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Disk Utility in Recovery mode not working!

When I boot up my MacBook Pro in Recovery Mode, everything works fine. But when I get to the menu and select Disk Utility, it tries to start Disk Utility, and then freezes when it says "Gathering Disk Information."

Help!!!

MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2012), OS X Mavericks (10.9.1)

Posted on Feb 10, 2014 11:02 AM

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3 replies

Feb 10, 2014 11:23 AM in response to hands4

I can't boot in safe mode. The reason I'm trying to do this is because when I boot up my mac, there is a grey folder with a question mark that flashes on my screen. I'm trying to go into disk utility to repair the disk. But I can't boot up normally or in safe mode.

And, I know it's stupid of me but I've never made a backup of my hard drive.

Please respond if you have anymore tips.

Feb 10, 2014 12:07 PM in response to greenhippo31

It sounds like your disk is very sick or dead. Let’s hope it is the former. I would do nothing to it (including booting it) until you get a new drive. Anything you do may make it worse.


Back to health and emergency data recovery:


You can install a new drive yourself, format it and install OS X on it. You can then put the old drive in an external enclosure, try to mount it, and then use the Finder to drag all the files you can onto the new system drive. Of course if it is to far gone then that won’t do any good but you won’t know until you try. Since it booted in Recovery Mode that says at least part of the disk is OK.


I recommend the following equipment and procedures:


You might as well purchase a new super-fast hybrid drive for under $100 than has an 8 GB SSD cache that makes the data fly. Google “Seagate 1 TB hybrid SSHD”.

You will need special screwdrivers to open the Mac and deal with the screws on the hard drive.

$5 Toolkit: http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/TOOLKITMHD/


You will want a USB 3.0 external enclosure into which you will place the sick drive.

$22 USB 3.0 enclosure: http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/ES2.5BU3W/

Purchase a 2 TB, USB 3.0 external drive as your Time Machine backup drive. Any brand will do as long as it is not WD. ( ~$100)

For example: http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansion-Desktop-External-STBV2000100/dp/B00834SJ S0


See the disk replacement tutorials at macsales.com, Crucial.com, or ifixit.com.

When you open the Mac take note of which screws go in which holes. They are not all alike.


With the new drive installed, it will boot in Internet Recovery Mode when you start it in Recovery Mode (Boot, Command-R). http://www.apple.com/osx/recovery/

To force it into Internet Recovery Mode use Boot, Command-Option-R.

Use Disk Utility to partition the drive with a GUID partition and Mac OS Extended Journaled format. Then install OS X.

If you need more detailed instructions post back.


Once it is up and running place the old drive in the external enclosure and see which files you can recover.


Then setup your Time Machine backup.

Time Machine Basics: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1427

Most commonly used backup methods:

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3045

Disk Utility in Recovery mode not working!

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