Having difficulty with clean install onto SSD

rouxeny · Sep 15, 2014

I have an early 08 Mac Pro. It seems to be slowing down and I wanted to install a SSD.

I'm trying to do a clean install of mavericks and have run into some problems. Basically, the installer quits before the restart with a generic message about there being an error.

I've tried installing onto another HDD, and off a boot USB drive. No luck. Not sure what's happening, but I'm hitting a dead end.

Would this work instead?
1. Borrow friends MacBook Air
2. Using my USB boot/install drive, install Mavericks onto an external drive (or USB)
3. Connect external drive to my Mac Pro
4. Copy contents of external drive over to my SSD
5. Use migration assistant to bring over whatever I want from my original startup drive
6. Set SSD as boot disk

Seems like it should work, assuming mavericks install for one computer is the same as another.

Any thoughts?

h9826790 · Sep 15, 2014

Is it possible for you to just install it via Appstore? In my own experience, once you finish the download from Appstore, you can install Mavericks to which ever HDD you want, no need to make a USB drive.

Or, simply use Carbon Copy Clone to clone your current HDD's OS to the SSD + whatever the data you want.

rouxeny · Sep 15, 2014

I tried through the AppStore and had similar problems. That's why I tried a USB boot disk.

I could copy the OS, but I'm searching for the mythical "clean" install.

illusionx · Sep 15, 2014

You already have a restore partition on 10.9. Just boot of that and install it on your SSD instead of creating a USB boot drive.

Else, you can look for the osx boot disk assistant.

satcomer · Sep 15, 2014

I want to say to those that do a Mavericks Upgrade (from a previous older version of OS X) that dome hackies still reside in the guts off OS X! So down the freeware EtreCheck and anything that shows up in red manually delete that since it is not compatible with 10.9.x.

rouxeny · Sep 15, 2014

Ah, but I don't have a restore partition because I initially installed mavericks onto a raid 1 setup. I've since taken that apart, but still no restore partition.

That's one of the reasons I want to do a new install.

illusionx · Sep 15, 2014

Yeah.. Check this. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4848

Weaselboy · Sep 16, 2014

rouxeny said:
1. Borrow friends MacBook Air

illusionx said:
Yeah.. Check this. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4848

Does your friend's MBA have Mavericks on it? If so, here is what I would do.

Get a 1GB or larger USB key and use the recovery assistant tool illusions linked to make yourself a recovery key. This is essentially the recovery partition only on a USB key.

Now option key boot to the recovery key on your Pro. Start Disk util and go to the erase tab and format the entire disk to Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Then quit Disk Util and click reinstall OS X and wait for the ~5GB OS to download and install.

SgtPepper23 · Sep 16, 2014

Hmm, seems odd. Here's what i would try / going to do in January with Yosemite:
1) Make a Boot Drive using an 8 GB flash drive (http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/ap...ate-a-bootable-usb-to-install-os-x-mavericks/ or http://arstechnica.com/apple/2013/1...otable-os-x-10-9-mavericks-usb-install-drive/ )

2)Reboot, hold the Option key and choose the USB Drive
3) Choose Disk Utility in the Menu Bar
4) Wipe your drive(s) (i'm assuming you've already backed up prior to this shenanigans)
5) Make sure it will be formatted with the GUID Partition Table
6) Quit Disk Utility, and begin the Installer
7) Choose your preferred drive for installation

Hopefully that works. Check back with us!

rouxeny · Sep 16, 2014

Sgt, that's basically what I've done, but with Mavericks.

I'll try the other suggestions.

rouxeny · Sep 16, 2014

Tried Recovery Disk Assistant only seems to work for Lion. No dice.

I'm back to borrowing a friend's computer to install a copy of Mavericks onto either an external drive or a USB stick. Then copying it over to the SSD.

I would copy over my current copy of mavericks, but my startup disk has more than my SSD can hold, and I'm not sure what I'd need to copy over.

Yosemite can't come soon enough!

Weaselboy · Sep 17, 2014

rouxeny said:
Tried Recovery Disk Assistant only seems to work for Lion. No dice.

That utility works with Lion, Mt Lion, and Mavericks. What it does is copy the recovery partition from the machine you use to make the recovery key. So if you use a Lion machine to make the key, you will only get a Lion recovery key to install Lion. If you make the key with that utility on a Mavericks machine, you will get a recovery key that will install Mavericks.

Why are you thinking it only works with Lion? Did you make the key on a Mavericks machine?

rouxeny · Sep 17, 2014

I don't have a copy of recovery disk assistant on my computer. I found a version online at the apple support site, but it seems to run only with lion.

I thought Mavericks moved to internet recovery?

Regardless, I don't have a recovery partition anyways, as one is not created if you install onto a raid 1 setup.

Weaselboy · Sep 17, 2014

rouxeny said:
I don't have a copy of recovery disk assistant on my computer. I found a version online at the apple support site, but it seems to run only with lion.

