Main drive won't boot reliably

If I have a duplicated ( via SuperDuper) external drive attached, the OS will boot from that drive, even if I have my main drive selected in prefs as the startup drive.
If I disconnect the external drive, my mac will boot from DiskWarrior DVD, in the Superdrive.
If I remove the disk, my drive gets me a flashing question mark.
I have DiskWarriored and TechTooled and they pass the drive, yet all the above indicate that all is not well with my main drive.
Yet in each case, if I start with 'Option' key pressed, my main drive appears in the list and will then boot happily and will run all day.
Any ideas as to why the drive won't boot OSX straight away?
tia
peter

good job on having firewire ports, you can run tiger.
to upgrade the firmware, you need to install a harddrive that has OS 9 on it. doesn't matter if the drive is in that computer at the moment, it can be a friends that has it installed already. you just need a installation of OS 9. Connect it to the internet after its booted, run the software update, it'll reboot some times and some junk and do it for you. Be nice and give the hard drive back to whoever was nice enough to lend it to you. They are SUPER easy to swap.
My impression of your hard drive is that it is failing its SMART crap. The problem with these things is that the heat they live with (cause of the proc and the crt in there, not to mention the psu) make them "stretch" as they work. you "can" dent the little disc/circle lookin part on the top of the hard drive with a hammer very lightly and sort of "force" it back in to a more optimal position for old age. Since i saw you just ordered a new hard drive from ebay (newegg would have been more trustworthy, ata 100 backwards compatability for the win), when you get that, put it in and come up with an OS 9 install disc. Gotta be one for your computer or a retail, which did or does come with tiger when you buy it.
I installed OS X Tiger on my iMac G3 400dv without doing the firmware update first and i updated it to the current version, did it break my monitor? nope. BUT, it says it can, so i'd install OS 9 first and do the firmware update like a good person would. I have since installed OS 9 and fixed the error on my part and reinstalled Tiger.

Similar Messages

My clone external hard drive won't boot - start up?

Hi,
I am selling my MacPro and need to clone its system drive for the new lap top I will buy soon. So I bought a new external 2TB HDD from OWC. I have found that this external HDD will not boot up, even though it says it is bootable, and appears in the Start Up prefs when I select it. It sppears on the desktop, doesn't make any weird clicking noises as well.
I am using 10.6.8 OS X. The 2TB HDD has two partitions (created with DU), one is bootable (Mac OS X extended journaled), and the other is a regular HDD space for media etc. It is GUID. It has "Ownership" checked in the info box.
I used CCC 3.4.4 and since this is 'hopefully' a one time deal, selected the 'Delete anything that doesn't exist on the source' setting. I cloned my system drive to the bootable space and had no problems with the transfer. Plenty of space to write all the files. I even made sure everything was checked in the 'source' window that a system drive might need. Everything was checked.
I spoke with a representive at the OWC Sales company and checked that this HDD can be used as a bootable drive.
I checked the connections: with external HDD with FW800, and Sata connectors. I have checked it with my Mac Book Pro as well. Same result. No boot.
I really don't understand why this drive won't boot, since everything looks correct.
Does anyone have any thoughts, suggestions, ideas for fixing this issue?
Thanks
M

Not sure if you managed to get this issue resolved yet Marcus, but I too have a similar problem:
Currently I'm upgrading from Leopard to Lion (via Snow Leopard) on both an iMac and MacBook Pro (both Intel), but before I proceed with the OSX upgrade I wanted to back everything up. Thus far I have partitioned an external firewire drive (G Drive - one that is bootable), and cloned each machine using Carbon Copy Cloner to it's own partition (both GUID). There is plenty of space left over on each partition.
The issue - I can boot the OS X from the external drive on the MacBook Pro but not on the iMac.
When I restart and hold down Option on the iMac the only drive that appears is the HDD, not the other two selectable drives that are visible if I boot up on the MacBook Pro. On the iMac in System Prefs > Startup Disc I can see all 3 drives but when I select it and restart, the machine freezes on the grey loading screen and goes no further.
Not that it should make a difference, but there is a 3rd partition on the external drive that is currently empty (for extra storage).
Any help is greatly appreciated - I can't find any relevant answers elsewhere. Thanks,
Dan

