eMac won't reinstall OSX,

[Pkupman57]

Hi guys,
I realize this has probably been discussed before, but Im not having much luck finding info.

I just recently got a freebie eMac.

It has a 38gig maxtor drive in it (probably the OEM drive) The guy I got i from has somehow erased everything on the drive, but i DO have the original DVDs for the system for OSX Panther. (gray disks) The problem I am having however, is that the install disc will not see the hard drive. Disk utility does, but I cannot erase it, or partition it. Every time I try, I get a failure message, and it says "unknown error: -20. Im not sure what to do now. Id like to get this system up and running, but Im not sure how to get OSX installed.

Any help, I would appreciate greatly (it was supposed to be a fully functional system prior, Id like to get it working again)

Thanks

 

[iamMacPerson]

Sounds like the drive is flat out dead. It would probably require replacement which isn't surprising considering the machine is at least 9 years old. The fact Disk Utility sees it but won't partition or format it indicates a bad drive.

It requires a standard IDE hard drive, although they are becoming hard to find. I would recommend getting a tested one off of eBay and try to replace it. Just know that its a PITA to open these eMacs.