My iMac 2007 won't BOOT on the El Capitan key

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Level 1

4 points

My iMac 2007 won't BOOT on the El Capitan key

Hello,

I re-initialized my 2007 iMac, and since El Capitan is no longer available on the app store I had to create a usb key to boot on it.

I press the "alt" key on my windows keyboard, I see the "OS X Base system" key and so I select it, I wait for the loading which gives me the recovery menu instead of the El Capitan installation page.

I've tried to rebuild my USB key several times, tried several different brands, restarted the iMac several times, but I always come across the "recovery" menu.

Can you help me?

Earlier Mac models

Posted on Oct 29, 2023 5:30 AM

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Answer 1

WheelieNick

Level 8

46,625 points

Oct 29, 2023 5:44 AM in response to Edonyae

You must not select macOS base system, this is your internal harddrives recovery system

When you cannot boot from USB, try and reset the SMC and the NVRAM of your Mac . After you've followed these procedures, try and boot from the USB again

See this instructions on how to reset NVRAM

Shut down your Mac.
Turn on your Mac, then immediately press and hold these four keys together: Option, Command, P, R.
Release the keys after about 20 seconds, during which your Mac might appear to restart. For example, you might hear a startup sound more than once, or see the Apple logo more than once.
When your Mac finishes starting up, you might need to adjust any system settings that were reset.

See this instructions on how to reset SMC

If your Mac isn't a laptop computer, follow these steps:

Shut down your Mac, then unplug the power cord.
Wait 15 seconds, then plug the power cord back in.
Wait 5 seconds, then press the power button to turn on your Mac.

This helped me a while back when I had the same problem with reinstalling Catalina on my 2013 iMac

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Answer 2

den.thed

Level 10

95,948 points

Oct 29, 2023 5:44 AM in response to Edonyae

While in Recovery Mode select Disk Utility.

While in Disk Utility select the iMac's internal hard drive.

If you see the iMac internal drive, Reformat the drive and Install macOS El Capitan.

If you do not see the iMac's internal hard drive, then the internal drive has failed and needs to be replaced.

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Answer 3

Edonyae Author

Level 1

4 points

Oct 29, 2023 7:05 AM in response to WheelieNick

I've done the manipulations, it doesn't change anything...

However something catches my attention, why my key is called when I want to boot on it "osx base system" I saw a video of someone installing and his key was called "Install OSX yosemite" so my key is supposed to be called "Install OSX El capitan"? I installed my key from a windows program called "transmac" because from what I understand, since I only own another mac m1, I can't create an El Capitan key from a mac m1, so I did it from my windows pc.

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My iMac 2007 won't BOOT on the El Capitan key

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