Disk Utility won't unmount drive

When I boot to a casper image via ethernet I will open disk utility and sometimes I can erase the drive but other times it just keeps erroring out. It says can't unmount disk even though the computer is booted to netboot. Why would this happen its very random. I think all the issues are with the 2012 Macbook Pros other macbooks don't have this problem.

To partition the drive, you'll have to boot from a different one, not from the recovery partition on the same drive. Or you can boot into Internet Recovery by holding down option-R at startup.

Similar Messages

Formatting/erasing USB memory stick using Disk Utility - won't unmount

Hi,
I've got a 2GB USB memory stick, and I'm trying to format it by erasing it on Disk Utility just as I have done with many USB memory sticks before now.
Whatever I try to do with this one though I get the error message:
"Volume Erase failed with error:
Could not unmount disk."
There are no manual switches on the USB memory stick to change, and I've checked that I have read/write privileges so I don't know what else to do. I can't find anyway of unmounting it.
I need this memory stick for transferring a large amount of files and it's the only one I've got, so any help that would stop me from buying a new one would be great!
Thanks people.

sorry bro it's toast. the only time i had something like this happen the manufacture said the drive had to be re-flashed. if they provide the software online you got lucky. other wise they will tell you to send in and get it replaced (warranty valid)
Message was edited by: realhiphop0331

Disk Utility will not unmount drive

I have a cloned copy of my Macintosh drive on a LaCie firewire drive as backup. I have booted to the firewire drive and encountered the following problems with the Disk Utility.
1) Verify & repair disk function on the Mac volume failed with the error: Could not unmount disk.
2) Volume erase on the Mac failed with the error: Could not unmount disk.
Using Terminal I have checked to see if any processes on the Mac drive are active, but that does not seem to be my problem. I tested this idea based the suggestion in a thread that reported the same type of problem.
I have used this backup system for many years with no problems. I always use the normal procedures for system maintenance that Mac users recommend.
Any suggestions for resolving this problem?
CS
iMac 1.83GHz Intel Core Duo Mac OS X (10.4.10) 2GB RAM

elmac
I have wiped the LaCie drive many times and reset the disk format. Just as a drill, I repeated the process this morning. No change in my situation.
I use OnyX on a regular basis to run BSD scripts. Based on your suggestion I ran all other maintenance processes. Did not solve my problem.
Since I last posted I ran the Apple Hardware Test, and the results indicated no problems. I also checked Disk Utility while booted from my installation disk, and successfully ran the First Aid repair disk function. So in this mode the Mac disk dismounts correctly.
The Mac drive dismount problem indicates that a process is active on the Mac drive. I have checks this out several times and I find no evidence that this is the source of the problem.
I plan on meeting with a friend on Monday who also has a Mac. I will test the LaCie drive connected to his computer to see if I get the same results. If I do then I will replace the LaCie drive.
Thanks for your assistance. If you have any additional ideas just post and I will followup.
CS

Desktop or Disk Utility won't show External Hard Drives

The Desktop or Disk Utility won't show 2 of my old external hard drives and so they are currently unsusable. My computer however recognise other external drives.
320GB Western Digital MyBook Premium model number: WD3200D032-000
500 GB Western Digital MyBook Premium model number: WD5000E032
I have same issues both of these external drives.
The blue circle lights come on so power is getting to it.
Tried 2 USB cables, one I know for sure is working - Nothing.
I am using Lion 10.7.4 on a mid 2009 13" MacBook Pro
All efforts to help much appreciated

No they haven't worked on this computer before. I using them on my old MacBook Pro (a computer which is no longer working) which ran Snow Leopard.
The 500GB drive "stopped working" with that old MBP too
But the 320GB drive was always working with old MBP if I remember correctly.
Cheers

Disk Utility won't partition ext. drive

Hi everyone,
I would like to split my external MyBook Pro drive in two so I can keep Time machine B/ups separate, but Disk utility keeps informing me that there is not enough space! I only want approx 80gb of the remaining 105gb. Where am I going wrong. Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Are you willing to erase the contents on the external hard drive? Disk utility won't subdivide existing space, you have to do the entire drive at once. However, there are utilities (I believe they are purchase/commercial only) that will sub partition an existing disk partition.

How can I initialize an external hard drive when disk utility won't work?