MAC PRO HARD DRIVE won't boot

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Replace small battery inside? replace chips? Logic board replace as last resort. Can't take it away from work at this point to an apple tech.
Had just installed updates to snow leopard and was successful...but went to restart it...and this crap happened.
Thanks for any help.
MT1111
< Edited by Host >

I'll try that tomorrow. Thinking it could also be:
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2) MAC PRO is plugged into a SURGE PROTECTOR, instead of right into the wall outlet.
3) Been doing a lot of FORCE QUITS and HARD BOOT -- unplugging it directly when it wouldn't shut down soon enough -- lately this past year.
I just assumed that this MAC PRO with the XEON QUAD CORE etc., was a heavy duty enough NLE,
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on the internal hard dives and just have to stop that.
I noticed these past few days that much of the LETTERING for hard drive icons and folders' titles
were starting to look in OVERLAPPING of the lettering. That was my first hint that something was up.

Cloned Drive Won't Boot

Hi All,
I have an external 320 GB drive that I use for backup for my Pismo and my 12" Al. It's in a Mercury On The Go firewire enclosure that usually works fine.
I use SuperDuper to clone my drives.
For some reason, the cloned drive of my 12"AL won't mount. I duped it again using SuperDuper, and it says it did it completely and it's supposed to be bootable. But when I change Startup Disk to the external I just get the blue screen--no apple, no spinning gear, no dock, nothing.
This was an expensive drive, and I want to have bootable backups. Anyone have an idea how to fix?
Cheers,
GB
Message was edited by: gblunt99

If the drive is only USB, it generally won't boot a PowerPC Mac running Mac OS X. You can exchange the hard drive case for one that has Firewire from http://www.macsales.com/ once you discover what type of internal drive is inside the USB case, if it is a USB drive. See this image if you don't know what Firewire looks like *
Secondly, the clone will only boot reliably the machine and/or model and vintage machine the clone was made from (the latter, it is important for legal consideration that you have the right licenses for it).
Partitioning a hard drive will allow you to create multiple clones, if there is enough room on the hard drive. For PowerPC Macs though the partitioning has to be Apple Partition Map. For Intel Macs, it has to be GUID. Here's a guide to partitioning:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61301
If you have a mix of PowerPC and Intel Macs, this guide explains how to do both.
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=2006061610374449
- * Links to my pages may give me compensation.

New hard drive won't boot!

I have an iBook, and the hard drive recently broke. First I installed os x on my external firewire hard drive, but the iBook wouldn't boot off of it (it's a maxtor onetouch drive). I got another hard drive, and using the installer (for panther), I formatted the drive, and installed os x on it. However, the iBook won't boot off of the drive. What is wrong? Is it more serious than just the hard drive?

Well I just tried to boot off of the external hard drive (which is a Maxtor Onetouch firewire drive), while I didn't have an operational hard drive. However now that the replacement drive doesn't work as well (which I am more concerned about), I am wondering whether it is a more serious issue, or not. When I took it apart, I didn't see a logic board connector as in http://www.sterpin.net/uk/ddibookg4uk.htm (picture 43). It boots the installation cd fine, so I assume that there is not a problem with the logic board? The drive I purchased was completely empty, and I am wondering whether the boot part of the partition is wrong?
In disk utilities (in the installer), it does not see the new internal drive. I have tried to start up holding the option key, but it only has a screen with two buttons, and that ticking clock as a cursor.

New SCSI Hard Drive Won't Boot

Hello,
I have a problem. My original SCSI drive died on me and I took it out and converted over to only ATA drives. Ever since I did that, my computer has always been a bit lagging. Slow. Not too fast. Anyway, I bought another SCSI drive and I'm trying to use that as my boot drive. I used Carbon Copy Cloner and checked "make bootable" in the preferences, but for some reason my computer just won't boot from it. I've formatted it and it shows up on my desktop, but it won't boot. Start. Make OS go boom boom. I would appreciate any help I could get. Thanks in advance.

