Drive not mounting after boot

I believe this is an epidemic problem in OS X. I have seen this problem on OS X 10.5 to 10.8.2. The fundament issue is that external drives will not mount randomly after the system is powered down and restarted. I have seen the problem with USB 2.0 and Firewire attached drives. I have seen this on many hardware platforms from PowerPC to i7 2.6GHz. I have seen the problem on different enclosures, WD, NextStar, Lacie etc. I have tried numours remedies like resetting the PRAM. The only remedy that works is unpluging the drive and pluging it back in, which if very annoying espicially since this is most prevalent in Time Machine backup drives. The many people who I help with their MACs don't often notice that Time Machine has been failing to backup for weeks since their drive has silently not mounted. Is there a real solution for this out there? It seems to me like a boot timing issue. Where the drive is not recognized by the low level driver, if it becomes powered on at a later time in the boot cycle. I can't really pin it down as it happens often but not often enough for any predictable pattern.

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USB drives not mounting after sleep

I've started to experience a frustrating problem whereby any connected USB drive fails to mount after the Mac has been to sleep. Rather alarmingly I get an error message saying "disk not ejected properly"
The set-up I have is two USB drives connected to my early 2011 MacBook Pro via a D-Link mains powered USB hub. I'd planned to have the Mac wake up at 2am for SuperDuper to perform a backup but it's proving impossible as the drive is never available and I have to do a restart before the Mac sees it again.
I've tried a few solutions I've seen online such as installing Jettison (didn't work) and making sure Spotlight isn't indexing the drives (didn't work either).
Can anyone suggest anything else?
THANKS

You can boot OS X from USB2 or FireWire as well as internal drives. There are also two unused SATA ports hidden away inside that OS X can use, but Vista/XP won't see. There is a $24 kit from NewerTech to connect SATA cable, run out PCI slot adapter, and use eSATA shielded cable to a 2-drive enclosure ($67+).
I always boot from an alternate boot drive before ever doing an Mac OS update - repair the drive, do backup, other maintenance. And even sometimes apply the update from there (requires using a standalone downloaded combined update, which is preferred method). Never apply an update w/o a working bootable backup. Something that requires multiple licenses I suspect with XP/Vista.
I have external backup and restore drives for Vista, Mac OS boot drive, 2-drive RAID for Vista, and Vista boot drive.
All of my drives are GUID. Vista is 64-bit, and has some support for EFI (SP1 will bring better support for UEFI).
Disk arbitration has been updated and improved and some products even had to wait for later versions (10.4.8 introduced a number of fixes I understand). I would be more concerned with make of drives and whether they have GUID/GPL or MBR partition tables.

Lacie drive not mounting after updating to 10.4.8

Hi,
I have a 160gb Lacie d2 external hd, and after updating my OS to 10.4.8 in October, it will not mount. It's recognized in Disk Utility, but will not mount. I've tried repairing disk permissions from both my current OS and from the installer DVD, but it isn't helping and I keep getting the same message.
When I first updated to 10.4.8 in October, my computer had problems re-starting (it would get stuck at the blue boot-up screen), so I had to turn it off by holding the power button. Ever since then, the lacie drive won't mount.
Is there anything else I can do? I've thought about trying Disk Warrior, but if possible I'd like to save the $100 to buy it!
Any advice? I would really appreciate it.