Have a Seagate 300 GB external firewire drive. Formatted it for Mac. Had worked great and then one day it would not mount, got message box with choices of "initialize", "ignore" and 'eject". Clicking initialize, disk utility comes up with only the "first aid" button showing active. When I click on it nothing happens. As far as I can tgell there are no other options
Any suggestions on how I can repair this drive or recover data would be much appreciated.
Thanks, Jim

OK, I suspect First Aid may be blank since Disk Utility "sees" the device but does not think there's anything on it.
1. How about if you select the drive and then click the Erase tab?
2. Also, what happens if you connect the drive, select Ignore, then open Disk Utility? Does the drive show up?
3. What's your objective here? Do you want to try to recover data from the drive, or simply erase it? If you're looking to recover data from the drive, see my "Data Recovery" FAQ.
4. Do you know what happened before the problem arose? For example, was there a power outage or was the cable or drive suddenly disconnected before the drive was Ejected? Any of these events can result in the drive's partition map being corrupted, leading to the kind of problems you're seeing.
5. Did you build this FireWire drive? That is, buy and enclosure, buy a drive, and install the latter in the former? If so, have you checked the connections?
Good luck!
Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X
Note: The information provided in the link(s) above is freely available. However, because I own The X Lab™, a commercial Web site to which some of these links point, the Apple Discussions Terms of Use require I include the following disclosure statement with this post:
I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise, from my recommendation or link.

Disk Utility won't initialize second Maxtor drive

My first hardware upgrade has not gone too well. I just got a Maxtor 6L250S0 drive to fill empty second bay of my dual 1.8 PowerMac G5. (Drive specs: 250 GB SATA Ultra 16, DiamondMax, 16 MB cache, 7200 RPM) Installation was a breeze, but I can't get my Mac to erase, format, partition or otherwise initialize the drive for use. When I rebooted, I got the message about needing to initialize the new hardware. I clicked "Initialize", and Disk Utility came up. Disk Utility lists "Maxtor SABRE" as a drive on the left and lists the following details at the bottom:
Disk Description : Maxtor SABRE
Total Capacity : 0 Bytes
Connection Bus : Serial ATA
Write Status : Read/Write
Connection Type : Internal
S.M.A.R.T. Status : Not Supported
Connection ID : Device 0, "B (lower)"
The Capacity and SMART status lines are a bit troubling. Is that normal when a drive is first installed?
I go to the ERASE tab and can only select "Mac OS Standard" or "UNIX File System" for the volume format. I select the Mac OS Standard and press the Erase button, but I get a message "Disk erase failed with the following error: The chosen size is not valid for the chosen file system."
I go to the PARTITION tab and can't do anything there either. When it lets me edit the form and press the Partition button, it gives an error saying "Device not configured." Usually as soon as I do anything on this form (e.g., select the Format dropdown), all the choices are grayed out with the notice "the disk is too small to contain partitions".
Based upon research here and elsewhere, I know this is a compatible drive. Am I missing a step? Could the drive be bad?
PowerMac G5 dual 1.8 Mac OS X (10.4.5) 2.5 GB RAM

My first hardware upgrade has not gone too well. I
just got a Maxtor 6L250S0 drive to fill empty second
bay of my dual 1.8 PowerMac G5. (Drive specs: 250
GB SATA Ultra 16, DiamondMax, 16 MB cache, 7200 RPM)
Installation was a breeze, but I can't get my Mac
to erase, format, partition or otherwise initialize
the drive for use. When I rebooted, I got the
message about needing to initialize the new
hardware. I clicked "Initialize", and Disk Utility
came up. Disk Utility lists "Maxtor SABRE"
Hi,
I have never seen a Maxtor come up as "Maxtor SABRE" in disk utility. Your post says the Maxtor 250GB hard drive is mounted internally. If so, I would guess that the drive is damaged. I would take it back for a working drive.
Or you could call Maxtor at (800) 262-9867. I have had two Maxtor drives fail in the last 5 months and the techs at Maxtor sent me replacements and then I returned the damage drives in their shipping boxes.
The Maxtor tech guys are very helpful and give Mac users the benefit of the doubt when it comes to warranty returns. At least that was my experience.
The drive should display Maxtor 6L250S0 in the disk utility window and Smart Drive status should be active.
I hope this helps,
Michael