First of all, thanks for your reply. I appreciate it.
A couple of things. I check my system profiler and I couldn't find out what kind of SCSI card I have. I even opened up my machine and there wasn't any writing on it. So how do I find out what type of card I have? My other question is if the same card worked for the SCSI drive I had before, why won't it work on the new drive. I've set it as the master at the end of the SCSI cord and like I said I used CCC. The drive shows up on my desktop but won't boot. Should I try loading OS from disks instead of using CCC?

DVD drive won't boot from Leopard or Tiger disks

Hi,
I have had some issues booting from the OS install disks with my DVD drive, is it the drive or is it the software?
Can this be fixed?
Thanks
Tom

There are known issues with some Leopard discs not booting, but if your Tiger disc won't boot either, I would say you probably have a defective optical drive.
-Bmer
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ATA drive won't boot alone-gray spinning startup screen. But will w/others

I'm troubleshooting a friends G4-PCI. And i can't get past a certain problem with the hard drives.
The hard drive (a 2003 80gb maxtor) doesn't want to boot.
But it will boot 10.4.11 if something else is in as well. So alone, i get only a flashing question mark. If another bootable hard drive in as well, the maxtor will boot. Same with a retail Tiger install disc.
This is the situation after all the things that i have tried which are these;
The initial problem was that it would crash if any real work was attempted. Then after a few powerbutton downs, the spinning 'watch' with gray apple screen at the beginning of the boot.
What i have done. Transfered all files onto a bootable drive, by first booting into the installer DVD in order to direct the subsequent boot to be on the good drive.
question 1) there is no 'option' boot in order to choose the volume, on the PCI, correct?
Once booted into the good drive, the maxtor mounts no problems.
Disk Utility. Disk Warrior. Still the Gray screen spinner. Fine.
Zeroed the drive. And super dupered the good drive (also a 80gb, 20% full) onto the maxtor. I figured if one copy boots, then the other will. After choosing the maxtor in system prefs, it booted fine. I then took my drive out. Then booted to test again, the maxtor alone. And again, the spinning gray apple startup menu that just keeps spinning.
Both drives were cable select and i tried both positions on the cable.
question 2) What did i miss?

You may have confused the G4 by not correctly setting the volume Jumpers to Master and Slave correctly. Look at the coonnection pins on the drives and you will see one of them has a small plasticlink which slides over two of the pins. That’s your Jumper. You may need tweezers to lift it off the pins. Your main Drive is served by the first of the two IDE cable connections, (the one closest to the Motherboard). Set that drive as Master. There should be a diagram on the HDD case to show which pins the jumper slides onto to create the Master. The second drive needs no jumper as it is the Slave volume. It sounds like you may have used your Slave as a start-up volume without transferring the Jumper onto that drive to make it a Master. Check it out. Good Luck.

Early 2008 MBP source drive won't boot after cloning

I cloned the original/source drive, via USB, Carbon Copy Cloner, to a Crucial MX100 256GB SSD. The clone process completed without errors. I powered down the system to do a start-up from the USB drive to see if it would boot. The computer will not start from the source drive and holding the Option key to select a boot drive never gets that far.
I can hear the optical drive try to spin up, the status light blinks quickly like it is trying to start and then quits, remaining a steady light. I have tried Cmd + R at boot without success. Tried the PRAM reset, also the SMC reset.
There is plenty of room on the source drive, at least 160GB. The target drive is the same size as the source drive.
Prior to cloning the source drive and powering down, the computer was operating flawlessly. This an early 2008 model with the 2.5Mhz processor.
Any recommendations? I am hesitant to remove the source drive and install the cloned SSD for concern that I'll end up with some other trouble.
I do not have a start up disk. BTW, the OS X is Yosemite, the most recent version, .10, I think.
Thanks,
Bob

