butterfunky

Q: MacbookPro won't boot/hard drive won't mount

This started a couple days ago.

I just finished streaming a show and tried to nav a page back when my computer went unresponsive. I got the spinning wheel cursor and waited a while for it to fix but it stayed unresponsive. So I shut down the computer using the power button. Upon attempting to power on again, the boot screen would show up and the progress bar would go about a fourth of the way before suddenly shutting down again. I tried a couple more times before I started to research on the Internet for some solutions. I tried opening up disk utility and noticed Mac HD was grayed out. i attempted to repair disk but after some error messages it said it could not be repaired. I tried booting in safe mode that same night but it would keep shutting down during boot. So the next day (yesterday) I tried again to boot in safe mode. This time it worked and I was able to see my desktop. I then tried to open Finder, but again The whole computer went unresponsive.

 

I do not have a backup of my hard drive so yesterday I went out and bought an external hard drive to try to backup my computer before trying anything else. But again, my HD will not mount while in boot up Disk Utility so I can't even try to make a backup. What I'm trying to do right now is boot into safe mode to try disk utility from there to see if my HD will be mounted.

 

I did notice a repeating sound coming from what I believe is the hard drive when my computer is unresponsive. The sound reminds me of a slow heartbeat with the faint pattern of a rotary phone spinning back to 0. I know that's kind of a strange description but this is hard to put into words.

 

I have a lot of family photos and music I would really like to not lose, so if anyone has any tricks up their sleeve for helping me create a backup in this situation, it would be very greatly appreciated. If you need more specific info such as Disk Utility's repair errors or whatever, let me know.

 

A couple side notes: I've seen mention of costly things such as Disk Warrior, but I don't have the funds to afford something like that.

We do not own another Mac so connecting two together is not an option.

 

I'm running a 15" Mid 2009 MacbookPro with the most recent version of OSX 

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Aug 28, 2015 2:58 PM

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Q: MacbookPro won't boot/hard drive won't mount

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  • by lllaass,Helpful

    lllaass lllaass Aug 29, 2015 4:19 PM in response to butterfunky
    Level 10 (189,410 points)
    Desktops
    Aug 29, 2015 4:19 PM in response to butterfunky

    I would purchase a replacement disk, SSD perferred, and external USB enclosure for the disk.

    Swap out the disk and install OX on the new internal disk using your Snow Leopard install DVD. Then fully update SL and go to the Mac App Store and upgrade to Yosemite.

    The place the old disk in the enclosure and connect to the Mac and see if you can retrieve any data from the disk.

  • by butterfunky,

    butterfunky butterfunky Aug 29, 2015 6:33 PM in response to lllaass
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 29, 2015 6:33 PM in response to lllaass

    Sweet that sounds like a good plan. I'll most likely do that. Thanks

  • by butterfunky,

    butterfunky butterfunky Sep 4, 2015 9:46 PM in response to lllaass
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 4, 2015 9:46 PM in response to lllaass

    Update: I've since purchased a SSD and installed it. I was able to reinstall OS X onto my computer with the new SSD. Now, I have a hard drive usb enclosure with my old hard drive connected to it. Upon plugging it in, the computer did not automatically recognize it. I am able to see it in disk utility as when it was installed and still Mac HD is grayed out. Now since it is connected via usb, I'm not sure if there is something I need to do to it in order to read it or something if it is even readable. Any thoughts?

  • by lllaass,

    lllaass lllaass Sep 5, 2015 1:20 AM in response to butterfunky
    Level 10 (189,410 points)
    Desktops
    Sep 5, 2015 1:20 AM in response to butterfunky

    Is it grayed out in Disk Utility?

    Can you post a screen shot of what disk utility says about the HD?

    What specific enclosure? Is it powered byt the USB bus?

    Does the enclosure work with other HDs when connected to your computer?

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