks (completely different from the bookmarks I had on my MBP). I Restored the empty bookmarks file again.
The trouble is, ~/Library/Safari is not available for most of my previous backups, and there were many between December 22 and this evening.
The net problem is that ~/Library/Safari/bookmarks.plist simply don't seem to be available beyond the most recent backup (and the random December 22 file).
I read somewhere that you can backup from iCloud backups, but I try as I might I cannot find how to do that, if it can be done.
Thanks!

Cannot find boot record of WD Raptor on KT4

Hello forum, this is my first post.
I have been searching Google for a solution of my problem and found this forum. However, after searching this forum and reading quite a few threads I still could not find the solution. Here's my problem:
I have a brand new WD Raptor 74 GB connected to serial 1 as a single drive. The mainboard is KT4 Ultra BSR. I have built an array by pressing ctrl-f at bootup. The only option was stripe and I have set the array (array 1) as bootable. I went into BIOS and set the array as first in boot order. Conclusion, the BIOS seems to detect my array and so far so good.
I booted Win XP installation CD and pressed F6 to install the Promise drivers. I used the newest drivers which were downloaded from MSI yesterday. Installation detected my array so I created a new partition, formatted it and the installation program copied files to that partition. When copying was finished, the computer had to be restarted and it was supposed to boot from my harddrive where it copied the files. Now to the point of my problem: BIOS has detected my array and tried to boot, but it says that boot record could not be found! I don't know whether Windows installation has failed to create a boot record or BIOS could not detect the boot record.
I have checked the contents of C: by booting Win XP installation CD and gone into recovery mode. I would access C: and found the common files used for Windows bootup: boot.ini, ntldr, etc.
So the required files are in place, but either the boot record does not exist or BIOS cannot find it. I wonder if anyone could give me any suggestion about how to solve this problem. I want to make my SATA drive bootable.
Thanks in advance

Quote
Originally posted by Wonkanoby
have you removed any other form of storage drives
ive evan seen xp write the mbr to a card reader rather than the target raid drive
I have a DVD and DVD-RW connected to IDE2. I had a Hitachi HDD connected to IDE1, but it was removed before I ran Windows installation. The reason is because I want my SATA drive to have C: while having a HDD connected would mean the partions on that drive would occupy the C and D partition letters. I planned to attach the Hitachi after Windows installation has completed. BIOS has no problem detected my array, but when trying to boot from the array, the boot record cannot be found eventhough I have run the Windows installation which I thought would create the MBR automatically.
Is there any way to make my array bootable? It has been boot-enabled in the SATA settings.

Cannot find boot folder- HD not in list on utility

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