wsev1955 wrote:
I have a HP Pavilion Dv4170us laptop added some new upgrades to it.. max RAM 2GB... a new battery... and I bought a 160GB samsung IDE drive to replace the origional 100GB drive...Using EZ Gig II software and usb drive adapter I successfuly cloned the smaller hard drive but when I swaped them out it won't boot windows xp.. just a black screen with the blinking curser at the top left corner... using my windows xp pro disc.. i ran the system recovery and tried first fix mbr command... then I tried fixboot.. I also looked for the boot.ini file which is not in the C: root drive...I only found a back up copy of it in the windows/pss folder... this is on both drives.. so the cloeing copied it all... but the origional drive will boot and the new one won't... I even tried reinstalling XP as a repair installation...still nothing... any ideas??
Hi,
Can you see the new hdd in the BIOS?
Dv6-7000 /Full HD/Core i5-3360M/GF 650M/Corsair 8GB/Intel 7260AC/Samsung Pro 256GB
Testing - HP 15-p000
HP Touchpad provided by HP
Currently on Debian Wheeze
*Please, help other users with the same issue by marking your solved topics as "Accept as Solution"*

PC not detecting drives, won't boot up passed HP Splash

Hey, so randomly two days ago I left my PC on and awoke to it frozen on the HP start up splash. Going into the bios I realize my hard drive is not detected, later on my CD drive stopped being detected. I ordered a new hard drive and I'm still getting the same problem.
I've done everything the support site says. I've switched back and forth between my new and old hard drive. I've tried switching the SATA ports its connected to on the mobo, I've tried disconnecting each piece of hardware one by one, but it still won't detect the drives. Still won't boot up Windows.
The only thing I can do is run a linux off a USB Stick, but if I try to install of course, there's no hard drive detected. This can't be a mobo problem, can it?
Please help, this is what I'm running.
HP Pavilion p6310y
Athlon ll X4 2.8GHz,
6GB DDR3,
1TB SATA,
DVDRW,
Win 7 Home Prem 64-bit.
the new HD is a 2tb WD SATA, so I don't see why that would be a problem either.

The Pegatron M2N78-LA (DDR2 & DDR3 versions) motherboards are dying. Specifically the chipset on the motherboard dies which results in not detecting any drives. HP Customer Support does not have it on a recall list and could not offer any real solutions. Many have resulted in changing the motherboard to other MicroATX boards compatible with the HP (but you'll need to also puchase a new copy of Windows7). Others have replaced it with the same motherboard from ebay (make sure you use the correct memory version)... however it is likely that the same motherboard would fail again.
See this thread. I had to replace one myself with another MicroATX board.
http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Desktop-Hardware/m8530f-desktop-PC-with-a-m2n78-la-mother-board-doesn-t...
If your model does not use the M2N78-LA (Stamped Right on the Motherboard) this would not apply.

G4 PowerMac mirrored drives won't boot after software update

This IS NOT about my PB but a PowerMac tower, G4, mirrored drive....running 10.5 (I think).
After some month of neglect, did software update yesterday.... 7 programs including a security update, iTurnes, QT, and I'm not sure what else.
Now it won't boot.
I have a Disk Warrior CD, but I can't get the SuperDrive door open to try to boot from it.
Help GREATLY appreciated.
Thanks,
TD