What I think.
The major changes occurred in the 10.4 original Tiger release. Due to the nature of what I believe the problem is 10.4.7 would just be changing how, where and when the issue(s) become most noticeable to you and not solve it. It will leave you hangin' somewhere else. This I/O API does effect everything. I only wanted to finish a movie with iMovie and set some clips at 00:05 f as I have done forever. Bought a new MacBook Pro specifically for OS X.4 and iMovie and all that was over. iMovie as well as many other Universal apps are IMO mostly non functional except at the OS and QT interface. All other Universal apps and devices cause it to choke and sputter as things pass through this very same I/O API that is causing the external HD issues. As for the PB G4, I was believing the age of the machine to be causing these failures then I had noticed many others developing the same issues on newer G4 machines. Most puzzling was the performance hit on the machines with the proper HW especially larger Core Image supported graphics cards as 10.4 has made this a very relevant piece of HW now. The more I read about the how's and why's of the changes in the architecture of the OS in the Developer Connection the more I realized that many issues that seem so unrelated are indeed caused by the same area and or error in this API. iTunes, Safari, iMovie, iPhoto, -.. CPU's, Fans, HD's, jpegs choking G5's and intels-.. plug n play's that worked yesterday not today, same machines/HW new OS.
Photoshop CS and, an extremely resource greedy, 3D Modeling/database application running in Rosetta works fine. Animating 3D graphics on the fly without so much as a stutter everything calm and quiet. Open Safari and the comp gets too hot to handle the fans are screaming just displaying basic window graphics here at the Apple Discussion boards. Most times this is a text only forum for me as the MPB can't even process the window graphics, often the original posts push-pin graphic is the only one that will display.
AFAICT Rosetta is just an application with no graphic user interface and it is not Universal Binary therefore avoiding this I/O kit as it was designed for the specific configuration of the MacIntel only and works fine. Apple's iLife and iWork apps especially, as well as any SW using this I/O Kit API for Universal Binary apps don't work properly. Anyone with a later G4 and especially a G5 with a good, Core Image supported, graphics card should be feeling like they have a new machine, not saying "hey my stuff isn't working anymore" or slow imports of files or processing.
Personally I would:
Start up from 10.3 install discs, back up my docs to external HD and re-partition the internal HD. At least two, IMO three partitions (do not journal OS partitions) would be the least. Install 10.3.9 on one 10.4+ on the (an)other. Docs on the third. Keep the OS partitions as small as possible while allowing for OS's extra "operating space". 3.9 only requires about 2-5 GB's above required space to install while OS 10.4 seems to need 5-10 GB that is always "free" depending on what you are doing and also allowing for any OS and app. updates that may come before the next OS X release. 3.9 is already maxed so one can assume no new news here.
My G4's HD set up is 6 partitions as it is now mainly a slave hub between my MBP and my "legacy" products PB G3, serial devices, Zip drives, modems, SCSI devices, scanners, printers old apps/file formats. Apps and HW that are still useful but "max out" at a certain OS/comp configuration are installed on that OS's partition, i.e. QT w/MPEG-2, Virtual PC, or Photoshop plugins that were never developed or not worth the investment for OS X or the current release as they are not used often enough etc.
5GB-9.2.2, 10GB-10.2, 15GB- 10.3.9, 20GB-10.4.6, 15 GB Apps. 35GB docs. Nothing gets written to any OS partitions unless absolutely required. All OS's share the apps they can (except 9 apps) and document partition. As far as I understand I should be able to use XGrid to use these other computers processors through the MBP. A "super computer" kind of set up with the G4 at the least, but documentation indicates it should work on any OS X so possibly my G3 as well which stopped at 10.1.
You do not have to duplicate apps and I would install and update all through 3.9 even if you install them in the 10.4 Apps. folder. At most you may need to create a couple of folders in the OS's System Library for Application Support or plug-ins etc. If you fear one OS reading from the other's Library/System files you can unmount the other OS volumes but I have yet to see this happen without intentionally directing the OS to do so.
I would do all my external back ups and device communication (cameras, HD's MIDI's etc) booting in 10.3 only. For me the G4 booted in Target disk mode seems to be the safest way to access an "external HD" via FW with the MBP. I have had zero problems with this method. A two step process for files that don't reside on the G4 but I'd rather be safe than sorry and I have already lost one HD that was completely unrecoverable (a mechanical rebuild lead to the discovery of overwritten files with driver type data and damaged disk surface from arcing). Small files I just access on the external HD's through G4 over the airport network. I have not used Bonjour in depth yet though will most likely incorporate that into everyday use as I was able to quickly transfer a few very large files to a friends MacBook with it. Used this Just after realizing the MBP lacks IRDA and neither of us had any cables with us.
The above type of configuration would give you the ability to move forward with 10.4 and easily work around HW, SW and connectivity issues by booting into 10.3 when needed. This is a great way of trouble shooting OS and app issues. My MBP already has a partition waiting for Leopard. If the OS lacks something or has problems of it's own I can boot back into 10.4 quickly and easily. If all is well with Leopard 10.4 will definitely be removed. The G4 will never see Leopard except over a network.
Sorry to be long winded. Hope this gives you some reasonable ideas. In a nutshell. I believe the problem is that the OS and QT are set to higher, more accurate standards (ISO's MPEG's, SMTP's, IEEE's etc) than in the past and the I/O API is unable to communicate/calculate and transfer the information properly between devices and apps.
BTW when your LaCie appears to have given up the ghost and will not respond at all, before you toss the whole thing remove the HD and put it in a different enclosure. I have dealt with hundreds of these and the Firewire ports on the PC board become too hot and melt off. Repair is not possible and although this is a known issue with LaCie no attempts have been made to correct this and they will not sell you a service part to repair it. Replacement would require removal and replacement of two screws and two plugs. Most HD's I have removed are Western HD's and work fine in a new enclosure.
HTH

