Can't Format HD as Mac OS X Extended

Question

Can't Format HD as Mac OS X Extended

I have a 60GB Toshiba drive that was an OEM Apple drive in my son's Macbook. I just upgraded his internal drive to a WD 320GB so I put the old drive in an external case to use as a portable drive. The drive worked fine in the Macbook. I want to wipe the drive and set a new, fresh partition but the drive won't format as Mac OS X Extended. The case I have is listed as a Mac compatible case altho I doubt that really matters.

Disk Utility will format the drive as a Master Boot Record and FAT32 or as a Apple Partition Map and Free Space drive but not a Mac OS X Extended. I even tried using Drive Genius but I get error messages saying the formatter failed.

Any idea what is going on?

Thanks.

David

G5 iMac Rev. B., Mac OS X (10.5.5)

Posted on Dec 30, 2008 6:18 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Dec 31, 2008 1:26 PM in response to David Schwartzer

Go ahead and partition as free space in Disk Utility, as this will give you a completely clean slate. Then erase (not partition) your disk again and set it up at Mac OS Extended.

Reply

Answer 2

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

Dec 30, 2008 10:48 PM in response to David Schwartzer

On DU's Erase tab, you need to select a single volume, not the disk, to activate the formatting options.

Reply

Answer 3

Alexandre

Level 3

854 points

Dec 30, 2008 10:57 PM in response to David Schwartzer

Is the drive S.M.A.R.T. (it's that early failure warning capability that alerts you at an early stage if the drive might fail).?

Reply

Answer 4

Dec 30, 2008 11:55 PM in response to David Schwartzer

Try partitioning the drive instead.

Reply

Answer 5

Dec 31, 2008 4:57 AM in response to David Schwartzer

Thanks to all of you for your suggestions but I had tried all of them without success.

1. I have selected the volume rather than the drive with the same results. Again, it will format as FAT32 or Free Space but not as Mac OS X Extended.

2. The drive was supported as S.M.A.R.T. when it was the internal disk in the Macbook. It is currently listed as Not-Supported but I believe that is the case with any external drive.

3. I have tried to partition the drive. That is exactly the problem. It will partition as FAT 32 or Free Space but not as Mac OS X Extended. I have tried both Apple Partition Map and GUID and both fail under both Disk Utility and under Drive Genius.

David

Reply

Answer 6

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

Dec 31, 2008 11:07 AM in response to David Schwartzer

I'm totally confused about what you've tried and what you're seeing. In Disk Utility, FAT-32 and Free Space aren't formatting options. These are the only volume formatting options:

Mac OS Extended
Mac OS Extended (journaled)
Mac OS Extended (case-sensitive)
Mac OS Extended (case-sensitive, journaled)
MS-DOS (FAT)

If you want help with this, provide step-by-step operations of what you're doing and seeing.

As for item #2, that's correct, the OS doesn't support SMART status reporting on external HDs.

For #3, what exactly is failing? Be specific.

Reply

Answer 7

Dec 31, 2008 1:44 PM in response to baltwo

Baltwo:

Sorry if I am not being clear. You are correct. The Format type is MS-DOS (FAT), not FAT32 although I believe that is the FAT style it results in. I'm surprised that you don't see a choice for Free Space. I have that listed for all three partition schemes, GUID, Apple Partition Map and Master Boot Record. I have all of the format options you listed below in addition to Free Space.

As far as step-by-step operations, I have connected my external USB drive and attempted to partition and format it in Disk Utility. I have selected 1 Partition and tried a partition scheme of GUID and Apple Partition Map. Both give the same results. I try to format the drive as Mac OS Extended (Journaled).

When I click Apply, DU just runs forever and never formats the drive. I know from past experience that a partition take about a minute so there is obviously something wrong. The only way I can stop DU is to unplug the drive at which point I get a box saying Format Failed. Permission denied.

If I use DU to format the disk as Master Boot Record and select MS-DOS as the format type, DU formats it fine. I've tried just about every other combination and DU either hangs or returns the error message, Format Failed: permission Denied.

Hope this helps.