After some month of neglect, did software update yesterday.... 7 programs including a security update, iTurnes, QT, and I'm not sure what else.
Now it won't boot.
What I like to call a case of computer indigestion. Too many updates at once. See recommendations below.
I have a Disk Warrior CD, but I can't get the SuperDrive door open to try to boot from it.
See if any of these help:
[Topic : Can't open drive door |http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1279497]
A dozen ways to eject or unmount a recalcitrant CD or DVD
http://www.osxfaq.com/dailytips/08-2002/08-12.ws
Ejecting media in Mac OS X: Removing 'stuck' CDs/DVDs
http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20041011075232575
Power Macintosh G3 and G4: About the DVD-RAM Drive
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=HT3072
PowerPC-based Macintosh: How to eject a disc when other options don't work
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106752
Force Eject (10.3 or later) - Can be used to eject any removable disk that the system will not eject. http://mac.softpedia.com/progDownload/Force-Eject-Download-34780.html
[Article #HT1310 - Startup Manager: How to Select a Startup Volume|http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1310]
In worst case scenario I wonder if sticking some tape to the door to get access to the drive itself, then using a straightened paperclip in the eject hole (do they still have those?) would work.
<HR>
Updating
Certain steps appear to minimize the risk of an update producing problems.
Number one is to make sure you have a bootable clone backup of your computer in case you do need to back out of it again. This is the only guaranteed way of not having to worry about the results of an update.
Some like to boot from their installer discs or an external backup and verify (and if necessary repair) their internal drives as well as drive permissions. This is done with Disk Utility. You can verify a drive while booted from the same drive but sometimes this produces spurious errors. Repairing a drive (if necessary) has to be done while booted from another disk. Permissions repair can, and is probably best, done when booted from your internal drive.
[Resolve startup issues and perform disk maintenance with Disk Utility and fsck|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214]
[Using Disk Utility in Mac OS X 10.4.3 or later|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=302672]
[Disk Utility's Repair Disk Permissions|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25751]
You can also go to the step of booting into safe mode to do the install.
[Mac OS X: Starting up in Safe Mode|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107393]
[What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode? (Mac OS X)|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107392]
[Safe Boot takes longer than normal startup|http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107394]
I like to download the update onto my computer and install it from there rather than let Software Update do it. I know a few people who had problems with doing the update via software updater found a manual install to work.
Repair permissions again afterward.
It helps to only install one update at a time and to run the computer for a while to make sure it is behaving well.
The more cautious even like to unplug third party peripherals (see [comment by BDaqua|http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9040746#9040746]).
Almost all of the above steps (except backup) have been questioned as to necessity because probably many people have done successful updates without doing them. I say they can't hurt, they can very likely do good (especially if your computer isn't regularly maintained), so why not do them to be safe.
[BDaqua's comments on updating problems|http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=8948595#8948595]
[Baby Boomer's comments on updating problems|http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9025760#9025760]
[Klaus1's post on updating and removing updates|http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=10257902#10257902]

Canvio 500GB drive won't boot into system recovery

First a little background:
Computer is a Dell desktop PC running Windows XP SP3.
Portable 500GB USB drive is a Canvio model HDTC605XK3A1.
"NTI Backup Now EZ" has been used to do a weekly backup for almost a year.
The PC recently started running very slow so I decide to restore a full system backup from two months prior. To do a system restore you have to boot from the Canvio drive into Linux and do a full system restore.
Everything started fine but during the restore the process crashed. Now the PC won't boot on it's own drive or the Canvio. I then plug the Canvio drive into my laptop and the drive is not recognized. I manage to repair the partition table and the drive is now recognized but will not boot. I get a message stating "BOOTMGR is missing".
I can retrieve all the photos and documents from the drive, but there is genealogy software on the computer and the data files only get saved to the drive image files. You can not retrieve individual files from the drive image. You have to do a full system restore using NTI Backup.
The big question is how do I make the Canvio bootable again? Or, is there an ISO available to burn to a CD?

I managed to get the drive to boot by using Grub4DOS. Most of the incremental images seemed to be corrupt, so I had to go back almost a year.

MacBook Pro Retina, late 2013: iTunes DRM error 8877652 won't boot reliably!

Mavericks 10.9.3, all updates installed (as of today, june 13, 2014)
Laptop is acting major strange -- which is new for this machine. It's worked flawlessly for months.
All of a sudden, Suspend / Sleep seems broken. I can close the lid, unplug the power, put the thing in my backpack (to go to work) when I get there, the laptop is FRIGGEN HOT and the fans are blowing full tilt!
If I do a Shut Down, I get to work, plug the computer in, hit the power button. *nothing* 30 seconds later I hear a startup chime, and it goes to the boot screen.
I get a never-ending spinner.
Doing a verbose boot, the last message I see is something about iTunes DRM, 8877652. wha?
Doing a boot to the recovery disk (hold down option) I can verify permission, verify disk, everything is fine. If I do a full shutdown from there, the machine won't boot. If I do a 'restart' from the recovery disk, the laptop boots 'normally', albeit slowly.
HELP!?

