can not find destination of my hard drive when installing! (updated: problem almost solved)

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

UPDATE: my problem has been solved thanks to others on insanelymac. search function ftw.

so this is the solution that fixed my problem,

in windows, i formatted the drive to FAT32 using Acronis Disk Director. For some reason, mac os x just did not want to read this, because it was formatted a weird way i suppose. So i found this thread, where venumx posted the solution.

I formatted the drive in fat32, but then i went in and edited the drive and changed it to ShagOS (swap).

Then i booted up mac os x, and tried formatting the drive to mac os extended journaled again, and it automatically mounted; and i was able to install.

 

here is the link to that thread: http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=48687

 

UPDATE 2: my computer constantly restarts after installation.

ive tried loading in verbose (-v) mode and "-f" as well. Does anybody know of this problem?

 

--------------------------

 

hey guys, ive been trying everything with this. i have been trying to install osx 10.5.6 but i have just been unable to!

I already formatted the partition and made it FAT32,

and YES,

I erased the partition in the installer to "Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)"

but it still does not show up! Take a look at these pictures, let me know what I am doing wrong, I would really appreciate that. Ive tried searching over and over as well :\

 

So after I formatted the partition to FAT32, I load up my CD and start installation.

 

I get to this screen, and I obviously go to DISK UTILITIES to erase the partition to "mac osx extended (journaled)"

 

 

 

erased the partition, you can see it is grayed out for some reason on the left, but nevertheless it lets me erase it to "mac osx extended (journaled)" so I go ahead and click erase.

 

 

 

 

 

and this is what it looks like after erase. for some reason it says MS DOS, and on the left hand side everything is still grayed out. (and it renamed my "macosx" drive back to default.)

 

 

 

so i closed it and hope to find my destination hard drive listed, but it's still not there...

 

 

 

 

dont know what to do next

any help is greatly appreciated! thanks again for your time.

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

can anybody help me with my situation? (back up)

[srs5694]

I've seen a few comments about problems like this lately, but I don't know the real cause. You might try doing an end-run around the problem:

 

1. Download System Rescue CD or some other Linux emergency disc with HFS+ support.
   
2. Boot said CD.
   
3. Verify your disk with fdisk, as in 'fdisk -l /dev/sda' to be sure that /dev/sda is the device you want to use. You should see your three existing partitions there. If /dev/sda doesn't look right, try /dev/hda, /dev/sdb, or other Linux device names. (Try 'ls /dev/[sh]d?' to find candidate names.)
   
4. Once you've found the right disk (I think it'll be /dev/sda, given your screen shots), use fdisk to change the partition type code: Type 'fdisk /dev/sda' and then use the 't' option within fdisk to change the type code to AF. When you're done, write the change by using the 'w' option.
   
5. For good measure, type 'fdisk -l /dev/sda' again at the command prompt to verify that the change has been made -- the type code should show up as "af," which isn't in fdisk's internal partition type list, so it'll be labeled as "unknown".
   
6. Type 'mkfs.hfsplus -J -v "My Mac" /dev/sda2' to format the second partition on /dev/sda to HFS+ with a journal and the name "My Mac". Change the name and device ID as appropriate for your system.
   
7. Shut down and try the installation again.
   

 

I can't promise that this solution will work, but it might. If it does, you won't need to use Disk Utility to reformat the partition; it should appear as installable right from the start.

 

If you don't have any other OSes on this drive, you could also try repartitioning or converting it to GPT format, which is the newer alternative to the old MBR partitioning scheme. This is even an option if you've got Windows Vista or Windows 7 data (not boot) partitions on the disk -- but getting Windows to boot from a purely GPT disk is tricky at best. It's conceivable the OS X installer will work better if the disk is in GPT format. If you're truly desperate, you could try a hybrid MBR format, which uses both GPT and MBR partition tables in a bid to work around the inability of some OSes to cope with GPT.

 

To wipe out all partitions and use GPT, try using Disk Utility. Click the whole disk and a "Partition" option will appear. You can use this to set up new partitions. Be sure to click the Options button so you can select the GPT option (Mac OS calls it by its full name, "GUID Partition Table"). If you want to save your existing partitions' data but convert to GPT, use gdisk, which is included on the latest System Rescue CD. It works a lot like Linux's fdisk, but it converts from MBR to GPT when you launch it on an MBR disk. Load the program, change the partition type code (or don't; you could rely on Disk Utility to do this later), and type 'w' to save your changes.

