I've take a SATA drive out of a Windows laptop. I've been told it can work in a MacBook Pro as long as it's formatted/erased (which may be wrong..?). I've installed the HDD into my MacBook, but when I hold Command-R it just starts up on a black screen (like the picture in the attachment, but Just "Start up Windows XP"... not safe mode or anything). And when I hold option, the drive to start up just says "Windows"... I can't access Disk Utility to format. Is it even possible?
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Can't format a HDD previously used in PC.
- Thread starter tuktukpirate
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The problem is you need to have something to boot to first to use OS X Disk Utility to erase the drive. It looks like you have already installed the drive and are trying to boot to it.
What year is your MacBook? If it is newer and on this list, you can hold command-option-r at boot to get to Internet Recovery and from there format the drive and install OS X.
What year is your MacBook? If it is newer and on this list, you can hold command-option-r at boot to get to Internet Recovery and from there format the drive and install OS X.
Thanks for the quick reply. It's a 2009. I can't use internet recovery because my MacBook airport module is busted and I use a USB internet stick for that...
I don't have an ethernet connection (basement apartment, just wifi).. looks like my problem may be able to get fixed if i could either fix my airport utility card or get an ethernet cable. and no, I don't have a disk version of the OS, I do have a version of Yosemite on a Bootable USB drive though.. but I thought the disk had to be formatted first before installing from the USB?
You can use that. Plug it in and hold the option key at boot and select the USB key to boot from. You can use Disk Util from the installer to format the disk.