I can't install OS X mountain Lion to my macbook pro. It says when I'm trying to choose the disk, (This disk is used for time machine backups'. What can I do about it? thanks!

For some reason you have a folder called Backups.backupdb at the root level of the hard disk on which you want to install Mountain Lion.

Move it to the Trash.

OS X- Cannot install on a volume used by Time Machine for backups

From the Finder's Go menu, choose Computer:

Double-click your hard disk icon. It is usually named "Macintosh HD":

Look for this folder:

Drag it to the Trash.

So I have done everything I can to find out why my mac wouldn't let me install mountain lion because of this issue. Even called apple support and was on the phone with them for 2 hours with nothing coming out of it except them wanting me to completely wipe my computer and start over. As soon as I got off the phone with them I found this and it instantly fixed my problem. Thank you so much!!

I'm trying to install Mountain Lion today (on a secondary MacBook that is running 10.6.8; I never did update to Lion). It's giving me the Time Machine problem and I just deleted the Backups.backupdb folder and all associated files. Totally trashed them. I'm still getting the error and don't understand why. Any ideas?

i had a similar issue with installing Mavericks and most advice was to wipe my hard drive clean

thankfully i found your post as i was just about to pay for apple support

followed your instructions mavericks now fully installed and operational

brilliant thanks your help 🙂