Disk Utility won't recognize new hard drive

Hello,
Thanks for taking the time to read this.
The original hard drive (80 GB) went bad, so I replaced with a new 160 GB Western Digital one. I formatted the hard drive using Disk Utility from the Mac OS X Disk. It worked the first time I booted into Leopard (I just booted up to make sure the OS loaded...didn't install any new software and/or hardware).
Then I shut it down and started it back up, and the computer didn't recognize the hard drive. I inserted the Mac OS X disk and ran Disk Utility, but the hard drive was not recognized.
So now I'm thinking the new hard drive was also bad. So, I ordered another one (Seagate 160 GB) and it to was not recognized when I ran Disk Utility from the Mac OS X disk.
When replacing all of them, I followed directions I found here and other websites. They all said to do it the same way, so I'm assuming the directions for replacing a hard drive in a laptop were correct.
I searched Google and found several posts suggesting using an application called Disk Warrior, but from my understanding, you cannot run it from a disk, it needs to be installed, which is obviously impossible since the hard drive isn't recognized.
Then I ran Open Firmware and did "devalias" from the prompt. From what I can tell in the list of hardware, the hard drive is recognized, but I am not sure. I took a picture of the screen printout but do not see an option to attached it to this post. Therefore, I'll just tell what it said for now and will create an image hosting account so I can add a URL for it later.
In the list, "hd" is in the left column and in the right column of the same line is "/pci@f4000000/ata-6@d/disk@0" (without quotes).
If anybody has any suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated.

Welcome to the Apple discussions.
I've replaced a few hard drives, and in instances where it's not recognized, it's either been a cable connection issue or I've seen others with a jumper issue. Either the hard drive to logic board cable isn't properly set, typically on the logic board side, or a jumper was left on the drive, where typically you can just remove it. I haven't personally had the cable fail, however, that's possible too.
When you pulled the large plug from the back of the original hard drive, did you do it very carefully? It's not like a desktop hard drive plug that you can just pull out ... it needs to be wiggled out, gently. I have a hard time believing two new drives would be essentially DOA, although the first one worked for a bit, which leads me to wonder about the physical connections.
Since you have your original OS X disks, you could try running the Apple hardware test to see if it gives you any error message(s).

Disk Utility won't partition my drive.

I have a LaCie external hard drive with a capacity of 298 GB and 247 GB used leaving 51 GB free. I am trying to create a 30 GB partition of just free space, but when I tell Disk Utility to start, it will start working for a while saying "Modifying partition map" and have the blue and white barber-shop pole for the loading bar. After a couple of minutes, Disk Utility will popup with and error saying there isn't enough room on the drive. Can someone explain this to me?

Kappy wrote:
There are no free utilities for defragmenting a drive. Only the cloning I described is free.
Here's what you should do:
To resize the drive do the following:
1. Open Disk Utility and select the drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list.
2. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. You should see the graphical sizing window showing the existing partitions. A portion may appear as a blue rectangle representing the used space on a partition.
3. In the lower right corner of the sizing rectangle for each partition is a resizing gadget. Select it with the mouse and move the bottom of the rectangle upwards until you have reduced the existing partition enough to create the desired new volume's size. The space below the resized partition will appear gray. Click on the Apply button and wait until the process has completed. +(Note: You can only make a partition smaller in order to create new free space.)+
4. Click on the [+] button below the sizing window to add a new partition in the gray space you freed up. Give the new volume a name, if you wish, then click on the Apply button. Wait until the process has completed.
You should now have a new volume on the drive.
That's what I did and it didn't work.

Disk Utility won't erase iMac drive

I have a late 2012 27" iMac.
I was taking it to the Apple Store to fix The Mechanism™ broke. (The tilt hinge). As I knew fixing it would entail leaving the iMac there for several days, I cloned my drive and erased the iMac.
HOWEVER, when trying to do it, both form a USB install drive I set up AND from the Recovery Partition, Disk Utility would fail to erase the drive. It would quit and go back to the install drive directory.
I then booted back to the regular drive, manually dragged most of the stuff to the trash and emptied it. I then went back to the USB drive and tried one last time.
This time, the drive reformatted like it was supposed to. I tried again, it worked again.
I loaded Mavericks on, and packed the iMac up and went to the store (where it is now).
The "Genius" had no idea why the erasing didn't work earlier, and since things now did work, I couldn't replicate. They're diagnostic scan showed everything was good.
It's the 1TB + Fusion drive.
BEFORE I manually erased everything, there was around 120 gb free on the drive. After there was 900+gb free.
Anyone seen anything like this? Have ideas what was happening?

