diskutil list not responding

Question

Level 1

0 points

diskutil list not responding

My 2009 27" iMac has recently stopped working. When I boot up it runs normally for few minutes and then everything freezes up and I get the beachball. I can move the cursor and drag windows around the desktop but I can't actually click on anything. I have to do a hard shutdown.

I can't boot into SafeMode, when I try holding Command + Shift on boot it just shuts down again. I also can't boot up into recovery mode because it does the same thing as when I just boot it normally.

I don't have a back up, so I'm currently trying desperately to find a way to back up at least my user folder onto an external drive so I can wipe the computer clean and start fresh.

I just came across the diskutil command in terminal. So I booted up into Single User Mode and typed in 'diskutil list' to find the drives I needed so I could mount them and copy and all that, but it came back with "Killed: 9" instead of any sort of list. I'm going from root#, so it looks like:

:/root# diskutil list

Killed: 9

What does this mean? Could I be doing something wrong? Does anyone have any other solutions I could try?

Mac OS X (10.6.7)

Posted on Dec 10, 2013 12:28 AM

Reply

Answer 1

LowLuster

Level 6

12,105 points

Dec 10, 2013 1:43 AM in response to SpencerCoons

Connect an external drive and install OS X on it, any version will do like from the original system discs that came with your Mac or the Retail Snow Leopard DVD you bought to upgrade it from the original version of OS X.

Once that is done boot the system from that external, which it will do after you complete the OS X install, and copy whatever files you can off the internal drive. When booting the first time from the external to that fresh install of OS X use the same User name and password that was used on the internal drive.

Your drive is failing or has failed and will need to be replaced. Hopefully it still has enough life left in it for you to copy your files off it.

Not haviing a backup is a very foolish thing. That is unless you don't have anything on that computer you care about.

Reply

Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Dec 10, 2013 2:30 PM in response to SpencerCoons

Apple - Support - iMac 1TB Seagate Hard Drive Replacement Program

Reply

Answer 3

SpencerCoons Author

Level 1

0 points

Dec 11, 2013 11:25 AM in response to LowLuster

This sounds like it will work! I don't know if I can install OS X on the external drive from my computer because it crashes so quickly. Would it still work if I installed it through a different Mac?

Reply

Answer 4

LowLuster

Level 6

12,105 points

Dec 11, 2013 4:26 PM in response to SpencerCoons

You won't know either way If it Will or If it Won't install until you try it. If it doesn't then it looks like you'll need to take the system to an Apple store.

SpencerCoons wrote:

This sounds like it will work! I don't know if I can install OS X on the external drive from my computer because it crashes so quickly. Would it still work if I installed it through a different Mac?

Reply