I thought Mavericks moved to internet recovery?

Regardless, I don't have a recovery partition anyways, as one is not created if you install onto a raid 1 setup.

I understand that, but if you look at my post, I was suggesting use this tool on your friend's Air to make the USB recovery key. Not on your Pro.

The recovery disk assistant here needs to be installed on your friend's Air then run and assuming that Air is on Mavericks it will copy the 650MB Mavericks recovery partition from that Air to the USB key. Then that key will allow you to boot from it and install Mavericks. See this.

Mavericks has nothing to do with Internet recovery. Internet recovery is something that is built into the firmware of newer Macs on this list.

illusionx · Sep 17, 2014

Having difficulty with clean install onto SSD

rouxeny said:
I don't have a copy of recovery disk assistant on my computer. I found a version online at the apple support site, but it seems to run only with lion.

I thought Mavericks moved to internet recovery?

Regardless, I don't have a recovery partition anyways, as one is not created if you install onto a raid 1 setup.

AFAIK, The recovery assistant will install what came with your computer.

Weaselboy · Sep 17, 2014

illusionx said:
AFAIK, The recovery assistant will install what came with your computer.

Internet recovery will install what came with the computer. But the recovery assistant will install whatever version the recovery assistant key was made with. So if you make the recovery assistant key from a Lion machine, you will get Lion. Make it with Mavericks and you will get Mavericks.

NoBoMac · Sep 17, 2014

All these gyrations! Maybe I'm missing something here, but since OP seems to be able to install Lion, why can't OP just install Lion and then download Mavericks from the App Store?

Weaselboy · Sep 17, 2014

NoBoMac said:
All these gyrations! Maybe I'm missing something here, but since OP seems to be able to install Lion, why can't OP just install Lion and then download Mavericks from the App Store?

Maybe I am misreading, but I don't see where he has Lion running?

crjackson2134 · Sep 17, 2014

rouxeny said:
I have an early 08 Mac Pro. It seems to be slowing down and I wanted to install a SSD.

I'm trying to do a clean install of mavericks and have run into some problems. Basically, the installer quits before the restart with a generic message about there being an error.

I've tried installing onto another HDD, and off a boot USB drive. No luck. Not sure what's happening, but I'm hitting a dead end.

Would this work instead?
1. Borrow friends MacBook Air
2. Using my USB boot/install drive, install Mavericks onto an external drive (or USB)
3. Connect external drive to my Mac Pro
4. Copy contents of external drive over to my SSD
5. Use migration assistant to bring over whatever I want from my original startup drive
6. Set SSD as boot disk

Seems like it should work, assuming mavericks install for one computer is the same as another.

Any thoughts?

Will it still boot Mavericks from the drive you were replacing?

NoBoMac · Sep 17, 2014

I'm probably reading too much into the following, Weaselboy. OP said:

Tried Recovery Disk Assistant only seems to work for Lion. No dice.

I took it to mean OP was able to get the Lion installer to run.

Weaselboy · Sep 17, 2014

NoBoMac said:
I'm probably reading too much into the following, Weaselboy. OP said:

I took it to mean OP was able to get the Lion installer to run.

Could be. I thought maybe he was just misunderstanding the text here talking about the recovery disk assistant.

rouxeny · Sep 17, 2014

I'm running mavericks.

I appreciate all the help.

I can hopefully borrow the computer sometime over the next few days.

crjackson2134 · Sep 17, 2014

rouxeny said:
I'm running mavericks.

I appreciate all the help.

I can hopefully borrow the computer sometime over the next few days.

If you are running Mavericks successfully on the old drive try this:

Put he SSD in an external enclosure, or drive bay (carefully), then delete all partitions. Then clone your current (UN-clean but working) drive onto the new SSD. If this works, remove the old drive completely, then place the boot drive into your system. Once you confirm it's working, reboot into recovery mode (from the SSD), and restore from there. You should end up with a clean install from the recovery partition.

rouxeny · Sep 17, 2014

crjackson2134 said:
If you are running Mavericks successfully on the old drive try this:

Put he SSD in an external enclosure, or drive bay (carefully), then delete all partitions. Then clone your current (UN-clean but working) drive onto the new SSD. If this works, remove the old drive completely, then place the boot drive into your system. Once you confirm it's working, reboot into recovery mode (from the SSD), and restore from there. You should end up with a clean install from the recovery partition.

I would love to have done this, but my old drive is 1.5 tb full out of a total of 3 tb and my SSD is 480 gb.

I've managed to use my friend's computer to install Mavericks onto a usb drive.

It's slow, but it runs. I tried using the recovery partition from that to install Mavericks onto my ssd, but it wouldn't work.

Will now try just copying the contents of the usb. Essentially cloning.

crjackson2134 · Sep 17, 2014

I've got nothing. I hope you get it sorted.

Having difficulty with clean install onto SSD

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