I have an iMac made in mid 2007. It is an Intel Duo Core processor. The hard drive has failed. Apple says I can use an external drive to run it. I have a installation disk for Snow Leopard. How can I install Snow Leopard onto the external disk given that the computer is unusable?
iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.4)
Where are you from?
Apple told you to use an external drive to run your Mac?
Your iMac is still supported by Apple. They certainly can install a new hard drive into your 2007 iMac if you are willing to pay between $200-$400 U.S.D. to do this.
DId Apple tell you to do this OR is it you aren't willing to pay Apple for what it will cost to replace the internal hard drive?
The costs of buying a good, quality FireWire (fast data transfer connection) will be similar costs for two drives (a working drive and a backup drive) and ithe drive won't be as fast runnng over an external connection. It'll be close, though.
Your iMac will always run its fastest from an internally connected hard drive.
You need to talk to somebody else at the Apple Store about getting this drive replaced and find out the cost of installing a larger hard drive than what was originally installed into your 2007 iMac.
2007 iMacs could have up to a 1 TB hard drive installed in them.
The 2007 iMac models are still being supported by Apple and therefore the Stores have to service it.
What are your iMac's specs.
To find out info about your system,
Click on the Apple symbol in the upper left of the OS X main menu bar. A drop down menu appears.
Click About this Mac. A smaller popup window appears. This gives you basic info like what version of OS X your iMac is running, the speed of your iMac's CPU and how much RAM is installed.
Click on the button that says More Info. A larger window appears giving you a complete overview of your iMac's hardware specs.
Highlight all of this info and copy/paste all of this into another reply to this post, editing out your iMac's serial number before actually posting the reply.
This will tell us everything about your iMac so we may begin to better advise you.
Actually, I just check and Apple has demoted the 2007 iMac models to Vintage status.
I think this means Apple,directly, will no longer service this model any longer. Bummer.
Do you have any other Apple authorized resellers or repair centers, that are within a reasonable travel time, that could install a new internal hard drive into your iMac? They might be able to do this instead as they aren't Apple, but authorized to sell and repair Apple products.
If no way to have an internal hard drive installed into your iMac, then you will need to purchase two good quality, large capacity FireWire 800 (fast data transfer connection) external hard drives.
FIreWire 800 drives will give you an operational speed close to the same speed as your iMac's internal hard drive.
One external hard drive will be used as your iMac's main working drive. The other drive is to be used to create either cloned, bootable backup drive or to be used with OS X Time Machine backup app.
To install OS X Snow Leopard onto an external hard drive, if your iMac's optical drive is still working, power up your iMac holding down the C key on the keyboard and immediately insert the install disc into the optical drive slot on the side of your iMac.
Your iMac should boot up to the system that is on the install disc.
Once you are in the Installer app, go up to the main menu bar and quit the installer.
Then on the main menu bar launch the Disk Utility app and format the external drive for Mac OS X Extended ( journaled ) format with a GUID partition scheme.
You can decide if you want one larger partition on break the drive down into more than one partition for data storage purposes or not.
Once the drive is formatted, quit Disk Utility, relaunch the OS X installer app and proceed, following the instructions to install OS X Snow Leopard onto your external drive.
Once installed, you'll be prompted to restart your iMac and it should automatically find where OS X is installed and boot up your Mac to OS X.
From there, you can go into OS X Preferences Panel and select the software update feature of OS X to update your OS X version to OS X 10.6.8 and all of your Apple installed apps.
In OS X System Prefrences panel under Startup disc icon, click the icon and set the startup disc for the external hard drive that shows your currently installed OS X system.
This OS X will know where OS X is always launched from and won't have to hunt for it when you always startup your Mac.
You will have to reinstall all your third party applications, too.
Good Luck!
Thank you so much for your help. This is the information I have about the computer concerned. Since it's a total HD failure I can't be sure that the OS is 10.6.8 but I know it's at least Snow Leopard. I'm sure of the rest of the information:
IMac 24 inch, Mid 2007
2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
Memory 4 GB
OS 10.6.8
Model Identifier: iMac7,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: IM71.007A.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.21f4
Serial Number (system):
Hardware UUID: 00000000-0000-1000-8000-001EC20C53AF
Again, Thank you for your help.
Best, Louise Dudis
if you can find an Apple authorized repair/service center to install a new HD, you can have a new, 1 TB drive installed into this iMac.
Otherwise, you need to follow my last post concerning the external drives to run your iMac and to backup its data.
Good Luck!
HD failed on iMac 7.1. How do I use external drive to run computer?
