Help please - with formatting my internal hard drive

hi all, new to all this forum lark.
i have a imac powerPC g4 700mhz, 256mb sdram.
its got os9 and osx 10.4.11 installed.
it runs slow and freezes all the time, so i've backed everything up and want to erase the hard disk and reinstall 10.4.11 on a nice clean empty hard drive.
How do i format my hard drive please...?
thanks

yes, brought from the apply shop in london. even when the finder is displayed(desktop) when i put the install cd in, it just ejects it after 10seconds!
how to i change target mode?
i really dont know alot about mac you see!lol

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After a startup problem with my macbook pro i put it as slave and formatted the internal Hard drive. Now i want to install OS X Mavericks from USB

After a startup problem with my macbook pro i put it as slave and formatted the internal Hard drive. Now i want to install OS X Mavericks from USB
How can i do that?

What did you "put as slave?" What Mac model do you have, exactly?

Wndr4700 media router formatting hfs internal hard drive

Recently switched over to all macs in our house. I was thinking about getting a Netgear Wmdr4700 instead of a time capsule. The router utility can only format hard drives as ext4 which from what I've read is not read/write compatible with macs without additional software. However the router supports and recognizes pre formatted hfs+, or hfs+ journaled drives. Any ideas on how I can format an internal hard drive with a Mac mini or MacBook Air before installing it in the router? Mabye I'm missing something...

Hello,
here is some info to help you out.
time machine will work perfectly fine with ext4 file system this is the default file system for the unit, i have have other netgear NAS devices with ext4 and btrfs and they also work fine with time machine. but if you so desire...
to format the drive with HFS+ you would need to do this via USB sata enclosure attached to mac mini or macbook air they cost about $20-30 the other option is if you know anyone with older mac pro (tower) they could format if for you or take it a place that repairs computers and they should be able to do this in just a few mins if they have a mac around, makes sure you create only 1 partition, GUID and choose mac osx entended journaled. make sure the wndr4700 firmware is updated first...ver 1.0.0.52 is the latest...then add newly formatted HFS+ drive turn back on and wait until unit shows green HD lights up on front. then follow instuctions to backup..my other advice is to buy an external 2.5 inch USB 3 drive as a secondary backup for your macs using time machine as well attaching it to your macs once a month (dont attach it to the netgear, even though you could), for backup...1 drive will work for several macs, buy according to size needed, backup once a month to this as well and then hide drive in your sock drawer, 2 backups are better than 1, good luck.
once your backups are all done, upgrade all your MACs to mavericks for free!!!!

How do I format a internal Hard Drive from a PC/laptop

How do I format a internal Hard Drive from a PC/laptop...My old internal hard drive had problems so I took it out and I have a 100 gb Seagate ATA drive that I replaced it with. In the mean time I've been using a external drive to boot up my powerbook g4. Not sure of what to do.

Hi, capitala1. Start your Powerbook up from your Mac OS X installer disc and open Disk Utility from the Installer or Utilities menu (depending on which OS version it is). Select the newly-installed Seagate drive inside your Powerbook as the target, and format it "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)". It makes no difference at all that the drive came out of a PC laptop: this is exactly the same procedure you'd use if the drive had just come brand new from its manufacturer.

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Disk Utility not formatting new internal hard drive

My 2011 mac book pro recently crashed giving me a gray screen with a folder(question mark). I tried reinstalling Yosemite, with no success. I bought a 2tb seagate hard drive, placed it into my macbook, however it's in master boot record. I tried partitioning it under GUID, but it is giving me error signs, as well "waiting for disks to reappear". I am currently erasing the hard drive, I understand that a 2tb hard drive is a huge hard drive and it takes time for it to be reformatted, but it's been over 12 hours and the estimate time remaining just continues to increase. What is happening? What am I doing wrong?

Just returned it, got the new one and same thing happened...I'm pretty confused with this right now. I used it as an external hard drive and it formatted fine. I installed Yosemite on it and ran fine as the operating system as an External Hard drive. However, as soon as I switch i put it into my laptop, it does not pick up or read. I just formatted the hard drive again and trying to install it, but now it is giving me a different error "this disk cannot be used to startup your computer yosemite". It's actually running as my internal hard drive right now and that's is what my computer is giving me.

How do I backup to time machine with a new internal hard drive?

