Macbook Pro 10.6/7 install woes

[Banyon]

I'm hoping someone out there can help me.

My shop was given a 15" macbook pro (2.0 core 2 duo, 1.5 GB ram, 80GB hdd, ect), and as much as I dislike apple business practices and their OS, I want to give Mac a chance. I wanted to upgrade to 10.6/7 to learn on a newer version.

We purchased 10.6 retail and attempted to install over 10.4 and it failed. I attempted to boot from the disk. failed. Made a bootable USB from a download dmg. failed.

I made a copy of the hard drive with Acronis, deleted all the partitions on it and completely cleaned off the hard drive (which was recommened by a article I was reading) then attempted usb and disk again... still nothing.

When I hold option and tell it to boot from USB or CD, it gives me a circle with a slash through it (some sort of stop or error sign). Everything I try results in the same. I'm not sure what to do that this point...

 

[iisjman07]

We purchased 10.6 retail and attempted to install over 10.4 and it failed. I attempted to boot from the disk. failed. Made a bootable USB from a download dmg. failed.

Can you give any more details other than 'it failed'? Any error messages, etc? When you tried booting from the disk, what did you do and what did the machine do exactly?

 

[datadatau]

+1 for more info.

I would try a clean install using the disk utility to format the drive.

 

[kevinjhaag]

Your unable to read DVD...

Easy... Just did one of these recently. Since you have a retail version of OS X, we can safely say their is nothing wrong with the DVD. So your Optical Drive is faulty. Plug in a external DVD drive and boot from it (Hold C key as you turn on the apple computer till you see a rotating circle). Also make absolute the hard drive has no windows partitions. Actually just make sure it doesn't have any partitions. This should be it.

If you are getting the dvd to boot up to start of install... Then I agree with DataDataU. You need to use disk utility to partition and format the drive to use for OS X.

And if you have errors... Then I agree with both guys above... Need more details on the errors.

Let me know how it goes for you.

Kevin

 

[gunslinger]

Can you give any more details other than 'it failed'? Any error messages, etc? When you tried booting from the disk, what did you do and what did the machine do exactly?

What he said............

 

[JustMe]

What version was the original Mac OSX software? I think the first version supporting the Intel chips was 10.4.5.

It kind of sounds like it is a Power PC chip in there, not the Intel. Of course, I could be wrong - if so... sorry

A list of OSX version : MacOSX Build Numbers

Apple's page on Mac OSX versions. Look for the MacBook Pro list: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1159

This page will tell you the year the MacBook Pro was released based on the computer's serial number: https://selfsolve.apple.com/agreementWarrantyDynamic.do

This page gives some additional info: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4132

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

We purchased 10.6 retail and attempted to install over 10.4 and it failed. I attempted to boot from the disk. failed.

This has me confused. Are you saying it DID boot from disk originally when it had 10.4 on it, then it wouldn't boot from disk on the next attempt? Did you get an error when it failed installing over 10.4?

I made a copy of the hard drive with Acronis, deleted all the partitions on it and completely cleaned off the hard drive (which was recommened by a article I was reading)

How did you wipe the drive? Did you make sure the partition scheme was GUID and format it to Mac OS extended (journaled)?

When I hold option and tell it to boot from USB or CD, it gives me a circle with a slash through it (some sort of stop or error sign). Everything I try results in the same. I'm not sure what to do that this point...

Looks like possibly bad install media. Your best bet if that really is a legit retail 10.6 installer is to make a bootable image of the installer on usb or an external HD as opposoed to trusting some .dmg you downloaded off the net.

 

[Banyon]

Sorry guys, I typed that after a very frustrating several hours. Let me see if I can be a little more clear.

Laptop is a MacBook Pro (15-inch Glossy)
Looks like its a late 2006 model, which would have come with 10.4.8

Specs on on the laptop say 2.0Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo, 512MB (upgraded to 1.5), 128Vram

What I ment by "failed" was every time I tried to boot from CD, USB, ext HD, it always gave me that circle with a / through it.

It had 10.4.8, I tried to install 10.6 from CD over the top of it. Tried to boot to the CD to do a clean install.. Stopped right after the option screen with a "stop" sign (the circle with /). Then I proceeded to try USB Flash drive, USB ext, ect.

Originally the CDs and USB drives were made on the mac, but when I deleted the HDD, I wasn't able to restore it. Now I am making the USB and CDs with transmac.

For the sake of my sanity and anyone trying to help, lets just assume I only have this one broken mac (so no remote installs), a blank standard 2.5 hard drive, a retail copy of 10.6, and no knowledge about the partitioning scheme that Mac uses. What do I set it up as on GParted? MBR, GPT? Does mac only use 1 large partition, or multiple (like linux).

Also, I've been having issues finding anything else I can boot into on Mac, after there any good boot media for Mac that might help me? For example I have Hiren's and some home made boot devices for intel machines.

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

Originally the CDs and USB drives were made on the mac, but when I deleted the HDD, I wasn't able to restore it. Now I am making the USB and CDs with transmac.

So, you originally said you purchased a retail copy of 10.6. Use that disk. I or anybody else for that matter isn't going to try to analyze why some downloaded .dmg won't boot that machine.

 

[Banyon]

the 10.6 disk gives me the same error. The dmg I made the usb from was a ripped version another shop in the area sent me after the CD failed to get past the option screen. it does the same thing. The other CDs I was talking about was a burn of a dmg I was given to test and see if the retail CD was bad.

This is what leads me to believe it may be something deeper, like EFI is broken or I'm doing something wrong.

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

Try ubcd4win and see if it boots that? Other than that I imagine you don't have another intel based Mac around to check that installer DVD?