Kappy wrote:
There are no free utilities for defragmenting a drive. Only the cloning I described is free.
Here's what you should do:
To resize the drive do the following:
1. Open Disk Utility and select the drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list.
2. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. You should see the graphical sizing window showing the existing partitions. A portion may appear as a blue rectangle representing the used space on a partition.
3. In the lower right corner of the sizing rectangle for each partition is a resizing gadget. Select it with the mouse and move the bottom of the rectangle upwards until you have reduced the existing partition enough to create the desired new volume's size. The space below the resized partition will appear gray. Click on the Apply button and wait until the process has completed. +(Note: You can only make a partition smaller in order to create new free space.)+
4. Click on the [+] button below the sizing window to add a new partition in the gray space you freed up. Give the new volume a name, if you wish, then click on the Apply button. Wait until the process has completed.
You should now have a new volume on the drive.
That's what I did and it didn't work.

Disk Utility unable to resize drive

Hi,
I have been trying to resize my boot partition so that it fills the remaing space, however Disk Utility won't sucessfully complete the operation. I have tried the following:
Normal boot - in Disk Utility drag the botton right of the partition to fill remaining space and tap apply. Disk Utility reports that operation has completed, however the partition graphic bounces back to it's previous state.
Boot to Lion Recovery HD - Repeating the above steps, Disk Utility reports an error trying to unmount the drive.
Download Lion Recovery Tool and Boot from USB - Repeating the above steps, Disk Utility reports an error trying to unmount the drive.
I have also tried to use iPartition, but have bot been able to resize the drive. I have a Boot Camp partition which is working fine.
Has anyone had a similiar problem?
Mark

Hi,
No I haven't got a solution for this yet - I'm probably going to have to drop and rebuild the boot camp partition.
Mark

Disk utility will not unmount my external HD to make repairs

Hi. Having a problem with an external 2TB HD connected to my iMac 11,2 running 10.6.8. The external was originally connected to a MacBook Pro (same OS) which failed and was replaced by the iMac about a month ago. The external has 3 partitions: Time Machine backup, Carbon Copy Cloner backup and a storage partition for image files.
I used the Time Machine back up to transfer files to the new iMac, re-cloned the whole drive to the CCC partition and added some new files to the storage partition. Everything has been fine until yesterday. I realized I hadn't turned on Time Machine yet to start backing up the new iMac. I selected the same Time Machine backup partition I had been using w/ the MacBook Pro as my Time Machine backup drive for the iMac, but all attempts to back up failed. Got this message:
Time Machine could not complete the backup. An error occurred while creating the backup folder.
Now when I turn on the external HD I get a message saying that the Storage volume can't be repaired and to back up the files from it. If I run Disk Utility it cannot unmount any of the volumes and can't initiate any repairs. Trying to fix disk permissions would fail on the CCC volume until 30' ago when it started displaying a long list of error messages. it's still doing it. Most of them start off with:
Open error 16: "Resource busy" on System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.6/lib/python2.6/ (this part here changes for each line).
And then the others begin with:
Open error 1: "Operation not permitted" on System/Library/frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.5/lib/python2.5/test/test _set.pyc (with some variation at the end)
When this list started running in Disk Utility, the Console displayed the following:
Cleaning up expired diagnostic messages database at path: /var/log/DiagnosticMessages/ 2014.05.28.asl
Disk Utility just finished with a bunch of lines that start off w/ either Unable to set owner and group on … or Unable to set permissions on ...
I can still display the contents of the volumes in Finder and I'm able to access the files but I can't work w/ the volumes themselves as explained.
Any ideas anyone?

Thanks Lau for you comments.
I need to install os8 because I need to run some old apps and I am using my os 9 for another computer I have.
By the way, the HFS+ file system was suuported from OS 8.1 and after and so that is not an issue. Good idea though.
And so I am back at my original question. It would appear that my OS X install disk doesn't like my blue and white G3's internal 12 GIG ATA drive and so I cannot format it with OSX Disk Utility. I would like to know why but for now I will just use OS 9 or OS8 drive setup. And so I have two choices: OS9 drive setup or OS8.5 Drive setup. Does it matter which I use? In other words is one better than the other? I will be later installing OS 8.6 onto this drive - and maybe OS 9 in the far future. I will try OS9's drive setup first.
Yes, and so this is my most immediate question at this point:
is there a difference between OS8.5 drive setup and OS9's Drive setup? (in terms or formatting a drive to install OS 8, 9 or even X maybe one day?) I will be using HFS+.
And then my second question is my original question which is why doesn't my OS 10.1.5 Disk Utility select my 12 GIG ATA drive? (its greyed out - dimmed?)
Thanks

