Installing OSX on a new hard drive?

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Installing OSX on a new hard drive?

The hard drive in my early-2007 MacBook cracked, and I had to get a new one. I have the new hard drive, and understand how to put the the physical drive into the computer, but I'm not sure how to reinstall OSX Lion without having a disk to reinstall from.I do not have a physical OSX disk though.

I need to reinstall OSX, I have no additional resources beyond the computer itself. I was running 10.7 Lion before it cracked.

When I hold down Cmd+R, I get "BOOTMGR is Missing, Press Ctr-Alt-Del to restart"

The new 2.5" hard drive was used in a Windows machine before the motherboard on the Windows computer was fried, so I removed the Hard drive in working condition, (I have tested it by plugging it into my Windows desktop with a SATA cable and it worked) and deleted everything from the drive. I'm not sure if I have to reformat it, it is currently NTFS, as I was using it as an extra hard drive for a Windows machine. In addition, I cannot retrieve any data from the old hard drive, since the internal disk was smashed. Also, when prompted to pres CTR-ALT-DEL, I have tried both while pressing Fn and while not, and there has been no response from the computer. Please Help!

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.7)

Posted on Jan 11, 2013 9:47 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Jan 11, 2013 9:54 PM in response to nathanielaldon

Internet Recovery isn't compatible with your Mac, so the only thing you can do is to reinstall the original Mac OS X version that came with your Mac, or Snow Leopard (as you have upgraded to OS X Lion, you should have the Mac OS X Snow Leopard disc).

Anyway, you need the discs to install OS X again, so if you have the Snow Leopard disc, it will be much easier:

1. Insert the Mac OS X DVD and press C key while your Mac is starting to start from the disc.

2. Go to Utilities menu > Disk Utility, choose the hard disk in the sidebar and go to Partition tab.

3. Select the existing partition and press - button to delete it.

4. Press "Options" button and choose "GUID Partition Table". You need it to install OS X.

5. Press + button to create a new partition. In Format, choose "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)" and press Apply.

6. Close Disk Utility and install Mac OS X.

You can do the same with the Mac OS X DVD that your Mac brought. If you don't have any discs, call Apple to get replacement DVDs for your Mac > http://support.apple.com/kb/HE57 Also, you will need to buy Snow Leopard again in order to install OS X Lion

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Answer 2

Jan 11, 2013 10:03 PM in response to mende1

My optical drive is broken, would this work from an external USB optical drive?

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Answer 3

mende1

Level 10

93,538 points

Jan 11, 2013 10:05 PM in response to nathanielaldon

For some Macs, it can work, but as your Mac hasn't got any operating systems, it will be very difficult or will not work. I recommend you to repair the optical drive in order to install Mac OS X again

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Answer 4

Jan 12, 2013 12:18 PM in response to mende1

Just in addition, that Apple logo or tone don't show up when I boot up the computer, When the blank hard drive is installed, I get a dark grey screen followed by BOOTMGR is Missing, Press CTR-ALT-DEL to restart. When there is no hard drive in the machine, I get a dark grey screen followed by a light grey screen with a file folder with a question mark on it. Will the disk format the hard drive without an OS to run from?

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Answer 5

Jan 12, 2013 2:11 PM in response to nathanielaldon

What you're getting is a drive asking for a Windows installer.

Until that's reformatted as detailed by Mende1, you cannot load OS X on it.

If you access to another Mac, you may be able to put the MB in Firewire Target Disc Mode and format using DU from the other Mac.

It may then be possible to use Remote Install (Applications > Utilities > Remote Install Mac OS X) to install from your DVD.

The crunch is whether the MB will boot to Target Disc without a supported drive being present.

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Answer 6

Jan 12, 2013 2:40 PM in response to noondaywitch

But if I just use the Snow Leopard disk, will I have to do that still? Can I reformat using the Snow Leopard disk?

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Answer 7

Jan 12, 2013 2:48 PM in response to nathanielaldon

You'll need the Snow Leopard disc to do the remote install.

I thought you said your DVD drive wasn't working?

I can't guarantee an external optical drive will work, because you don't have the correct USB drivers installed.

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Answer 8

Jan 12, 2013 3:38 PM in response to noondaywitch

I see, I didn't quite understand, I was going to give it a shot with the external one before replacing the internal, but just so I get this staight, your solution is an alternative to replacing the internal DVD drive?

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Answer 9

Jan 12, 2013 5:02 PM in response to nathanielaldon

Also, just to test, I started up while pressing option while having a USB flash drive plugged in, and what I got was only a hard drive icon with "Windows" written under it, with or whithout the flash drive plugged in. I don't know if this will help, but just giving as much info as possible.

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Answer 10

Jan 13, 2013 5:18 AM in response to nathanielaldon

nathanielaldon wrote:

I see, I didn't quite understand, I was going to give it a shot with the external one before replacing the internal, but just so I get this staight, your solution is an alternative to replacing the internal DVD drive?

If it works, yes. What I'm not sure of is whether or not FTDM will work without a Mac OS system on the HD.

If that doesn't work, then either replace the DVD drive, or remove the NTFS inernal and put it in a suitable enclosure for use as an external drive. You can then mount it on another Mac to do the format and install (from the SL DVD).

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Answer 11

May 21, 2013 8:39 PM in response to nathanielaldon

I just replaced the hard drive on my macbook, and sucessfuly installed disc one, and now it asks for disc 2. The problem is, it won't accept any disc at any time now. I tried redoing the install by inserting disc one again and booting while holding "c" but the disc is instantly ejected within 1-2 seconds from insertion. I have tried inserting at multiple times during the boot sequence, with no results

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Answer 12

Mar 4, 2014 10:42 PM in response to mende1

Thanks for your reply, just installed a new SSD in my 2007 MacPro!

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Answer 13

Mr Brea

Level 1

0 points

Apr 12, 2014 11:11 AM in response to mende1

Hi I can't even get to past the first stage as the screen just goes off after a few minutes of the loading screen.

Any help?

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