 

[Banyon]

Try ubcd4win and see if it boots that? Other than that I imagine you don't have another intel based Mac around to check that installer DVD?

No, I don't have another Mac around period. Unless the retail DVD AND the DMG are both bad... I doubt it has anything to do with the install media. Also not having any other macs around mean no remote installs or anything similar.

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

No, I don't have another Mac around period. Unless the retail DVD AND the DMG are both bad... I doubt it has anything to do with the install media. Also not having any other macs around mean no remote installs or anything similar.

Try different RAM. Other than that its time to take it apart and swap parts. Obviously you have no other Macs and I highly doubt you have parts, so I don't know what to tell you? If you don't have even novice type tools to trouble shoot Macs then all we can do is speculate. Did this thing even boot when it came to you in the first place with 10.4 on it?

 

[Banyon]

Yes, it was booting fine with 10.4.8

We just decided that if we were going to sit down and take the time to play with a mac and try to learn the ins and outs, we wanted to do it on a newer version.

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

Yes, it was booting fine with 10.4.8

We just decided that if we were going to sit down and take the time to play with a mac and try to learn the ins and outs, we wanted to do it on a newer version.

Well, either the install media or possibly the optical drive (or both) are screwed up. I highly doubt there is anything wrong with the EFI, especially since there was really nothing wrong with the machine to start with. Actually, if I seen the machine and media I have a gut feeling its something painfully simple.

The best and most accurate description of the prohibitary sign mean that the computer has found a bootable copy of OSX but it is either damaged or missing one or a few critical components. I threw in that it could be a flaky optical drive, but I doubt it since it doing the same thing whichever way you are trying to boot and that symbol is rarely anything to do with the optical malfunctioning.

 

[kevinjhaag]

Seriously.... Its Faulty Optical Drive

Seriously... the Optical Drive is faulty. Plug in a usb external DVD drive and boot from it (Hold C key as you turn on the apple computer till you see a rotating circle). Also make absolute the hard drive has no windows partitions. Just remove all partitions and put it back into the mac. When you get the Install DVD to work, then use the disk utility to partition and format the drive for use for OS X before starting the install. That should be it. I just worked on a couple just recently and they were having the same results as you are having. The No symbol means it cannot find anything to boot. OS X is most likely to be broken enough to not boot and your optical drive is faulty and cannot read the DVD's. You can try holding X key while turning it on. Its a sort of safe mode for OS X.

Let me know how it goes for you.

Kevin

 

[anonymous Mac Tech]

Seriously... the Optical Drive is faulty. Plug in a usb external DVD drive and boot from it (Hold C key as you turn on the apple computer till you see a rotating circle). Also make absolute the hard drive has no windows partitions. Just remove all partitions and put it back into the mac. When you get the Install DVD to work, then use the disk utility to partition and format the drive for use for OS X before starting the install. That should be it. I just worked on a couple just recently and they were having the same results as you are having. The No symbol means it cannot find anything to boot. OS X is most likely to be broken enough to not boot and your optical drive is faulty and cannot read the DVD's. You can try holding X key while turning it on. Its a sort of safe mode for OS X.

Holding the x key at boot does absolutely nothing. A safe boot for OSX is done by holding the shift key.

It would be so easy to restore the image of the actual (purchased) retail DVD to an external HD or usb stick with only another Macintosh computer with a known good working optical drive. But the OP has no other Mac to do this with. I'm still suspecting the media being used. Why would it go to the prohibitory symbol every time with whatever media that was used. Furthermore, it could be a bad optical because those machines were famous for the flaky Matsui optical drives, but the chances are it wouldn't even give the option to boot the DVD in boot manager, much less get the prohibitory symbol. I'm not ruling out the media unless I actually see it with my own eyes.

But what do I know..?

 

[Banyon]

Furthermore, it could be a bad optical because those machines were famous for the flaky Matsui optical drives, but the chances are it wouldn't even give the option to boot the DVD in boot manager, much less get the prohibitory symbol. I'm not ruling out the media unless I actually see it with my own eyes.

This is kinda why I ruled out the bad optical, except for the fact it took forever to burn a DVD, it worked fine previously. Also when I put in boot media and hold option, it sees the disc and gives me the option to boot from it.

 

[kevinjhaag]

Faulty Optical Drive

Holding the x key at boot does absolutely nothing. A safe boot for OSX is done by holding the shift key.

Thats right... I don't know what I was thinking. Its the shift key. The X key was for something else tho too.

I'm only assuming he's not making other media correctly because he is doing it from a windows computer. Its very possible since its not created from a Mac to begin with. I'm also assuming the retail dvd of OS X is good and should boot without a problem. So thats why I think the optical drive is flakey. But also based on my experience of the same issue just recently. I just fixed a couple macs last week doing exactly the same thing. The option to boot to DVD was there but when I choose it, soon afterwards I would get the prohibitory symbol; hence the reason I assumed the drive was flakey besides the age of mac. So I hooked a regular external usb dvd drive to mac and put install dvd in it and it booted up without a problem and I installed OS X Snow Leopard.
That's why I wouldn't rule out optical drive till you try a external optical drive. Just give a try and see what happens. But I also agree with you Mac Tech, I wouldn't rule out media either. Could be a faulty DVD or incorrectly made boot media. Who knows... We are not there and we would probably have it figured out with minutes for you. Well good luck and take care.

Kevin

 

[Banyon]

Well, I'm gonna try an USB optical on the mac and attempt to use the media to setup an OSX86 machine so I don't have to share the mac when playing with it.

This will test both the drive and the media. If the media is damaged, I hope they have some sort of return policy.