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

i am definitely going to try this right now.

thanks for your help rod.

 

if there are any other alternative ways of going about this, please let me know guys,

because im not all that sure this is going to work.

 

if you've heard about this problem, by all means post any of your knowledge.

Anything and everything is really appreciated.

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

so i downloaded the final build of systemrescuecd, which was labeled

SystemRescueCd-x86-1.3.0

 

and burned the image to a cd.

 

when i tried to boot it (from boot start screen) it wouldnt work / was not recognized.

dont know what the problem there was. it just couldnt boot it. any advice rod?

[srs5694]

First, check that you burned the image correctly. Mine has a handful of files (sysrcd.dat, sysrcd.md5, etc.) and four folders (isolinux, bootdisk, etc.). Note that sysrcd.md5 has an MD5 sum, so you can check that the file you downloaded wasn't damaged in the process.

 

If that all looks OK, then I'd check your burn options in whatever tool you used to burn the CD. Perhaps there's something that's rendering the CD incapable of booting.

 

If you still can't figure it out, try another Linux emergency disc. Perhaps Parted Magic would work better (although I'm not 100% sure that it includes the necessary HFS+ formatting support).

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

ok, so rod, (and everybody else that has ever had the same problem as me)

i decided to go more indepth and try to search how to create hfs+ inside of windows, instead of using mac os x utilities. i didnt know what was causing my problem (I was unable to erase the disk into mac os journaled extended) so i figured it had to have been because of one my steps in the earlier stages of this process.

 

so this is the solution that fixed my problem,

in windows, i formatted the drive to FAT32 using Acronis Disk Director. For some reason, mac os x just did not want to read this, because it was formatted a weird way i suppose. So i found this thread, where venum posted the solution.

I formatted the drive in fat32, but then i went in and edited the drive and changed it to ShagOS (swap).

Then i booted up mac os x, and tried formatting the drive to mac os extended journaled again, and it automatically mounted; and i was able to install.

 

thanks again rod!

hope this helps anybody who had the same problem!

[srs5694]

FWIW, the MBR partition type code for ShagOS swap is 0xAF -- the same as the type code Mac OS X uses for HFS/HFS+ on MBR disks. Thus, you were essentially doing part of what my procedure would have had you do, but with a different tool.

 

Did you ever get System Rescue CD to boot, BTW? My copy boots fine. It's a very useful utility to have, even if you're not a Linux user, since it's got partitioning tools, filesystem utilities, etc.

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

FWIW, the MBR partition type code for ShagOS swap is 0xAF -- the same as the type code Mac OS X uses for HFS/HFS+ on MBR disks. Thus, you were essentially doing part of what my procedure would have had you do, but with a different tool.

 

Did you ever get System Rescue CD to boot, BTW? My copy boots fine. It's a very useful utility to have, even if you're not a Linux user, since it's got partitioning tools, filesystem utilities, etc.

Yes, exactly. What you said in your post lead me to use a different tool other than systemrescue.

No I did not get it working unfortunately. But heres the thing now,

this only gave me a new problem....

 

the os installs successfully, and asks to restart. when it restarts, i try to load it using verbose mode, and normal mode, and it keeps restarting bring me back to the computer start up screen. It just repeats this process. I am not sure what I am doing wrong now. its lame because i was excited to have it working finally, until it lead me to another problem.

 

Is there a certain driver or patch i did not include before installation?

im running on a dell xps 400

pentium D (dual core)

(i checked off ATi for Video card drivers)

video: ATi Hyper Memory PCI Express X16 (DVI/VGA/TV out) Radeon X300 SE

video: ATi Radeon X600 256MB HYPERMEMORY

audio: Sigmatel stac 92XX C-Major HD Audio

 

 

if you (or anybody else) have any idea, by all means let me know.

i really am eager to have this up and running and you've helped me out a lot so far. thanks again for your time. has anybody heard of this situation before?

[ForumSnoBorderRK]

so can anybody help me with my existing problem?

I am actually trying to install once more with maybe a kernel and a new bootloader.

Can anybody quickly suggest a kernal / driver / patch I should use?

 

I am standing by until 5:30pm pacific time. Anything helps honestly.

take a look at my specs above.

 

ok well i tried installing with the voodoo 10.5.4 kernel and the alternate bootloader by chameleon.

I will let you all know if this works.

 

Nevertheless, any knowledge / advice / help you can give me is greatly appreciated still.