Thanks,

David

Reply

Answer 8

Dec 31, 2008 1:50 PM in response to Playa Wolf

Playa Wolf:

I tried you suggestion. The Partition to Free Space worked fine. The erase started to work but DU ran for about 2 minutes and then returned the error message:

Disk Erase failed

Disk Erase failed with the error:

File System Formatter Failed.

Reply

Answer 9

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

Dec 31, 2008 4:43 PM in response to David Schwartzer

Thanks for clarifying. No I don't see Free Space as a format option, but I'm not actually working with a disk that I can afford to erase/reformat/repartition, just what I see in DU. Since DU is hanging or you're getting the +Format Failed: permission Denied+ error message, the essential missing information from all previous posts and the main problem, maybe you should investigate using the Terminal command diskutil and see what transpires. If you're getting that error message, maybe the permissions on the external don't allow you to reformat the ext. Check them.

Reply

Answer 10

nerowolfe

Level 6

13,090 points

Dec 31, 2008 4:54 PM in response to David Schwartzer

It is a possibility that the firmware of the external box does not support that which you are attempting.

Reply

Answer 11

Alexandre

Level 3

854 points

Dec 31, 2008 11:42 PM in response to David Schwartzer

nerowolfe made a useful suggestion (that the there may be a hardware compatiblity issue here).

Coming back to disk utility, there should be little reason (unless above applies) why you cannot get rid of the partition:
1)You open DU
2)You select the actual disk (NOT the drive with the indent, listed underneath = select TOP level), ususally it might say e.g. "372.6GB WD4000KD-00NAB0")
3)The drop down menu called "Volume scheme" with partitions should now be coloured in (previously greyed out)
4) UNDERNEATH, you find a plus and a minus.
Click the minus.
This will erase all partitions.
5) ONLY then, partition as "1 partition" and choose the Mac OS X Extended.
I am using a 7 year old harddrive disc (HDD) in my Mac that used to be in my old Windows PC.

Let me know.

Reply

Answer 12

Jan 7, 2009 9:39 AM in response to David Schwartzer

I had the same problem this morning. I tried to format my 1TB LaCie drive as Mac Extended, as it had come pre-formatted as MS-DOS. My G5 running X.5.6 would not format, partition, or erase, just as the OP describes. I tried both FW-400 and FW-800 connections; same result. I have another G5, same model, running X.4.11, and I tried it on there; it formatted and partitioned immediately. Perhaps Disk Utility in X.5.6 has a quirk?

Reply

Answer 13

jdbents

Level 1

0 points

Jan 8, 2009 6:16 AM in response to Matt Bogen

I am having the same problems with 10.5.5 .

I have an external USB SATA drive that is 750 GB.

I try to erase or partition the drive and it give me this message:

Disk Erase Failed
Disk Erase failed with the error:
Permission denied

I completed the same operation on a PowerMac 10.4.11 and the format worked without any problems.

Sounds like a bug on 10.5.5!

Reply

Answer 14

Feb 4, 2009 1:16 PM in response to jdbents

Found the answer at this post:

http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/other-hardware-peripherals/105482-problem-w-wd- my-book-formatting-sharing.html

1.- OPEN DISK UTILITY
2.- SELECT YOUR DRIVE ( MINE HAS THE TWO "WD" letters AN THE END OF ITS NAME)
3.- GO TO PARTITION, WRITE THE NAME YOU WANT, CHOOSE THE NUMBER OF PARTITIONS (I SUGGEST YOU TO TRY FIRST JUST ONE. LATER YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR MIND)
4.- SELECT THE PARTITION YOU CREATED. GO TO OPTIONS (ON THE BOTTOM OF THE DIALOG WINDOW)
5.- (HERE IS THE KEY OF THE PROBLEM) SELECT GUID PARTITION TABLE/OK
6.- APPLY

Reply

Answer 15

Feb 26, 2009 4:39 AM in response to MovieMack

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!! I had exactly the same problem with my new Toshiba drive and have just solved it after finding this forum on a Google search so am very grateful to all you clever people!! The Guide Partition Table checkboxes in the options window was the key - I don't have a Macbook so chose the second option for PowerPC based macs and it reformatted perfectly after that!

Reply