Mavericks won't install because Macintosh HD "cannot be used to start up your computer"

I've searched around, but I haven't found a solution yet. Any ideas?

Thanks for the quick response. I had already found this while searching for a solution, and it unfortunately didn't solve the problem. I'm in the process of backing up right now, I wanted to avoid reformatting and reinstalling, but it's looking like that might be my only option.

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Mac OS X cannot be installed on "Macintosh HD", because this disk cannot be used to start up your computer

I have a macbook pro with snow leopard on it. I am giving it away to a family members, but would like to erase the disk before giving it away. When I put my snow leopard dvd in, and click "install", I get a screen asking me to select the hard drive to install on. When I click the only one listed: "Macintosh HD", I get the message:
Mac OS X cannot be installed on "Macintosh HD", because this disk cannot be used to start your computer
If I try to boot from the dvd, my mac just hangs on the gray screen that shows the apple logo. Basically I put the dvd in, shut down the computer, when I turn it on, I hold the "C" key, and it just hangs.
How should I go about erasing everything on the computer, and re-installing the OS, I just want it to look like it did when it came from the factory. Any help would be much appreciated.
Note: I lost my original install dvd, so I called Apple and asked for a replacement, they charged me $20 and sent the Snow Leopard disk that I am using as my replacement.
Thanks.

It's possible you got a disk from Apple you can't use. What you should have gotten were gray disks based on the Mac's serial number so you would get disks which were identical to the ones it came with.
If the disk you received has a picture of a Snow Leopard on it, then they sent you a 10.6.3 retail disk, which will not have any of the bundled iLife apps on it.
Much more important is the point release. If your Mac originally came with 10.6.4 or some later point release of Snow Leopard, then 10.6.3 will not install on that Mac. The necessary hardware drivers are not on the retail disk.

Can't install: "this disk cannot be used to start up your computer"

After making sure that my current startup disk for 10.5 was imaged to another hard drive, I inserted the Snow Leopard install disk and double-clicked the Install icon. Everything worked fine till I got to "Select the disk where you want to install Mac OS X." All of the disk partitions had warning triangles, including the one for my original startup disk, which has worked perfectly for the 10.5 pre-installed on my new iMac (identifier 9,1). When I click on the icon for this drive, the warning message below states "Mac OS X cannot be installed on 'iMac HD', because this disk cannot be used to start up your computer." Obviously that's not true, since that's where the OS is installed. No other programs were running except Finder.
I used Disk Utility to check the disk and repair permissions: no change in the installation program's message. I quit the installation program and reinserted the DVD. It certainly does a lot of churning of the DVD before you ask it to do anything. With all external hard disks disconnected, it still gives the same error message.
Where do I go from here? I thought Snow Leopard was "The world's most advanced operating system. Finely tuned." It can't even install itself and recognize a bootable internal hard drive on an iMac.

GasMan4932 wrote:
When I click on the icon for this drive, the warning message below states "Mac OS X cannot be installed on 'iMac HD', because this disk cannot be used to start up your computer." Obviously that's not true, since that's where the OS is installed.
How did you partition this drive, if you did that? Does it contain start up or utility partitions for any other OS (for instance Linux)? There have been reports that the "cannot be used to start up your computer" message will appear if a third party utility was used to create a 'triple boot' system or such, apparently because SL is picky about the format GUID partition scheme table info & how partitions are allocated space on the drive by other formatting/partition methods.
For some users with these partitions, the fix has been as simple as "tickling" (slightly changing) the partition size of some partition with Disk Utility, which apparently updates the GUID partition scheme table info so that the SL installer accepts it as safe to use with SL.( In this sense, the message may be trying to say the installer thinks the disk can't be used to reliably start up your computer with SL, not in general.)
See the discussions topic Cannot install Snow Leopard over 10.5.8 for more about this.

Install error : disk cannot be used to start up your computer [or] MediaKit reports partition (Map) too small