External drive not mounting after crash

I had the finder lock up on me and I had to force a restart.
At the time an external USB2 drive was plugged in. Since the forced restart the external drive is not mounting. It won't mount via USB2 or Firewire. It is formatted as Mac OS Extended.
Upon booting the computer notifies that it can't be read and asks to initialize, ignore or eject.
The system profiler sees it. Disk Utility sees it but it won't allow the options to verify or repair to be used.
Disk warrior, Drive 10, and Disk Rescue won't allow the drive to be fixed unless its mounted. In fact the drive won't even appear as an option in those programs without mounting.
So what do I have left to try?

After trial and error and moving the drive around to various enclosures I had Disk Utility open up the options to verify and repair.
It wouldn't actually fix it or go through the whole process of fixing it but that was enough to let a boot from the Disk Warrior CD see the drive as an option.
I only recovered about 60% of what was originally on it after DW redid the directory but it was at least something.
One question though what sort of issues could my boot drive's directory have that would effect the external ones? Is the corruption the fault of the internal drive?
I ask because although I've been assured that it will work fine I am running a 160G drive in a machine that only sees the first 128GB as the boot drive. I am not 100% positive that won't have some side effects but everyone around here seems to tell me its all good and that I shouldn't worry about that. Its this belief that makes me use the external drive as my torrent media drive since there is so much more reading and writing being done to it.

External Hard Drives not Mounting after Yosemite Upgrade

I've just upgraded to Yosemite, and none of my external (USB) hard drives are mounting (they don't even appear in Disk Utility).
Any ideas?