I have picked up my brand new MBPR on the 4th as well, and last night restarted for the first time after software update ( mavericks ) and after 3 hours hours of grey screen with spinning wheel called APPLE who again never knows what they are talking about because they keep saying " we never heard about that " when I called about the same issue on my 17 inch 2 months ago. So I called 3 times this morning and when I let them know that I am quite " puzzled " that every time I mention a Maverick Issue suddensly my call gets disconnected, and nobody calls me back when THEY SWEAR they took notes of my call bacl number. Last call a few minutes ago, I spoke to a supervisor and talked for 45 minutes about all issues and when he expressed concern about me recording the call I told him " You guys record my calls, so where does it say where I couldn't record yours if I wanted to ? " and the supervisor hung up on me... Way to Go APPLE!!! I've been an apple devotee since I first got my apple lisa in 1984 but they have only been going to " s*** " the last 2-3 years.
So DIGGLY, do like I will this morning and return your purchase!

Internal Hard Drive Won't Boot or Mount

I don't know if this is the right forum for this but...
My 24" iMac running 10.5.2 won't start up. Meaning I can't get past the grey screen. I fsck the disk in single user mode and got back "invalid nobe structure (4,19621)" and repairs failed, then quickly shut down. As I understand it the (4,19621) means that the file with catalog node ID 19621 in the Catalog B-Tree portion of the disk directory has an invalid extent entry. I might be wrong here. If any knows how to correct that problem that would be helpful. But thats not the real problem.
I should add I tried to boot from the install DVD and repair the disk with disk utility and it would not repair the disk either.
Disk Utility recognizes the disk as "232.9 GB AAPL Firewire Target Media" and thats all while in target disk mode.
The real problem is the disk won't mount in firewire target disk mode. I would like to try to recover some of the fills that I haven't backed up mainly in my documents folder or repair this problem.
I am going to install (well not me) a new hard drive Monday and have a fresh and new system but in the mean time I would like to try to recover some of my files if possible.
I should add the one time it did mount, all the folders were there but none of the files. And it gave no worrying. I checked the S.M.A.R.T. status and the start up volume yesterday and got the report the disks seems to be okay.
Any help in getting the disk to mount in firewire target disk mode to repair and/or recover some files would help.
Message was edited by: windylove

Thank you for the reply. That was the best and most logical reply.
DW never got to that point if thats what you are talking about nor did it get past "Inspecting disk" and Step 1: Searching entire disk in final rescue attempt". After hours of the beach ball spinning.
I am not within my apple care 3 years time frame. When they replace the hard drive tomorrow they said they might be able to recover some of my data in my Users folder.
Do you think that is possible?
That is more what I am worried about at this point. All of my important files have been back up there are just a few that weren't.
You confirmed what I was thinking. Thanks

External drive won't boot after install?

I tried installing mountain lion onto an external SSD drive. At first it worked, using my USB install drive and selected my external drive as the target. All the files are copied over and asked me to restart. However, after restart all it did is booted back into my internal drive OSX. Even if I held down the option button it won't allow me to boot the external drive. Any ideas? I'm doing this from the retina macbook pro.

Install or Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion from Scratch
Be sure you backup your files to an external drive or second internal drive because the following procedure will remove everything from the hard drive.
Boot to the Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Partition and Format the hard drive:
1. Select Disk Utility from the main menu and click on the Continue button.
2. After DU loads select your external 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. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) 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 Security 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.
Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion: Select the External drive, then select Install Lion/Mountain Lion and click on the Install button.
Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible
because it is three times faster than wireless.

Main drive won't boot reliably

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