HT3910: Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard: How to Erase and Install

Learn about Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard: How to Erase and Install
Mike Safar

Q: Cannot Install on Mac Mini 2006

Dozens of articles and forum posts talk about problems trying to perform a fresh install of Snow Leopard on a Mac Mini.   I keep getting an error that says Mac OS X cannot be installed" even though I'm using the retail image.   I have a Mac Mini circa 2006 (1.6Ghz processor, 2GB RAM, 60GB drive with a clean partitiion).  

 

What am I doing wrong?

 

Should I have a parttition already, or no partiiations? 

Mac mini, Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Sep 6, 2012 12:31 PM

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Q: Cannot Install on Mac Mini 2006

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  • by Kappy,

    Kappy Kappy Sep 6, 2012 12:36 PM in response to Mike Safar
    Level 10 (271,133 points)
    Desktops
    Sep 6, 2012 12:36 PM in response to Mike Safar

    Are you trying to erase the drive and do a clean install of Snow Leopard or are you trying to install Snow Leopard on a separate partition on your hard drive? If the latter you will need a partition that's minimally 20-30 GBs. If you don't have one set up, then you must first create a new partition on your hard drive provided there is sufficient contiguous free space to do so.

  • by noondaywitch,

    noondaywitch noondaywitch Sep 6, 2012 3:21 PM in response to Mike Safar
    Level 6 (8,142 points)
    Sep 6, 2012 3:21 PM in response to Mike Safar

    1 Partition (i.e. 1 volume) is sufficient, especially with what is by today's standards a very small drive.

     

    How did you format the HD? It needs to be GUID partition map and Mac OS extended (journalled.

     

    What do mean by "retail image"? SL comes on a DVD which you need to boot from to format and install.

  • by Mike Safar,

    Mike Safar Mike Safar Sep 6, 2012 3:52 PM in response to Mike Safar
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 6, 2012 3:52 PM in response to Mike Safar

    My DVD player is broken, so I have a DMG of the disk. 

     

    I'm erasing the whole hard drive, and creating a journaled, GUID partition map.

     

    I'm certain the Mac is in working order because I successfully recovered a Time Machine backup onto the very same drive and it boots fine.  But I want an absolutely clean install on this machine.

     

    As I said, dozens of folks have reported this issue, but I can't believe that I can't do a fresh install.   Am I going to have to install Leopard and then upgrade or something?

  • by noondaywitch,

    noondaywitch noondaywitch Sep 7, 2012 4:02 AM in response to Mike Safar
    Level 6 (8,142 points)
    Sep 7, 2012 4:02 AM in response to Mike Safar

    The disc image needs to be mounted on a bootable volume to run DU from it to erase the drive.

     

    If that drive is the startup drive, it won't work, because the target drive has to be unmounted to carry out the operations.

     

    Some people have installed successfully from USB thumb drives, but I've never had occasion to attempt that.

     

    Perhaps one of them will see this thread, but it may help if you started a new one asking specifically how to install from a Disc Image.