MacBook Pro 2009. 250 SD, HD 8Gb Ram.
I have had this issue for about a year...with no resolve!
Apple and the User community have not been able to solve issue.
I have had to work around it since the Oct 2013 Mavericks upgrade which “killed” (rendered unmountable) both my USB and Optical drives.
Hundreds of replies and remedies have not corrected my issue. Hundreds of replies stating that if there was a global issue it would of been fixed by Apple, not true. And dismissive replies stating that there must be a hardware issue are very discouraging.
So now, hoping to help the voiceless masses, I'm forced to share my experience.
As I stated, I have been having the issue since one of the Mavericks upgrades. The upgrade rendered externally attached drives unmountable...They are all seen in Disk Utility. They are just not mountable. Regardless of the flavor of the disk format, either Mac or PC, they are found, seen and refuse to mount. I can see them using Terminal commands, I can see them in System Report. I can reset all the memory I want...turn it off, reset, sleep, turn on, restart...NOPE...And the optical drive takes in disks but ejects them after an attempted mounting. Keep in mind, there are no physical issues with either USB or optical drives.
So now...I have had enough and need to correct the issue or buy a new equipment - starting to get into software development and need working equipment!!!
For the past month, I have been visiting the Apple store to assist in my issues...Back Story: I'm an IT Field Tech for the largest department store in the country and I have the good fortune of dropping in the Apple store anytime I want...The Geniuses booted the MB with a bootable image of Mavericks, and the USB and Optical drives WORKED fine...So, after I had stumped the Geniuses with my problems, we agreed that we would attempt to format and re-image the MacBook...Fine, do it, it's backed-up, how you ask? - Via my wireless My Book Live 3T drive, which only took 24 hours to backup, AKA Time Machine!
Great news! The re-image of Mavericks proved to work! I WAS able to mount external drives attached! How is that possible? Don't know, don't care! It just worked! So happy!
But wait! I then took the laptop home. Connected to my WiFi, to update Mavericks to the latest version...Good so far! Then it came time for a Time Machine restore, AKA Migration Assistance restore...So, I proceeded to migrate data back to my MB via wireless drive, good so far, booted in Migration Assistant, and I chose to restore everything except the network files, thinking that may be an issue...22 Hours later, the MB migrated without issue...all apps and personal files had migrated! YAY!
BUT NOW THE USB AND OPTICAL DRIVES FAILED TO MOUNT!!!
Great now what? I know, I will just re-image and start again...WAIT, I don't have a Mavericks Install Disk, no problem, I will just create a bootable USB drive with the Mavericks Install Image I downloaded onto my MB this month...NO YOU CANNOT, because you have no use of the USB drives!...And, Apple stopped making OS CDs back in 2009...Oh, and that wouldn't of done me any good, because the optical dive was unusable, anyway!
SO, back to the Apple store with my head hanging! At this point, Yosemite came out the previous Thursday, so no more Mavericks images, great! Perhaps the new OS will alleviate my nightmare!!!!...So, they re-imaged my Mac with Mavericks, drives worked again! SO, I took my MB home and attempted to download the new OS, Yosemite...which only took 2 days due to the amount of traffic on Apple's servers!...Anyway, Yosemite finally installed without out issue! Drives still worked! And so, I shutdown and restarted the system...No issues, USB and optical drives worked beautifully! Yay, Yosemite!...Fixed all my troubles!!!...Not so fast...
And so, I, again, attempted to do a Time Machine restore, via WiFi, this time it took 24 hours to restore...AND it worked! All apps and personal files transferred without issue, So happy! Put the laptop in Sleep and left it home and went to work! Came back from work, tested the system without issues. Rebooted...USB and Optical drive are NOT MOUNTABLE!
So now, what is the file that the restore keeps pushing to my MB that kills the USB and optical drives?
I would just stop restoring from a Time Machine backup, but the only way to get into the TM image is to use Migration Assistant. I cannot view the date in time of the image in TM's Star Wars time line. So, I'm forced to back up everything from the image in Migration Assistance. Not sure that it being an encrypted image has anything to do with it...
...Regardless, what is being “restored” to the MB that continues to configure the OS in such a way that makes all external drives unmountable...keep in mind, my external keyboard, hub and mouse are usable via USB.

External Hard Drive not mounting after...drop

Hi all,
Not really a Time Machine question, but my wife, not realizing an external USB hard drive was connected to my macbook, pick up the laptop and the external drive dropped on it's corner...slight damage. It is a 320Gb hard drive with three partitions....two for storage and one for time machine backup. The two storage drives are mounting find and seem OK, but the time machine partition is not mounting. Disk Utility sees the partition but can't mount or repair it and gives me the error "Invalid sibling link, unable to verify or repair."
Any ideas on what I should do next (other than back up the other two drives)? Should I try erasing the disk and see if it'll mount?
Thanks,
John

Johnk93 wrote:
Disk Utility sees the partition but can't mount or repair it and gives me the error "Invalid sibling link, unable to verify or repair."
If you have +Disk Warrior+ (4.1.1 or 4.2 only), or another heavy-duty disk repair app (that you're certain is compatible with Leopard), it might be able to repair the partition. DW is about $100, so unless you think you may need it for other things in the future, it may not be worth the chance.
Otherwise, if Disk Utility can erase it, it's probably ok. In this case, though, it would be worthwhile clicking +Security Options+ then +Zero Out Disk+ to be sure it can write to the entire partition.
Long term, though, I'd be a bit reluctant to trust my backups to it. (Perhaps a hint to Santa?)
Additionally, I am having trouble ejecting the two working partitions. It seems to eject them becuase they no longer appear on my desktop, but I get the "unable to eject...." error message. Not sure what this means.
See what happens after erasing the TM partition. That may clear it up. If not, try mounting them again.

External hard drive not mounting after Leopard install

Installation seemed to go ok, but when I switched on my Maxtor One Touch II drive nothing happened. Doesn't appear in Disk Utility but I can see that it is attached when I look at System Profiler. Any ideas what to try next?

After giving up on the upgrade of leopard I decided to do a clean install (to get rid of all the junk) My Lacie 800 and 400 fire wire drives mounted with no problem. It turns out my seagate fw 400 drive daisy chained off my would not mount and cause the other drives not to respond in the finder till I removed the Seagate drive and then the other two drives worked fine. I daisy chained my Firelite 400 and it mounted fine and its being used for time machine. So far haven't been able to solved this problem, the Lacie and Firelites work fine.

