ML Install emergency, help!

kdum8 said:

I downloaded the Mountain Lion install package from the App Store and ran it and received the message below.

I have restarted and tried several times to no avail. I do have two time machine backups of my previous OS, 10.6.8, but what should I do now?

It says that the disk 'Macintosh HD is damaged' but I have never had any problems until just now.

I am at a loss what to do from here.

Click to expand...

Is there any Data on the disk which you want to keep like photo's or Music?

If not you can partition the HD first.

BTW, your screenshot is upside down

kdum8 said:

Hi and thank you for trying to help me out.

All data on the disk was backed up to two separate time machine drives before I started the install process. That should be enough right? I can restore from them?

Will partitioning the drive fix this? If so can you tell me what to do?

(P.S. I know about the inverted image, but since my computer is now down I had to post this from my iPad and don't know how to re-invert it!)

Click to expand...

In your image I can see Disk Utilities, can you see it?
Click on it and Disk Utility will open, now your internal Hard Disk should show up, click on it and then click on the erase tab on the right, now it should be Mac Os Extended (Journaled).
Name your disk and click erase, NOTE, this will erase everything on the disk.
Check after erasing the disk if it is GUID, click on disk and you can see in the lower part if it is GUID, should normally be.
After this quit Disk Utility and the Installer should show up again.
Yours is a bit different, mine shows install OS 9 drivers, you won't see this, not needed.
Screenshot below.

Edit: Be sure nothing else is connected, you don't want to erase the wrong disk!

kdum8 said:

Yes I found disk utility.

Two questions:

1. Which of the two drives should I erase, the '750.16 GB WDC' drive or the lower tiered 'macintosh HD'?

2. I understand that this will erase my drive, but can I then reimport all my data from time machine once ML is installed even though the TM backup was made under snow leopard?

Click to expand...

Give me 5 minutes, I am eating.

kdum8 said:

Yes I found disk utility.

Two questions:

1. Which of the two drives should I erase, the '750.16 GB WDC' drive or the lower tiered 'macintosh HD'?

2. I understand that this will erase my drive, but can I then reimport all my data from time machine once ML is installed even though the TM backup was made under snow leopard?

Click to expand...

I'm back.

What happens if you click on repair the disk, does it repair the disk?



1. I want to explain the difference in between HD and Volumes, as you can see in My screenshot there is a HD called 74.5 GB ST.... ,that is the Harddisk and under it are 3 Volumes (partitions), one of them invisible and Mac 1 and Second.
Now, you have to choose the 750.16 GB WDC to erase the disk.

2. Yes you can reimport your TM backup.

kdum8 said:

Sure thing, thanks.

Is erasing the disk the only way this is going to work? Can I just temporarily go back to Snow Leopard?

Click to expand...

If you want this then try to repair the disk and see if it can be repaired.

kdum8 said:

I clicked repair disk and it seems to have repaired. How would I then go back to SL?

Thanks for your explanation of disks and volumes, that makes sense.

Click to expand...

Was there anything like red text in the repair section, and was it all green after and it says, disk appears to be OK.

If the above is the case, restart and look if it boots into Snow Leopard.

kdum8 said:

The repair had red the first time I tried, but now it says 'the partition map appears to be OK'

When I restart, I just get back to the install screen as before.

Click to expand...

Did you remove the Cd/USB stick?

Hold down the Option key when you startup and choose the disk.

kdum8 said:

I am not using a CD/USB stick, rather just the ML installer that is on my hard drive and came with my mac.

If I hold the option key down and restart, I only get an option to boot into the OS X installer.

Click to expand...

This means the disk is not available, you could try to use Disk Utility again and under first aid click repair permissions, after this restart again and see if this works.

If not I think you should go ahead and erase the disk, that is, if you want a running system.
There is a program called Diskwarrior which probably could repair the disk but then you need an extra bootable OS X System which you don't have.

kdum8 said:

Ok I wil, go ahead and erase. Once I have I can install from the installer package I guess?

Click to expand...

Yes.

kdum8 said:

Oh no! I received this message.

What do I do now?

Click to expand...

No worries, you should click on the macintosh HD, that should work, the HD can not be unmounted because the installer is on it, you can erase the Macintosh HD though.

kdum8 said:

Unfortunately I can't unmount either drive. The installer is on the macintosh drive I think, as I just downloaded it straight from the mac store to my computer's main drive. I did make a copy of the installer first both to a separate DVD and to another USB hard drive though.

What now?

Click to expand...

If you downloaded it and burned a DVD then startup from the DVD or the USB hard disk, did you burn the image in Disk Utility, if so drop it in the Mac, reboot and hold the C key upon startup, it should start from the DVD/CD drive.

kdum8 said:

I didn't burn the disk image in disk utility, rather in toast. I tried forcing it to boot from the disk, and it seemed to try and load from it, but then I have the same problem when trying to erase the hdd, suggesting I wasn't able to actually boot up from the DVD.

The same for the USB drive, I just dragged the ML image across. I don't know how to force boot from a USB.

Click to expand...

Dragging the image onto a USB stick does not work, I know toast, it should work but might not.

You can burn a DVD from Disk Utility from the "Installer" or make a bootable Hard disk, look at your own screenshot, there is a burn Icon.

kdum8 said:

I really don't know what's happening but inserting a blank DVD disk just sees it ejected again immediately.

Of course this is assuming that the reason I can't erase my macintosh partition is because the installer is on that drive. But isn't it supposed to be?

Click to expand...

Are you sure it is an empty DVD?
It should work, I see the disk burner inside your Disk Utility and the burn Icon, be sure you have an empty DVD.