gypsymoth Posted March 31, 2012 Share Posted March 31, 2012 Hi All First post and hopefully you can assist. I'm aware I might not be in the right forum so any directions appreciated To cut a long story short, my Hackintosh media centre running Snow Leopard is now failing to boot and wont get to the splash screen that had a Chameleon on it. Unfortunately I cant remember the build but it might be iAtkos? My father was an avid x86 / Hackintosh builder but unfortunately he passed away in November, and despite my computer savvy, I dont have enough to diagnose the problem on my own. The box itself contains a main drive with the OS, and a second drive with all my music, photos etc... so obviously I'm keen to either (a) get it running again or ( at the very least, recover my valuable data. I took a backup a few months back but will lose some photos When I power on the machine, the disk whirrs, it goes to some BIOS splash screens - more slowly than usual - then stops at a certain stage. I'm attaching screenshots to help explain the failure point. The final stage is where it says "DISK BOOT FAILURE. INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER". I suspect it hasnt even got to the OSX load point, and this is a boot / DOS issue but cant be sure If anyone has seen something similar, or can guide me to a solution of sorts, I'd really really appreciate it Many thanks D Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
rlf Posted March 31, 2012 Share Posted March 31, 2012 Looks to me that it is failing in BIOS. Long before it gets to trying to boot OSX. I would open it up and check all the cables connected to the hard drive - both ends. Make sure nothing is loose. If that doesn't help, I think you are in deep do-do because data recovery services are expensive. (Whoops - see that data is on 2nd drive) Also, be sure there isn't a CD or DVD in the drive. 1 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1809979 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phoenix2058 Posted March 31, 2012 Share Posted March 31, 2012 Insert i-Boot CD and then boot from it, i had a similar problem, the PC said "no operating system" then i inserted ###### and it showed me all harddisks i can boot from, and so it worled for me 1 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1809987 Share on other sites More sharing options...
gypsymoth Posted March 31, 2012 Author Share Posted March 31, 2012 Insert i-Boot CD and then boot from it, i had a similar problem, the PC said "no operating system" then i inserted ###### and it showed me all harddisks i can boot from, and so it worled for me thanks for the tipoff. I tried ###### a few days back but may not have burned it correctly. Will give it another go @rlf - thanks. Opened up the box and connections look fine - hasnt been touched in about 2 years. Lots of dust naturally, which I cleared away my worst fear is disk failure but I'm confident the photos etc... were on disc 2... I hope! cheers Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1809997 Share on other sites More sharing options...
gypsymoth Posted March 31, 2012 Author Share Posted March 31, 2012 firstly... thanks again all burnt ######, put it in and got to the ###### splash screen Interestingly, I had the option to either boot into ###### OR the OSX I had just before the crash... which suggests the boot disk is still active? When I chose either option, I got the following errors and hit the wall Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1810003 Share on other sites More sharing options...
rlf Posted March 31, 2012 Share Posted March 31, 2012 What it suggests to me is that the 1st drive may still be dead but there is an installation of OSX on the 2nd drive and that is what it was trying to boot when you got the kernel panic. What if you went into BIOS and set the 2nd drive to be the primary boot drive and see if it will try to boot the 2nd drive? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1810004 Share on other sites More sharing options...
eep357 Posted April 3, 2012 Share Posted April 3, 2012 Also check bios and make sure sata is set to AHCI and not IDE Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1810676 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gringo Vermelho Posted April 3, 2012 Share Posted April 3, 2012 Yeah I was thinking that too, the BIOS probably reset itself to default settings that don't work with his OS X installation, maybe the CMOS battery died while the PC was unplugged. Replace the CMOS battery (ask for a CR-2032) and read up on recommended BIOS settings for OS X. 1 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1810757 Share on other sites More sharing options...
gypsymoth Posted April 3, 2012 Author Share Posted April 3, 2012 thanks guys - will check those out Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/277657-broken-hackintosh-cant-boot-no-support/#findComment-1810835 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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