My Macbook Pro's hard drive got corrupted about a year ago so I had to get the hard drive completely replaced. However, I wanted to start backing up my data to time machine so if the same situation were to reoccur, I would be better prepared. For some reason Time Machine does not recognize the new internal hard drive of the computer as it is supposed to. Could someone please help? thank you in advanced
Current OS: OS X 10.8.4

That error message is saying that it is attempting to setup a Time Capsule for Time Machine to backup your data on.
Do you have a Time Capsule?
Do you have an external Disk Drive?
You can do a backup to the internal disk drive. It is worthless to do that.
Allan

Trying to install/format an INTERNAL hard drive using Disk Utility gives me "Error: -69760: Unable to write to the last block of the device". Is that a hardware problem and what could be done about it?

*** PLEASE NOTE*** - This is a query about an INTERNAL HDD not an external one. Thanks.
My Mac is a late 2009 model and the current hard drive recently failed. So I bought a new one, exactly the same, albeit 750gb instead of 500gb. The HDD is a Seagate Momentus 7200. Before the my current drive failed I made a time machine back up to an external USB HDD. I've inserted the HDD into the bottom of my Mac, plugged in the USB and started my machine pressing the 'Option' ([ALT]) key. I go into Disk Utility to try and format the new HDD by creating a new partition but I keep getting the messages,
"Error: -69760: Unable to write to the last block of the device"
or
"POSIX: could not allocate memory"
This is actaully the third HDD I've tried. The first was another Seagate Momentus 7200 500gb, but this time it was a newer model (model number ended in 423AS instead of 420AS - the new one I am trying ends with 420AS, which is the same as the current HDD). I then tried a Western Digital drive but that one didn't even show up in DU. Forums and tech support are suggesting it's faults with the HDDs but surely not three in a row?
Could this be an issue with another part of my Mac?
Is there anything else I can do to format the HDD, have I missed a crucial step?

Did you ever get a resolution to this issue?
I am having that exact error with a new 512GB SSD from Crucial, in a 15" MBP mid-2010.
I really wonder now if the stupid SATA cable could be bad - causing the initial SSD fail. I am replacing it with the EXACT same drive, and getting that "last block" error when i partition in the GUI or from command-line.
thanks!

Re: Need to format an internal hard drive into FAT32, how?

OK, this is no playstation forum but bear with me.
I bought a new 1 TB samsung internal HDD for my playstation 3 but it will not recognize it, probably because it is not pre-formatted into FAT32. I need to format this drive. I tried to put into an old laptop and do it but the connections were different. I put it into my Satellite A500-12W and thought I would use an old windows XP cd and find a "format" option instead of installation. However, the computer would not boot from the CD with the new hard drive in. I got the error message:
"PXE-E61: media test failure, check cable
PXE-MOF: exiting Pxe rom"
The drive is brand new and should not be faulty. I had created Sattelite recovery discs before so I put number 1 in and then I reached the installation process but it seemed I had no option but to install the entire thing which is 4 DVDs and when I did it before I recall it being a days work (formatting often is with all the OK's that needs to be pressed) and I am working a lot these days, I would like to avoid making a full install just to be able to felete everything again and format it into FAT32. Since we are talking about the internal drive I can't just do it from windows since there is no windows on it....
The user manual has nothing useful to contribute, I have looked through setup looking for a "format" option but can't find one.
Can anybody help me? Can I for example enter MS-DOS without an operating system istalled and do it from there? All I want is an empty FAT32 HDD....

Hi
I assume you have formatted the HDD in FAT32 but you didnt create an partition.
You have to create an partition on the HDD and then you can format this in FAT32
Then the full 1TB should be accessible.
You can do this using tool like fat32format
Copy this fat32format on diskette or HDD. Its not big 24kb
Now you have to point to the fat32format.exe and have to start this application using command fat32format.exe
Then use command fat32format X: (X means the HDD drive in most cases its C)
Now you have to press Y for Yes
Other method:
Boot the notebook using an Linux Live CD like Knoppix
Such linux does not need to be installed on HDD.
Now Linux should be able to access the HDD and you could create an FAT32 partition on this HDD

Can you help a novice format an external hard drive?