Greetings,
I am aware that this problem has been discussed, but in long and vague discussions that I had to sift deeply to find an answer. Therefore I am posting a clear message, as this problem can be very troublesome for someone who just received a Mac OS installation disk and cannot install it.
Situation : you cannot install/update your new system because the installer does not consider your volume.
Error message : this disk cannot be used to start up your computer.
Version française : Ce disque ne peut pas être configuré pour démarrer votre ordinateur.
Also discussed below error: "MediaKit reports partition (Map) too small"
Note : although this occurred with a Snow Leopard (10.6) install DVD, it can alo occur with Lion (10.7) according to discussions on Apple web site.
IF YOUR CONDITIONS ARE AS FOLLOWS :
- You are using an official Apple installation DVD of Mac OS 10.6 (Snow Leopard) [or 10.7 Lion] or an official download/upgrade of those systems.
- Your main Mac partition scheme is in GUID as it should be (check with Disk Utility). That partition contains a Mac system that can start-up.
- Your volume format is: Mac OS Extended (journaled) [the format should not be Case Sensitive.]
- You have the hardware requirements to install Mac OS 10.6 (Intel processor; internal or external DVD drive or a linked DVD drive; 1 GB of RAM; a screen controlled by your computer graphics card; at least 5 GB space on the hard disk or 7 GB if you install all components).
- Using Disk Utility, you of course tried the disk Repair Tool and the Repair Permissions tool.
- Your hard disk does not have a file called Backups.backupdb (if it does, this means Time Machine has once used this hard disk for its back-ups). Anyhow, if it were the case, the installation would give a different error message (with the word TimeMachine). This file may block the installation: Apple Support suggest to place it in the garbage, *without* deleting it, and placing it back on the disk later. Mind you, if you do not use this hard disk as such to save your Time Machine back-ups, you can simply delete this file.
HOW TO FIX :
1. Boot with the 10.6 install DVD (Tip: you can either select Mac 10.6 as the boot DVD in your Start-up Preferences or simply press down c during the start-up).
2. Above the install screen, you have a Utilities tab from where you can run Disk Utility. Select your hard disk and select the Partition tab. Resize the primary Mac partition (don't add a new one) by decreasing it by about 5 GB.
It will look like this http://i.imgur.com/jHTbr.jpg
( That image shows only one partition, but the same principle applies even if you have two or more partitions on your disk.)
Also see the official Apple how to: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3926
Version française: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3926?viewlocale=fr_FR
3. Commit the change by hitting "Apply"
3.b. If you get the error "MediaKit reports partition (Map) too small", this is a rare error where the partition that follows (for example Bootcamp) is slightly overlapping your main Mac partition. You will need to reduce that other following partition. Once you have reduced the other partition, you will probably need to return to step 2 and 3 and try again.
[ For example, in my case, I had resized my Bootcamp with CampTune software and it would seem that the file system ended-up somehow larger than the actual partition container. I simply asked CampTune to reduce the partition a bit (barely 2 GB) and that fixed it.]
4. Reboot, again into the 10.6 install DVD.
5. You can then install 10.6.
6. Once 10.6 is installed, use the Disk Utility on the desktop (you can boot into the primary HD at this point) to resize the primary partition back to its original or maximum size.
SOURCE (main fix): http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=774410 [and] http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3926
SOURCE (explaination for MediaKit error): some Apple discussion post.
nb: in my case, it was on a MacBook Pro (late 2008).

GasMan4932 wrote:
When I click on the icon for this drive, the warning message below states "Mac OS X cannot be installed on 'iMac HD', because this disk cannot be used to start up your computer." Obviously that's not true, since that's where the OS is installed.
How did you partition this drive, if you did that? Does it contain start up or utility partitions for any other OS (for instance Linux)? There have been reports that the "cannot be used to start up your computer" message will appear if a third party utility was used to create a 'triple boot' system or such, apparently because SL is picky about the format GUID partition scheme table info & how partitions are allocated space on the drive by other formatting/partition methods.
For some users with these partitions, the fix has been as simple as "tickling" (slightly changing) the partition size of some partition with Disk Utility, which apparently updates the GUID partition scheme table info so that the SL installer accepts it as safe to use with SL.( In this sense, the message may be trying to say the installer thinks the disk can't be used to reliably start up your computer with SL, not in general.)
See the discussions topic Cannot install Snow Leopard over 10.5.8 for more about this.

Can't install OSX Mountain Lion, on the disk selection screen i cant select the Macintosh HD to install OSX giving a message (This disk cannot be used to start up your computer).only have one disk to select and my partition map scheme is GUID partition

just bough OSX Mountain Lion, my laptop operating with v10.6.8. Can't install OSX Mountain Lion, on the disk selection screen i cant select the Macintosh HD to install OSX giving a message (This disk cannot be used to start up your computer).only have one disk to select and my partition map scheme is GUID partition table. 24.44gb disk available.

Verify your computer can run Mountain Lion:
Upgrading to Mountain Lion
To upgrade to Mountain Lion you must have Snow Leopard 10.6.8 or Lion installed. Purchase and download Mountain Lion from the App Store. Sign in using your Apple ID. Mountain Lion is $19.99 plus tax. The file is quite large, over 4 GBs, so allow some time to download. It would be preferable to use Ethernet because it is nearly four times faster than wireless.
     OS X Mountain Lion - System Requirements
       Macs that can be upgraded to OS X Mountain Lion
         1. iMac (Mid 2007 or newer) - Model Identifier 7,1 or later
         2. MacBook (Late 2008 Aluminum, or Early 2009 or newer) - Model Identifier 5,1 or later
         3. MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer) - Model Identifier 3,1 or later
         4. MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer) - Model Identifier 2,1 or later
         5. Mac mini (Early 2009 or newer) - Model Identifier 3,1 or later
         6. Mac Pro (Early 2008 or newer) - Model Identifier 3,1 or later
         7. Xserve (Early 2009) - Model Identifier 3,1 or later
To find the model identifier open System Profiler in the Utilities folder. It's displayed in the panel on the right.
Open Disk Utility and verify the drive is partitioned using GUID and formatted Mac OS Extended, Journaled. If it is then do this:
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
Now try installing Mountain Lion.