Disk Utility won't start up in 10.5.3

I have been unable to open up my Disk Utility at all. I was able to do so earlier, perhaps with 10.5.0 while I was mounting my external hard drive. Now, I cannot mount the hard drive, and therefore cannot use Time Machine all because DIsk Utility won't open. I've diagnosed my hardware with "Disk 1" and found no problem. And, I've reinstalled the operating system. Any ideas?

Chris:
I just had the same issue on my son's MacBook. As long as you have a wired keyboard, the following will work.
1. Shut down the computer if it is on.
2. Press the power button to start the computer.
3. Immediately press and hold the Command (Apple) key and the "s" key for single-user mode.
4. Type mount -uw / (then press the Return Key) wait for next line to appear with # root/
(there is a space between t and - and another space between w and /)
5. Then Type "passwd" (without quotation marks then press the Return Key)
6. Enter new password (this will be for the root user account) (watch your fingers when you type because it doesn't show what you are typing, then hit the Return Key after you type it.
It will prompt you to retype the new password again, so retype it again and then hit the Return Key) wait for next line to appear...
7. Then Type "reboot" (without the quotes and hit the Return Key)
after the computer restarts and comes up with the login window....
8. Login with any of your usernames just to get the desktop up.
9. After desktop comes up choose System Preferences, then choose accounts. Unlock if you have to and using the username: root ..... and the password you just setup in the single user mode You now should be able to make users including your existing user account an admin.
After you log back in under your real account, it is advisable to deactivate the root user account. To do this,
1. Click the Finder icon in the Dock.
2. From the Go menu, choose Utilities.
3. Open Directory Utility.
4. Click the lock in the Directory Utility window if you need to unlock the utility.
5. Enter an administrator account name and password, then click OK.
6. Choose Disable Root User from the Edit menu.
Hope this helps.
David

Disk Utility won't resize a partition

Disk Utility won't resize (eliminate smaller partition from a 2-partitioned internal) Hard Drive. This is the message I get:
"Partition failed
Partition failed with the error:
Filesystem resize support required, such as HFS+ with Journaling enabled."
Help files offer no information on this error. I followed the Help instructions to do this operation, but the resize doesn't work. The older, smaller partition shows up in Disk Utility but is dimmed out. It will activate at highlight, but is not recognized on the desktop.
Any suggestions as to how to fix this problem?

Intel based Macs use a different partition scheme called GPL or GUID rather than what PowerPC used, APL.
You could try reformatting, or get a new system, and run BootCamp and Windows even.
Even if you've used Macs for years, there is always a place on my book shelf for this one, David Pogue's "Mac OS X: The Missing Manual (Leopard Edition)"
http://books.slashdot.org/books/08/02/27/1551206.shtml

Disk Utility won't verify or repair permission

As the title says I am having a problem with Disk Utility. The hard drive is brand new (just replaced by Apple Store) and I wanted to repair permissions after the dock wouldn't unhide (this had fixed it in the past). It starts, and says about 1 minute remaining. Nothing happens, the only text displayed is telling me that it has begun. The status bar doesn't move and then it hangs and i get the spinning wheel.
The same thing happens for verify and repair for permissions and disk.
Any advice would be great.

A quick search in these forums for permissions or *permissions problem* reveals many posts the past four months.
In a nutshell, repairing permissions w/Leopard takes anywhere from 10-40 minutes, depending on what's installed and what's contained in /Library/Receipts/bom/. The repair permissions operation has changed in Leopard. The stalled progress bar is an unresolved bug (they haven't figured out how to make it work whilst it's checking or rebuilding the a.receiptdb, in /Library/Receipts/db/. To see what's really going on, open that folder in a Finder window, select list view, launch Disk Utility, select your boot volume, and click on repair permissions. Watch the Finder window flash files that are being read and checked against the current a.receiptdb file. That's what's taking all the time and freezing the progress bar. Once that's finished, the progress bar starts moving and the permissions are being checked and repaired. Also note, that you won't get any *they were repaired* message back for any that are noted to be incorrect.

Disk Utility won't unmount drive

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