Hard Drive Not Mounting After Being Magically Changed to Read Only

I was using a firewire connected, verbatim 1tb drive as a time machine. Everything had been working fine, but I walked away from my laptop for the morning and came back this afternoon to find my hard drive changed to read only. Time machine wouldn't back up to the hard drive; so, I rebooted.
Since then, I haven't been able to get the hard drive to mount. It won't show up in Drive Utility or on the desktop. I have rebooted the hard drive, unplugged it, turned it on and off.
What should I do? How do I fix this? It has my backups and my music. I'm no amused.

I've had exactly the same trouble this morning.
I'm using a MacBook Pro with my Time Machine on a portable Hard Drive. When doing my regular back up the computer froze. I force restarted the computer and the TM drive came up as 'Read Only'.
So, I rebooted again and the drive is not mounting at all. I can see it connected through System Profiler, however the drive isn't showing up in Disk Utility.
Does anyone have any ideas? Coz I don't seem to be the only one with this issue.

HELP! Firewire drives not mounting after crash

So I had two FW400 drives daisy-chained together. I was exporting a quicktime while simultaneously compressing another QT in Compressor. Apparently, too much for my computer to handle and I got the spinning ball of death. Nothing would force quit. So I had to shut down by holding down the power button. Restarted and neither drive will mount, daisy-chained nor individually. I plugged in a 3rd FW drive and it mounted fine, so I'm guessing it's not my Firewire Bus or PRAM or something internal to my computer.
Is it possible to fry these drives? Hope not as I have a lot of media on them.

Phew. I’m not sure what happened, but I ran the Disk utility from the Installer disc and no repairs were necessary. But while at it, one of the drives mounted. Then I power cycled the other drive and that one came online. So looks like I’m in the clear!
...Although, now FCP won't launch. The load window appears and the last thing I see is "Loading Audio Filters".

USB External Drive not mounting after use with Time Caplule

I have a 1TB external Lacie hard drive I have been using to store data via connection to my Time Capsule USB port.
I purchased a new HD to replace the Lacie and would like to use the Lacie as an external drive for my Macbook Pro.
Issue:
I erased all files on the Lacie before disconnecting it from the Time Capsule.
Connected the Lacie to my Macbook Pro via USB port.
Lacie disk spins, but never mounts - disk image never appears, disk just keeps spinning.
Ran Disk Utility. Lacie image shows up. Tryed to erase, but got an error that it wont mount.
Tryed to repare disk, but got the same message.
This also happens when I try to connect the Lacie to my iMac.
So, hooked it back up to Time Capsule. Disk shows up just fine.
What's going on???

Where does it show up - Finder or System Preferences/Time Capsule?
Try ejecting the drive, turning it off for awhile, restart the computer, and then restart the drive and plug it in.

External Hard Drives not mounting after upgrading to Lion

The disks orked without issue before then I upgarde and nothing. I see that others have had the same problem but I haven't seen and answer. Can anyone help? My iomega drive can be seen in DU but can't be highlighted and is running two red lights. My Lacie brick disk has completely vanished.
I'd happily go back to snow lepord if it's a simple fix.

The disks orked without issue before then I upgarde and nothing. I see that others have had the same problem but I haven't seen and answer. Can anyone help? My iomega drive can be seen in DU but can't be highlighted and is running two red lights. My Lacie brick disk has completely vanished.
I'd happily go back to snow lepord if it's a simple fix.

External drive does not mount on boot

I have a Toshiba MK5055GSX 500GB external drive which I use for Time Machine but for some reason it does not automatically mount from a cold boot. Before I started to use it for Time Machine (it was formatted as NTFS at the time) I had not problems with it. All other external drives correctly mount on boot.
I had thought it might be a problem with the drive itself but if I disconnect it and reconnect it with my iMac running it mounts every time without fail. If I reboot after it has mounted it also mounts at boot. Only if I start the iMac using the power button with the drive already connected does it fail to mount and the results are consistently repeatable.
Does anyone have any ideas why this might be happening and how to fix it?