Greetings.
I'm not very tech literate, so I hope you can help walk me through the following.
I have an external 250 GB firewire drive for back up, and I'd like to format and partition it as a bootable drive and also to back up my 2 internal 40 and 20 GB drives. I don't know how to do this. for example, I don't know whether to format the disk as OS Extended or OS Extended (Journalled). Also, when I backed up using Super Duper, I selected the "make this a bootable disk" option, but couldn't boot from it (It's currently a "Mac OS Extended" disk).
Also, when I have Disk Utility opened, why do I see 2 icons for the same disk? For example, my main drive says" 37.3 GB ST 340014 A", and an indented icon says "OS X" (which is what I named the drive). I know that Disk Utility can or cannot perform certain of its functions depending on which icon I select.
I know this is basi stuff for you...but not for me.
Thanks.
G4 Dual 450 Mac OS X (10.3.9) 1GB RAM

Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in the 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. Set the number of partitions from the dropdown menu (use 1 partition unless you wish to make more.) Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled, if supported.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the volume(s) mount on the Desktop.
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, if supported.) 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 will take 30 minutes to an hour or more depending upon the drive size.
You can clone your system to the external drive as follows:
How to Clone Using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Select the destination drive on the Desktop and press COMMAND-I to open the Get Info window. At the bottom in the Ownership and Permissions section be sure the box labeled "Ignore Permissions on this Volume" is unchecked. Set Ownership and Permissions as follows: Owner=system with read/write; Group=admin with read/write; Other with read-only.
2. Open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder.
3. Select the backup or destination volume from the left side list.
4. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
5. Select the backup or destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
6. Select the startup or source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
For added precaution you can boot into safe mode before doing the clone.

Help Please - Can't See External Hard Drive

Hi,
Apologies for the length of this post, I'd really appreciate any help anyone can give me with this problem.
I've been using an Lacie external firewire drive for ages and suddenly I can't see the icon on my desktop or access it.
I realised a few months ago I changed the name of the drive and accidently put a space at the start of the title - is this the problem? I think it's been working fine up to today.
I can see the disk in Utilities and get the following error message when I try and verify the drive:
Disk Utility stopped verifying “ Audio Drive 1 ” because the following error was encountered:
The underlying task reported failure on exit
And:- Verifying volume “ Audio Drive 1 ”
Invalid Volume Header
Checking HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Invalid sibling link
The volume Audio Drive 1 needs to be repaired.
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
1 HFS volume checked
Volume needs repair
When I try and repair, I get the following:
First Aid Failed
Disk Utility stopped repairing “ Audio Drive 1 ” because the following error was encountered:
The underlying task reported failure on exit
And:- Verify and Repair disk “ Audio Drive 1 ”
Invalid Volume Header
Checking HFS Plus volume.
Checking Extents Overflow file.
Checking Catalog file.
Invalid sibling link
Volume check failed.
Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit
1 HFS volume checked
1 volume could not be repaired because of an error
Many thanks for your help,
Rob

Can anyone help me with this: I recently bought an external hard-drive (maxtor seagate 1Terrabite) to backup everything on my macbook/PC/Playstation 3, but at the time of purchase i forgot that they all use different formatting systems (FAT32,NTFS etc) how silly of me.....
is it possible to partition my External HDD in separate formats e.g: one partition as FAT32 and another as OSX, so that i can backup all my data from all my different systems, like my PS3.
if this isent possible, the only other option i could think of is to just buy another external HDD but then it all becomes to costly
if anyone has an answer please email/IM me on [email protected]

HELP PLEASE!!! My hard-drive space is disappearing!!! Over 300GB gone!!!

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Run whatsize and then delete the huge file.

When trying to format my internal hard drive, it's greyed out in Disk utility?

I'm trying ot format my computer and wipe everything off before giving it away, but Disk Utility has everything greyed out and won't let me choose my hard drive. I have the original CD and everything that came with the computer. How do I fix this fast?

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Be sure to make a backup first because the following procedure will erase
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Can I install 2 different osxs (Maveriks and mountain lion) on my macbook with 2 different internal hard drives?

Macbook 15" i7 2.2 750GB and 16GB RAM
have plenty of space on my 2nd hard drive and want to try to install 2 OSx on both hard drives.
A- will that really work?
b- will Mac ask to choose which one to start?
I can't take a 'leap of faith' just yet as am away from my backup so wanna know if anyone has ever tried it?
i'll do it for fun so i have no valid reason.
Cheers

1. Yes.
2. By default, the second OS installed will be the startup disk. This can be changed from the Startup Disk pane of System Preferences and overridden by pressing Option at startup.
(110905)

Help please - with formatting my internal hard drive

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