Is it possible to start a mac without a hard drive in it?

Hi,
I recently had a problem with my Mac and had the Hard drive taken out so I could put it in a caddy to get my work off it.
What I was wondering is can it be booted or started without the hard drive in it as I want to take it to repair shops for them to have another look without having to put it back in.
Thanks.

daforum wrote:
the Hard drive taken out so I could put it in a caddy to get my work off it
Not all external caddy's are option/alt bootable.
A USB to SATA adpater cable should work.
Read though all these, you'll get a idea what you can and cannot do
https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro?view=documents#/?p er_page=50
BTW you need to use 10.6 now, so might as well get that disk from Apple and work from that
OS X 10.4/10.5 need to upgrade, 10.6.8 ok still

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#2 is impossible if you want to boot the other mac, they must be both intel or PPC, as you cannot use an intel-based mac as a boot mac for the other ppc-mac, and vice-versa.
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Message was edited by: edwinteh

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Thank you for the info.
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At the moment this seems to be working in both Mac and PC.
One thing i have noticed is when i try to transfer disk images (over 4Gb), near the end i get an 'unexpected error occured' (error code 1309).
From the internet:
error -1309 fileBoundsErr: file's EOF offset mark or size is too big
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it's possible, but difficult. i'm in the middle of trying to get this to work on my MacBook, but not there yet. The best resource i've found is here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=510030
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Initial easy steps to gain disk space:
- Delete all files in the Downloads folder.
Empty the Trash.
- Start iPhoto.
Empty its trash.
Restart.
Backup:
Run a Time Machine (or other) backup since you are about to delete and move files and you may need to recover from any inadvertent mistakes or decisions. You will need one external hard drive for your Time Machine (or other) backup and a second if you plan to offload some files. (See suggestions for where to purchase hard drives at the end of this message.)
For more about backups:
Time Machine Basics: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1427
Most commonly used backup methods:
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3045
Methodology to protect your data. Backups vs. Archives. Long-term data protection:
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6031
Deleting files:
Then use the free application OmniDiskSweeper http://www.omnigroup.com/more to explore your volume in descending order by size so you can attack the problem from the top down, deleting the largest unwanted files first. Delete with caution and do not delete any system files. Remember to empty the trash after trashing the files.
Additional reference on freeing disk space:
http://pondini.org/OSX/DiskSpace.html
Offloading files:
Consider moving some of the no-often-used large files or directories to an external disk. Use ODS again to find them. This will be at least your second hard drive. Your first one(s) is/are for your Time Machine (or other) backup(s). Do not offload files onto a Time Machine disk.
Format the second drive as Mac OS Extended (journaled). Using OWS to find large files/folders and copy them from the system drive to the external hard drive and delete them from your internal drive.
Then  > System Preferences > Time Machine > Options… > Remove the offload HD name from the exclusions list.
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From: http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/freeingspace.html
To move your iTunes Music folder to another disk or partition:
To change the location of your iTunes Music folder, carefully follow the instructions in the AppleCare® Knowledge Base document "iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Music folder."Additional information can be found in iTunes Help.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.thexlab.com/105/ 00000849.html
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To move your iPhoto Library folder to another disk or partition:
To move the iPhoto Library folder to a new location, employ the instructions in the AppleCare Knowledge Base document from http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2506 corresponding to the version of iPhoto you are using. Additional information can be found in iPhoto Help.
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https://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/12175/iphoto-buddy
https://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/7158/iphoto-library-manager
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Thanks.

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I'm having trouble with my iMac g5's drive and need
to see it on the desktop of my powerbook so I can
back up data from it before I erase it.
Thanks.
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Hal

Aha OK then, that should work fine.
The only snag might be, if your missing the original thermal sensor from the original 24" Hard Drive.
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image courtesy of > iMac Intel 24" EMC 2267 Repair - iFixit

Is it possible to start a mac without a hard drive in it?

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