David Mahony

Q: Unable to boot El Capitan from USB Boot drive

Hi Everyone,

 

I've created 2 different versions of an El Capitan boot drive using Terminal and on Apples advice Diskmaker X (1 on an 8gb usb stick and another on an internal HD) however neither of which will work for me!

I've tried choosing system preferences but neither boot disk will show up to choose and neither show if I restart holding down the ALT key.

To give you some background I've replaced my video card for an unsuported Nvidia GTX 670 which has no EFI and hence no grey start up screen so could this be the cause of my problem?

I should also mention that I cannot get into recovery mode using cmd-R.

 

Many thanks in advance...

OS X El Capitan (10.11.3), Nvidia Geforce GTX 670 • BenQ FP241W

Posted on Sep 22, 2016 7:23 AM

Close

Q: Unable to boot El Capitan from USB Boot drive

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

  • by David Mahony,

    David Mahony David Mahony Sep 22, 2016 1:50 PM in response to David Mahony
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Apple TV
    Sep 22, 2016 1:50 PM in response to David Mahony

    Anyone?

  • by Eric Root,

    Eric Root Eric Root Sep 22, 2016 8:43 PM in response to David Mahony
    Level 9 (72,595 points)
    iTunes
    Sep 22, 2016 8:43 PM in response to David Mahony

    Can you boot normally with the OS you have installed?

     

    Do a backup, preferable 2 separate ones on 2 drives. Boot to the Recovery Volume (command - R on a restart or hold down the option/alt key during a restart and select Recovery Volume). Run Disk Utility Verify/Repair Disk and Repair Permissions until you get no errors. If you are running 10.11, use First Aid. Then re-install the OS.

     

    OS X Recovery

     

    OS X Recovery (2)

  • by David Mahony,

    David Mahony David Mahony Sep 23, 2016 10:05 AM in response to Eric Root
    Level 1 (9 points)
    Apple TV
    Sep 23, 2016 10:05 AM in response to Eric Root

    Hi Eric,

    Can you boot normally with the OS you have installed?

    Yes no problems so far!

    Boot to the Recovery Volume (command - R on a restart or hold down the option/alt key during a restart and select Recovery Volume)

    This does not work for me at all neither does cmd-alt +R.

    I cant even see the boot drive in system prefs/startup disk!

    When I click on the usb drive and run the installer it seems to work ok (obviously I quit it before commencement)