Receiving error message "The installation cannot proceed, because the operating system is running on a case sensitive volume"

Basically, if Acrobat Pro won't run on a case-sensitive volume, and you have formatted your boot drive as case-sensitive, there's no option other than to make the drive case-insensitive. Which can only be done by reformatting the hard drive (being sure to make it case-insensitive this time), then reinstalling or restoring your system, apps and data.

You may be able to back up using Time Machine, and then erase your hard drive and restore to the newly-formatted drive. That could be less hassle, if it works. The catch is, I'm not sure if it works, as I have never delved into use of case-sensitive volumes. I'll see if I can snag our resident Time Machine expert for you, though.

When you choose the format, you'll have a variety of different ones to choose from, including several different forms of Mac OS Extended. Some of those will be labeled as being case-sensitive, you'll obviously want to avoid choosing one of those. The normal default, and what you will want to choose, is Mac OS Extended (Journalled).

BTW, I did some digging, and it looks like Carbon Copy Cloner will allow you to restore a case-sensitive clone to a case-insensitive volume, with one caveat:

http://help.bombich.com/discussions/questions/198-can-ccc-backup-a-case-sensitiv e-volume-and-restore-to-a-case-insensitive-volume

Thomas A Reed wrote:

You may be able to back up using Time Machine, and then erase your hard drive and restore to the newly-formatted drive. That could be less hassle, if it works. The catch is, I'm not sure if it works, as I have never delved into use of case-sensitive volumes.

It will work, to a degree. You'll be facing the same problem as with using CCC per Thomas' link -- if there are two files in the same folder with the same name but different capitalizations, you're in a pickle.

The problem with CCC's procedure seems to be that you'll never know whether some files were overwritten, thus losing one or more. You may never have done that intentionally, but it's possible it was done accidentally, or by an app.

The problem with Time Machine's procedure, as I recall, is if you do a full restore and have a conflict, it will fail. I think you'll get a message, but only for the first conflict it finds.

If you install OSX, and use Setup Assistant, that will also fail, as I recall.

If you install OSX, create the identical user accounts, then use the Star Wars display to restore selective items, you'll get this message:

It doesn't tell you how many files are involved in the folder(s) being restored, much less any of their names. (And there aren't any such messages anywhere in the logs, either.)

None of those are real attractive, are they?

As I recall, what the earlier user did was this:

Created a case-insensitive partiton on an external HD.

Used Finder to copy (drag and drop) one sub-folder at a time from his home folder to the external, temporarily.

When there was a problem (same message as the one above), examine the (original) folder in question to find the duplicates, and rename as necessary.

Delete the copied folder and try again. Once there were no more problems, delete the copied folder and move on to the next one.

Once all conflicts had been corrected on the original, backed-up (with TM, CCC, etc).

Then reformatted the internal HD, installed OSX, used Setup Assistant to transfer from the backups.

I take it that I'll have to reinstall the original software that came with my computer and then install OS X 10.7.3.

Wrong. You can boot from your recovery partition, then reformat your boot volume as needed, follow a restore from backup/CCC/whatever. You don't need to go back to whatever OS came with your machine.

Installing on a case-sensitive file system is extraordinarily unusual. Before doing anything else, run Disk Utility and report what type of disk your startup drive is using. Here is my startup disk:

If you truly have a case-sensitive file system, yours would look like this:

If you really do have a case-sensitive file system, you should be able to restore from Time Machine since your startup disk is more restrictive than the Time Machine volume. However, I consider Time Machine to be a great backup solution for those times when you didn't know you needed it until after the fact. The only thing better than Time Machine is another backup. If you know you need a backup, it is best to make a new, redudant backup using Carbon Copy Cloner or similar. With two backups, you can feel more confident about repartitioning your startup drive.

Camelot wrote:

I take it that I'll have to reinstall the original software that came with my computer and then install OS X 10.7.3.

Wrong. You can boot from your recovery partition, then reformat your boot volume as needed, follow a restore from backup/CCC/whatever. You don't need to go back to whatever OS came with your machine.

Have you ever done that when there were name conficts? Do you know for sure whether there are messages showing what files were overwritten?

etresoft wrote:

. . .

If you really do have a case-sensitive file system, you should be able to restore from Time Machine since your startup disk is more restrictive than the Time Machine volume.

But if there are name conflicts on the TM volume, a full system restore will fail. So will Setup Assistant or Migration Assistant.

Pondini wrote:

etresoft wrote:

. . .

If you really do have a case-sensitive file system, you should be able to restore from Time Machine since your startup disk is more restrictive than the Time Machine volume.

But if there are name conflicts on the TM volume, a full system restore will fail. So will Setup Assistant or Migration Assistant.

But how would those conflicting files have ever made it to the Time Machine volume in the first place? If the original poster truly has a case sensitve disk, it is important to create another, case sensitive backup. Otherwise, there seems like a (rather small) chance of lost data.

I'm still suspcious. I have seen bloatware like Microsoft and Adobe give random errors due to internal logic bugs much more often than anyone actually runs out of memory/disk space or uses a case sensitive file system.

etresoft wrote:

. . .

But how would those conflicting files have ever made it to the Time Machine volume in the first place?

Time Machine won't back up a case-sensitive disk to a case-ignorant one.

In fact, case-sensitive is the default -- if you let it reformat a drive for Time Machine, it will be case-sensitive.

I'm still suspcious. I have seen bloatware like Microsoft and Adobe give random errors due to internal logic bugs much more often than anyone actually runs out of memory/disk space or uses a case sensitive file system.

Yes, I agree. The first thing to do is be sure its really case-sensitive, but since the OP says he reformatted it a couple of years ago, it probably is.

TrinTrin wrote:

. . .

According to the disk utility, "250.06 GB Fujitzu" HD format is Mac OS Extended (Journaled). However under the user profile HDD, in my case "MNR HD" it reads Mac OS Extended (Case-sentitive, Journaled).

Something's not clear there -- the top line for the drive doesn't show a format.

Can you post screenshots, please?

The one you're looking for is like this:

TrinTrin wrote:

According to the disk utility, "250.06 GB Fujitzu" HD format is Mac OS Extended (Journaled). However under the user profile HDD, in my case "MNR HD" it reads Mac OS Extended (Case-sentitive, Journaled). I'm little concerned about doing a restore from my time machine for a variety of reasons.

Is your home directory on a different volume than your startup drive? It sounds like your startup disk is correct but your other drive is case sensitive.

I am wondering if I should return my Adobe Acrobat Pro X and avoid the hassle?!

That is another issue. Unless you have very specific requirements, you should be able to create PDF files with no trouble just by using print/save to PDF. It would be a good idea to get the hard drive issue fixed. You never know when this will bite you again. I'm surprised you made it this far.