HT203195: "You cannot install Mac OS X on this volume..." alert in Installer
Learn about "You cannot install Mac OS X on this volume..." alert in Installer
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Helpful answers
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Aug 22, 2015 4:37 PM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,4- I can't seem to get the GUID partition scheme to work, so I may install OS X on it.
That is the only way you can install OS X on the drive. It must use the GUID Partition Table for it to be bootable on a Mac.
I don't believe there is a way to change the partition table without erasing the entire disk.
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Aug 22, 2015 4:51 PM in response to Barney-15Eby isa.k,Barney-15E wrote:
4- I can't seem to get the GUID partition scheme to work, so I may install OS X on it.
That is the only way you can install OS X on the drive. It must use the GUID Partition Table for it to be bootable on a Mac.
I don't believe there is a way to change the partition table without erasing the entire disk.
This is what it looks like, after doing my research on how to install Mac OS X onto said HDD...
The only reason I am asking here, is because I had a chat with Apple Support yesterday, and they said for me to achieve what I want, I would need to partition the external HDD in Windows, and bring it back to my MBP to do the format and install OS X on it that way... I was given a ticket number, in case I needed to call back with the same issue, only to receive this message in the pop up chat window, "We don't have enough information to complete this request. If you would like to start a new support session, please close this window and return to the Apple Support page."
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Aug 22, 2015 5:27 PM in response to isa.kby FatMac>MacPro,While it's not entirely clear what you're trying to do (at least to me), first, have you tried booting with the option key down at the chime, which takes you into the Startup Manager on your internal drive and lets you choose among bootable partitions?
If you have an NTFS external, you can't install OS X as you've found. But, since
isa.k wrote:
...3- I have partitioned an external Windows NTFS formatted 2 TB HDD, and have successfully erased the contents, with the Mac OS X (Journaled) option...it doesn't appear there'd be anything lost if you erased it again and this time created one new partition with the GUID partition table selected under Options. Then you could install OS X.
Since you're also trying to save your Win 7 partition and the data on it, you might consider using the Boot Camp partition as the basis for creating a Virtual Machine using VMware Fusion, Parallels, or Virtual Box. Once done, you could run it in your Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition without worrying further about Boot Camp and other HD formats.
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Aug 22, 2015 10:56 PM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,They either didn't understand what you wanted to do, or they don't understand the Mac OS.
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Aug 22, 2015 11:54 PM in response to isa.kby isa.k,The story in point form:
- Late 2014
* Purchase MBP, set up Mac, and after a week or so, install Win 7 using BootCamp. Partition1: OS X = 350 GB. Partition 2: BootCamp = 150 GB
- 21st of August:
* Mac has always booted up just fine, today it decides to hang at boot screen
* Cold boot. Enter "Recovery" mode and tried fixing Macintosh HD partition (BootCamp is available to log in to) to no avail. Several attempts made at this process
* Boot into "Recovery" mode once more, attempting to boot into BootCamp. BootCamp is now no longer an available option to select.
- 22nd of August:
* Create a boot drive using my 32 GB thumb drive. Boot into thumb drive's Mac OS X successfully.
* Attempting to transfer files from internal HDD to USB.
* Able to transfer files over in either small quantities, or small sizes from both internal Mac partition, or from the NTFS Win 7 partition. Files not copying over completely, due to either file size or amount... gives error. Perhaps a larger HDD that has the portable OS X on it may be the solution?
* Chat with online Apple Support Genius, telling them I have a 2 TB... but with needed data on it, which is preferably better off left alone. Will a partition do the job?
* Advised to partition the external NTFS HDD, but to first consult with Microsoft (as it was initially formatted via a Microsoft OS) to see if it was safe to do so
* Microsoft advised that there should be no problems
* Partitioned (shrunk) external HDD successfully
* Used Mac's Disk Utility to format partition successfully
* Tried creating GUID Partition Table to no avail. Seems like I can only do it to the HDD as a whole, and not apply it to the individual partition
- 23rd of August:
* Posted here my conundrum
* Tried getting in contact with Apple Support again, and the only thing they could offer this time was for me to erase the contents of the MBP clean, and reinstall OS X.
Seriously?
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Aug 23, 2015 5:57 AM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,* Tried creating GUID Partition Table to no avail. Seems like I can only do it to the HDD as a whole, and not apply it to the individual partition
The partition table is the format of the whole drive. It is not something that can change partition by partition. It defines the partition structure.