Does this drive have a separate power brick? If it does I suggest using it to see if that fixes the problem. If the enclosure has both USB and Firewire ports try using the drive on a Firewire port instead of a USB port.
It sounds like the drive is not spinning up early enough in the startup process to be detected.
Not knowing how you prepared the drive for the Mac, you should re-prep the drive as follows:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (for Intel Macs) or APM (for PPC Macs) then click on the OK button. Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.

Prevent volume mounting after booting

Is there a way to prevent a particular volume to mount after booting? I boot from one volume but have other volumes-disks that I may want to mount at a specific moment, but I not want the Mac to mount automatically after each booting (a waste of energy, disk usage, noise, and so on). Of course I can manually mount each volume-disk after booting, but what I want is something that prevents them from mounting in the first place after booting or rebooting.
I remember that could be configured with third party applications used to format disks on Mac OS 9 (Casablanca Works Drive 7, LaCie Silverlining, Prosoft Radialogic, etc) but I do not see how to do it on Mac OS X.
Thanks.

Search these forums for automount and see this one, for example, http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=6112779 Remember to try it at your own risk.

10.4.7 & FireWire drives not mounting

Hi everyone,
since this morning my trusted LaCie FW HDs won't mount, are not seen in System Profiler and Disk Utility.
I tried almost every thing I could find, resetting vram, pram, powering everything down, waiting, disconnecting all the cables, powering back up, connecting one after another, etc. - no changes.
Every application runs fine. Except, of course, Logic because I have all my sounds and song projects on these drives.
My system.log continues to say every second again:
...-Computer kernel[0]: AppleFWOHCI_AsyncTransmit::waitForDMA - context not going inactive.
The console.log repeats:
-Computer root[175]: [MAFL] attempt to make FSSpec for "121-210.cypress" failed -120\n
-Computer root[175]: [MAFL] attempt to make FSSpec for "210.cypress" failed -120\n
-Computer root[175]: [MAFL] found no firmware to load for 210\n
Does anybody know what these logs mean?
Is anybody else having this problem with 10.4.7?
I started a similar thread on A-S-D- Installation and Setup, only to find out, that a lot of people there are experiencing the same issue (FW drives not mounting, not showing).
Would resetting the PMU help?
Please help, I can't work

Back from the mysterious world of HDs, so easy to solve..., sometimes...
I tried the HDs on my friends older PB and all was fine.
Resetting my computers PMU did not solve the problem, after I tried everything else.
I refrained from reinstalling 10.4.7.
All other applications (but Logic, because I could not access my files) were running smooth.
Going back to 10 a.m. yesterday, basically starting over, there was one thing I missed checking (being human): the AC to DC converters supplied by LaCie for their drives.
See, they are under my desk, like out of sight...
Voilá! Individual testing revealed, that the AC/DC converter for the first LaCie drive in my chain did not spin up any of my other six LaCie drives, which I never run all at the same time, but they still have their own power supply.
Changed power supply on the first HD and now I am back to the fast speed and glitch free system I love. Back to enjoying work as well
What a day. And I am very sorry, that I was implying to blame 10.4.7 for this. My PB has never been faster

Usb hard drive not loading after security update

usb hard drive not loading after security update
I can't seem to find any other posts about this problem.
I have three external hard rives connect by a USB hub to my iMac.
Problem is that if I turn on the hard drive(s) AFTER start up I get a message that the drive either was not recognized by the OS or that it was ejected unexpectedly.
I get the same issue but not all the time if I turn them on before I boot the iMac.
I used the disk drive utility to "repair" the drives but they always come back as "probably ok".
If I restart the iMac with the drives connected (on), it seems to work but not all the time.
A bit annoying as I am wondering if the drives are OK or not.
I don't always need the drives as they are for backing up images from my camera using Apreture.
This all began after i did the latest security update.
is the update to blame?
mahalo.

Yes, you can still use those instructions to reset the PRAM.
You said that you booted to your install disk and that your primary drive did not show up at the Select a Destination screen? That usually means that the computer is either not recognizing your partition, or it's not recognizing the hard drive itself.
Start with this article and follow all the steps even if you already tried them. I suspect that you'll get to step 4 and you'll end up having to call Applecare. If you haven't done those steps, they're most likely going to make you do them anyway, so you might as well get them done before the call.

Drive not mounting after boot

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