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Boot old 10.6.8 install from USB drive on iMac Late 2012

S

simonjones88

macrumors newbie
Original poster
I'm hoping someone can help with an issue I'm facing.

I recently upgraded from a late 2006 MacBook running 10.6.8 to a 27" iMac Late 2012 running 10.8

The MacBook is pretty much dead. It overheats, buzzes, hangs - hence the upgrade.
My problem is I can no longer use my copy of Logic 8 so I'm looking for a way to boot the old 10.6 install on the new machine.

Upgrading to Logic 9 isn't an option, as I work on projects with a partner who uses 8. We need to move between each other's setup, me upgrading would render his version obsolete.

I have removed the MacBook Hard Drive and put it in a USB 2 caddy, it mounts fine on the new machine under OS X 10.8, but I can't work out how to boot it.

I have tried:
  • Setting startup disk to 10.6 HD in a USB 2 caddy - this gets to the grey Apple logo and hangs (I left it for an hour)
  • Virtualisation in Parallels and VM Ware Fusion - I can't find options to boot from physical boot drive
  • VMWare/Parallels restore from 10.8 restore partition, then use startup disk when it loads and connect USB and use startup disk from there - reboots to restore partition again or says "not OS X Server powering down"
  • Making a .dmg of my 10.6 install disk to install on Parallels/VM and go form there - install disk image doesn't work either

There must be some way to get it to boot the old drive on the new hardware, directly or virtually 😕
Any help appreciated...

Thanks,
Si
 
Safe Mode might work, but it wouldn't be a very pleasant way to use the OS everyday. Normally you would Hold Shift+Command+V right after the startup tone. But since its a external you can try holding it after clicking the Snow Leopard hard drive icon (let go when you see text scrolling). If that works, post back the last few lines it hangs on.

You can also try the Parallels guide: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1365439/

But as for running the drive directly... I don't think Snow Leopard (even fully updated) has the necessary drivers to boot on the Late 2012 iMac. You could try asking advice on a Hackintosh forum, they do this kind of stuff all the time.
 
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"My problem is I can no longer use my copy of Logic 8 so I'm looking for a way to boot the old 10.6 install on the new machine."

You might be able to coax 10.6 to run inside a virtual machine, but there is no way you're going to be able to boot a 2012 iMac with OS 10.6. Not going to happen.
 
simonjones88 said:
I'm hoping someone can help with an issue I'm facing.

I recently upgraded from a late 2006 MacBook running 10.6.8 to a 27" iMac Late 2012 running 10.8

The MacBook is pretty much dead. It overheats, buzzes, hangs - hence the upgrade.
My problem is I can no longer use my copy of Logic 8 so I'm looking for a way to boot the old 10.6 install on the new machine.

Upgrading to Logic 9 isn't an option, as I work on projects with a partner who uses 8. We need to move between each other's setup, me upgrading would render his version obsolete.

I have removed the MacBook Hard Drive and put it in a USB 2 caddy, it mounts fine on the new machine under OS X 10.8, but I can't work out how to boot it.

I have tried:
  • Setting startup disk to 10.6 HD in a USB 2 caddy - this gets to the grey Apple logo and hangs (I left it for an hour)
  • Virtualisation in Parallels and VM Ware Fusion - I can't find options to boot from physical boot drive
  • VMWare/Parallels restore from 10.8 restore partition, then use startup disk when it loads and connect USB and use startup disk from there - reboots to restore partition again or says "not OS X Server powering down"
  • Making a .dmg of my 10.6 install disk to install on Parallels/VM and go form there - install disk image doesn't work either

There must be some way to get it to boot the old drive on the new hardware, directly or virtually 😕
Any help appreciated...

Thanks,
Si
Click to expand...

What does Disk Utility say about the now external hard drive? If the information at the bottom recognizes it as bootable then you might be closer than you think to being able to boot from it. I would recommend getting an external HDD dock that is usb 3.0 compatible though because the usb 2.0 will probably give you a headache.

Select Get Info when you boot into ML on the icon for your external and see if the checkbox is checked for ignore ownership; if it is, uncheck it. SL Leopard is Intel, so you should be able to boot from the external.

A am running Lion and was able to boot OS X 10.5(the version I cloned from an iMac G5) from an external HDD. On the same external, I have OS X 10.4, 10.5, 10.6, and 10.7 cloned on separate partitions and all bootable(except for 10.4 though because I was dumb and removed the Intel architecture before cloning it and now only my iBook G4 and iMac G5 recognize that partition).

Do you happen to have the server version of SL? If so, that is one of the few versions of OS X that is legally bootable from a virtual machine in VirtualBox.
 
If you arent using any of the new features in logic 9 (flex time, new plugins etc) then you should be able to open the session in logic 8 fine. It'll complain that it was created in a newer version, but should open fine.

I'd be very surprised if you could get the imac to boot from snow leopard, as there wont be any drivers for any of the newer components. For all the heartache it might be more worth while just upgrading to logic 9.
 
Thanks for all the replies, everyone!

So I've spent a fair amount of time on this over the last couple of days.

Quad5Ny
  • Shift+Command+V showed it hanging at "loading drivers... Loading system\library\caches\com.apple.kext.caches\startup\extensions.mkext"
  • Safe mode didn't do anything different I'm afraid.
  • The Parallels guide you posted proved the most usefull. I managed to do a fresh SL install in Parallels and VM. Bad news is it fell down trying to install Logic (0MB VRAM within parallels and VMWARE - no QE/CI support). I copied my original 10.6 app file to the virtual machine and that ran, but I couldn't get any audio drivers to work. So in theory, Logic was running, but I had no audio.

RedCroissant
  • The Ignore Ownership option you posted didn't seem to have any effect

As a last ditch I copied Logic from my 10.6 applications folder to my 10.8 applications folder. I launched it on 10.8 and to my surprise IT RAN! 😀
I had to enter my serial number and everything again, and it ran a lengthy plugin test, but once that was all done it loaded and I was able to work on my current project immediately!
It's not as speedy as I expected, but I guess that's a compatibility issue and it still smashes the performance of my old macbook.
I think where a lot of people have fallen down is not having an existing install that they can copy over. I found the installer wouldn't run, but the installed app would -odd!

Thanks for your help again guys.

Si
 
simonjones88 said:
As a last ditch I copied Logic from my 10.6 applications folder to my 10.8 applications folder. I launched it on 10.8 and to my surprise IT RAN! 😀
Click to expand...

That's interesting to know. That probably figures that you could use an application like Pacifist to force Logic 8 to install.
 
pulsewidth947 said:
That's interesting to know. That probably figures that you could use an application like Pacifist to force Logic 8 to install.
Click to expand...

Please tell me more. I also do not want to spend the money on the newest logic. I spent hundreds on Logic Studio years ago and I only use it for voice over work. Now since I upgraded my computer I cannot run it any longer. I really don't want to mess with my HD. I want it to be able to work. Is there anything for this issue?
 
I have read of some successes booting Snow Leopard, but it requires installation of a minimum 10.6.7 and the last full retail install release by Apple was 10.6.3.

If you search the internet however there have been user modified Install DVDs that will install 10.6.7 (which, after booted, can then be upgraded to 10.6.8 by use of Software Update).

Also, can you be more specific about what your problem was with the installation of Logic in Snow Leopard installed in Parallels?

[click on image to enlarge]
 

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