Can't install OSX Mountain Lion, on the disk selection screen i cant select the Macintosh HD to install OSX giving a message (This disk cannot be used to start up your computer).

Can't install OSX Mountain Lion, on the disk selection screen i cant select the Macintosh HD to install OSX giving a message (This disk cannot be used to start up your computer).

Read
https://discussions.apple.com/message/15659267#15659267

Can't install MAC OS X Lion - Macintosh HD "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer."

I downloaded OS X Lion this morning and when I went to install it I got a "Screen - Select the disk where you want to install OS X." -- Had two disk my Macintosh HD and my Time Machine (both are 1TB). The top and most important is the Macintosh HD (999.86GB - 739.75GB available states "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer". What do I need to do to install OS X Lion?

Create a Backup Lion Bootable 10.7 Disk
Purchaseand download Lion from the Mac App Store on any Lion compatible Macrunning Snow Leopard.
Right click on “Mac OS X Lion”     installer and choose the option to “Show Package Contents.”
Inside the Contents folder that     appears you will find a SharedSupport folder and inside the     SharedSupport folder you will find the “InstallESD.dmg.” This is     the Lion boot disc image we have all been waiting for.
Copy “InstallESD.dmg” to     another folder like the Desktop.
Launch Disk Utility and click the     burn button.
Select the copied “InstallESD.dmg” as the image to burn,     insert a standard sized 4.7 GB DVD, and wait for your new Lion Boot     Disc to come out toasty hot.
With this disc you can boot any Lion compatible Mac, and install10.7 just like you installed previous version of Mac OS X. You caneven use Disk Utility's Restore function to image your Lion boot discimage onto a external drive suitable for performing a clean installon a optical-drive-less MacBook Air, or Mac mini server.
If your using Mac's in a mission critical type environment or have third party hardware or software you must rely upon working correctly. It's advised to wait until all the bugs, driver updates, third party software updates and other issues are resolved before upgrading. This might take several months. Then if you do so, do one machine at a time and carefully test everything before full deployment.
It's also highly advised to backup all one's data either manually to a external powered drive in addition to TimeMachine and Hold option bootable Carbon Copy Clones etc.

Just bought and downloaded Mountain Lion. Attempted installation: "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer." It's the only disk I have. Help!

Just bought and downloaded Mountain Lion. Attempted installation: "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer." It's the only disk I have. Help!

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac7,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.4 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: IM71.007A.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.21f4
Serial Number (system): QP*****X89
ystem Version: Mac OS X 10.6.8 (10K549)
Kernel Version: Darwin 10.8.0
Boot Volume: Macintosh HD
Boot Mode: Normal
Computer Name: Stuart Gahona
User Name: Stuart Gahona (Stuart)
Secure Virtual Memory: Not Enabled
64-bit Kernel and Extensions: No
Time since boot: 48 minutes
<Edited by Host>

Mountain Lion wont install on macbook. "This disk cannot be used to start up your computer"

Basically, when I try to install the mountain lion update onto my Snow Leapard OS, I get the above message. Something must be wrong with my hd configuration.
I think the problem was caused when I tried to install linux on a partition before this and failed miserably time after time; I think the problem was that reFIT wasn't recognizing the proper partitions to boot into. Anyway, I also noticed that even after deleting the defunct linux partitions using Disk Utility, the linux drives still showed up in the reFit startup menu. Did I screw up my HD? Is that what is preventing me from installing Mountain Lion? If so, how can I fix it?
Thanks.

Go to System Preferences > Startup Disk and press Macintosh HD. Open > http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3926

Getting an error message while launching bootcamp ""Boot Camp Assistant cannot be used: You must update your computer's boot ROM firmware before using this setup assistant".

Need Help how to address problem with undoing partition from BootCamp Assistant- receiving error message
"Boot Camp Assistant cannot be used: You must update your computer's boot ROM firmware before using this setup assistant".
attempted solutions:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964?viewlocale=en_en
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379?viewlocale=en_en
Mac HD is already MAc os Extended(journaled)
***problem still persists with above solutions.