You can't install the OS on that drive, but you can copy files onto it after booting from the USB stick.
If both partitions don't boot anymore, my guess is the drive is failing.
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Aug 23, 2015 9:30 AM in response to isa.kby FatMac>MacPro,Once you've copied all the files you need to protect to a safe location, you might try bringing the OS X partition back to life by downloading the 10.10.5 combo updater to the USB drive and running it but selecting the internal drive as the target.
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Aug 23, 2015 6:36 PM in response to isa.kby isa.k,Thank you both for your information and advice.
I'm looking into a way to create a boot disk with Ubuntu. Hopefully I can create such a drive that will allow me to transfer files across easier.
I'm just gutted that Apples aren't the end all be all when it came to computers, that I had always thought it was.
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Aug 23, 2015 6:43 PM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,You seem to have done everything you need to do to transfer the files over to you external hard drive.
What is it that you don't like about booting up using the USB stick and then copying the files off the internal hard drive onto the external hard drive?
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Aug 23, 2015 7:46 PM in response to Barney-15Eby isa.k,Barney-15E wrote:
You seem to have done everything you need to do to transfer the files over to you external hard drive.
What is it that you don't like about booting up using the USB stick and then copying the files off the internal hard drive onto the external hard drive?
- 22nd of August:
. . .
* Able to transfer files over in either small quantities, or small sizes from both internal Mac partition, or from the NTFS Win 7 partition. Files not copying over completely, due to either file size or amount... gives error. Perhaps a larger HDD that has the portable OS X on it may be the solution?
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Aug 23, 2015 7:56 PM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,How big is the partition on the external drive? I thought you had split a 2TB drive into an NTFS partition and a Mac OS Extended partition?
When you boot to the USB stick, how much free space is on the drive. You need around 10 GB to be safe.
Perhaps it has nothing to do with the size but that the internal hard drive is near death and the file structure is completely corrupted.
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Aug 24, 2015 12:03 AM in response to Barney-15Eby isa.k,Barney-15E wrote:
How big is the partition on the external drive? I thought you had split a 2TB drive into an NTFS partition and a Mac OS Extended partition?
When you boot to the USB stick, how much free space is on the drive. You need around 10 GB to be safe.
Perhaps it has nothing to do with the size but that the internal hard drive is near death and the file structure is completely corrupted.
The funny thing is that when i try copying the files en masse from internal (from either the Mac or NTFS) partitions, after a few files copy over, i get an error message stating an error has occurred and file transferring stops. The thing is when i look at the target disk, the file that supposedly couldn't be copied is there and seemingly health, for all intents and purposes.
In response to your question though... The external drive was initially formatted as NTFS years ago. It is 2,000 GB in size. I use it to back up other data. I have since shrunk the size to 1.4 TB via Windows 10 and then proceeded to format the remaining, newly partitioned 600 GB via the Mac OS X boot drive's Disk Utility.
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Aug 24, 2015 4:09 AM in response to isa.kby Barney-15E,What does the error message say?
Do you have at least 10GB free on the boot disk?
Another option is to use the ditto command in the Terminal: https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/ man1/ditto.1.html
It will keep copying through almost any errors. Any files with problems will not copy, but it will skip on to the next file.
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Aug 24, 2015 1:54 PM in response to Barney-15Eby isa.k,Barney-15E wrote:
What does the error message say?
Do you have at least 10GB free on the boot disk?
Another option is to use the ditto command in the Terminal: https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/ man1/ditto.1.html
It will keep copying through almost any errors. Any files with problems will not copy, but it will skip on to the next file.
I forget what the error message says exactly. However last night I tried copying over a few files to the external HDD and realised that in only one instance where it had given an error, it had yet still copied over a functioning copy of the file. All other instances, the file didn't copy over at all unfortunately. to be honest, I never really bothered reading the error message in either instances.
The boot usb has approximately 20+ GB free.
The ditto command? Hmm... is this reminiscent of DOS'
copy a: *.* b:
Or something like that??? I apologise if that command line is incorrect (thus causing confusion), as it has been approximately 15-20 years since i would have last used that command... I also apologise for bringing in an MS DOS example, into a Mac forum.
Gosh, I think I'm getting my hopes up again!