No I have only one physical HDD. Here is a diskutil list result
/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.3 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            499.4 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3
Also here is a system info
Hardware Overview:
Model Name:          MacBook Pro
Model Identifier:          MacBookPro8,2
Processor Name:          Intel Core i7
Processor Speed:          2.5 GHz
Number of Processors:          1
Total Number of Cores:          4
L2 Cache (per Core):          256 KB
L3 Cache:          8 MB
Memory:          8 GB
Boot ROM Version:          MBP81.0047.B27
SMC Version (system):          1.69f3
15-inch, Late 2011
current situation
- I've recovered from external drive (mountain lion 10.8.1 ) which i prepared by Lion Diskmaker before.
Current issues:
1) I have Recovery HD but when I boot from it - Reinstall Mac OS X option is not working
2) I have EFI password and won't be able to clear it as well as reset PRAM
3) Boot Camp Assistant is not working as well with the error in the subject
Any ideas how to fix all of these?

OS X Mavericks won't install because of time machine

Has anyone had a problems with OS X Mavericks not installing itself because of time machine backing up data on the internal hard drive? what have you done/been recommended to do to overcome this? I have a macbook pro mid-2012 version with OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.5 running.

You will need to delete the backups.backupdb folder from the internal hard drive. If you are concerned there is data in there then move it to an external hard drive before deleting it.

Mountain Lion won't install because it says my Mac HD cannot be used to start up my computer?

I've tried redownloading Mountain Lion but that didn't work. I've also gone into start up disc in my settings and restarted my computer with my Mac HD. It isn't partitioned. Any help here?

Just Follow this procedure...
1. Go To BOOT CAMP and create a BLANK PARTITION. Say a minimum of 10 GB. You do not have to install anything on this.
2. After you create this, go back to ML installer and now you will see 2 HD's. one will be your main HD and the second one will be the one you just created.
3. Install the ML OS X on the main hard drive. Once installed, reboot the machine go to DISK UTILITY and delete the blank partition you had created.
4. So, now you have your HD at its full capacity.
Try this it should work.

I have downloaded v10.7.2, but it won't install because it cannot be verified. It will not download again.

I have downloaded v10.7.2, but it won't install because it cannot be verified. It will not download again.

Something like this:

Mavericks won't install on newest mac mini fusion drive

I have a mac mini, latest version. I have a fusion drive.
Mavericks won't install on that drive. I get this message:
This disk doesn't use the GUID Partition Table scheme. Use Disk Utility to change the partition scheme. Select the Disk, choose the
partition tab, select the volume Scheme and then click Options.
Well, I did that, up to "choose the partition tab." Then it says "you may only split this partition into two. To do this, click +."
I did that, and there were two partitions. the only option left is to select apply, which I didn't.
The "options" were still greyed out.
So now what?
Thanks for any input.

Lion creates a recovery area with a minimal version of OS X and it may be unable to do so due to use over the years, and possibly other resizing operations (Boot Camp). It could just need more space, if you only have less than 8gb free. Lion shuffles and merges the two systems when it upgrades. You can burn the image downloaded from App Store by finding the dmg file inside the "Install Mac OS X Lion.app" bundle, dragging it into disk utility, then burning from there.
Otherwise, you can appropriate a MBR/BIOS formatted 4GB thumbdrive, 8GB of either EFI or MBR/BIOS thumbdrive, flash storage device, or external hard drive, and format it, using the restore operation through disk utility to copy the contents of the installer disk to the media. Exposed via the alt key before the Apple logo, should show the bootable media, where you can format over the former installation.
As always, backup your files when upgrading. I recommend if your installion is over a year old to wipe and upgrade if you can't make otherwise the media bootable, using your 10.6 recovery dvd.
If you cannot find an external medium to backup your files before the upgrade, if you need to format via disk utility (Through 10.6 media), you can consider Dropbox as an option (2GB free account).
It's not uncommon for the partition to simply refuse operations, including upgrades and resizing.

Mavericks won't install - not enough memory

I have successfully downloaded Mavericks and restarted. But it seems I filled my hard drive and it won't install, because it does not have enough memory. It seems Mavericks install created a new virtual startup disc, so every time I restart, Mavericks tries to install but finds out it does not have enough memory to do so. Is there a way around the new Mavericks startup disc to the old startup disc, which is on the same hard drive, so that I am able to clean up hard drive before installing Mavericks? I only have access to Terminal, Disk Utility and System information through Mavericks Installer menu. When I quit the Mavericks Installer, it tries to select a new startup disc, but does not find any. I have iMac with Intel i3 and latest OS X Mountain Lion before Mavericks install. Thanks for any help.

Thanks for reply. Yes, sorry, I don't have enough free disc space. The question is, how to get out of the Mavericks OS X Install process and start the computer using old system, old start up disc, which is on the same hard drive. Otherwise, I don't have a chance to clean up space on the hard drive and I am in the loop, Restart - Install OS X Mavericks - Finding out there is not enough space - Restart - etc.

Mavericks won't install because Macintosh HD "cannot be used to start up your computer"

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