Hard drive / SSD / OS X help!

[bredd]

first of all, im new to this forum, so im terribly sorry if i post this in the wrong section. Second, im typing this from a phone for reasons im about to mention. Hence the typos. Now, on to where i need help.

So a week ago, my macbook pro suddenly broke down. the screen froze. when i turned it off/on and i see a flashing folder with a question mark, instead of the usual; loading apple icon.

seeing no end to this, i talk to a friend of mine, who knows a lot about the subject. he told me that its most likely a broken hard drive and it needs to be replaced. i pick up an m4 crucial SSD (decided on doing an upgrade) and install it properly in my macbook.

oh, some background info on my computer: It is a macbook pro bought in november 2010 running osx snow leopard. which was the os it was running pre - crash.

anyhow, when i boot up my macbook (today) holding the alt key with the osx SL disc inside, i had a lot of issues formating and partitioning the SSD. i kept getting the: POSIX reports: The operation could not be completed. Cannot allocate memory.

after rebooting and such, partitioning the SSD suddenly worked and i installed SL on it and was happy as ****. however, i noticed several things that i thought were odd: it said that i had the newesr version of snow leopard possible, even though i did not. so, i couldnt update, nor could i download app store so i could buy mountain lion. i reboot it, and i get this:

a blinking folder with a question mark.

So i beg you MR, what shall i do!? i need a macbook up and running ASAP, preferably running mountain lion.

please, ask me if anything is unclear

 

[r0k]

first of all, im new to this forum, so im terribly sorry if i post this in the wrong section. Second, im typing this from a phone for reasons im about to mention. Hence the typos. Now, on to where i need help.

So a week ago, my macbook pro suddenly broke down. the screen froze. when i turned it off/on and i see a flashing folder with a question mark, instead of the usual; loading apple icon.

seeing no end to this, i talk to a friend of mine, who knows a lot about the subject. he told me that its most likely a broken hard drive and it needs to be replaced. i pick up an m4 crucial SSD (decided on doing an upgrade) and install it properly in my macbook.

oh, some background info on my computer: It is a macbook pro bought in november 2010 running osx snow leopard. which was the os it was running pre - crash.

anyhow, when i boot up my macbook (today) holding the alt key with the osx SL disc inside, i had a lot of issues formating and partitioning the SSD. i kept getting the: POSIX reports: The operation could not be completed. Cannot allocate memory.

after rebooting and such, partitioning the SSD suddenly worked and i installed SL on it and was happy as ****. however, i noticed several things that i thought were odd: it said that i had the newesr version of snow leopard possible, even though i did not. so, i couldnt update, nor could i download app store so i could buy mountain lion. i reboot it, and i get this:

a blinking folder with a question mark.

So i beg you MR, what shall i do!? i need a macbook up and running ASAP, preferably running mountain lion.

please, ask me if anything is unclear

I suggest you do everything via a usb drive. Ignore the HDD in your MBP until you get a bootable disk up and running. So you got some of your steps out of order. For me, when I get an SSD, I start by connecting it via an SATA to USB cable. I then partition it HFS+ Journaled, GUID partition scheme. Next I either clone my existing Macintosh HD or install a new OS on the thing. I boot from it via USB by holding option and if I'm satisfied that it is bootable, only then do I start unscrewing things. I know in your case the internal drive wasn't working but it's a LOT faster to swap things when you don't have to take out any screws.

Do you have a USB to SATA cable handy? I know they can be obtained on Monoprice or at Microcenter. At BestBuy they will be overpriced but still available. You can then get whatever drive you intend to use fully up and running the way you like it before you open your MBP again. Assuming you want to stick with the SSD no matter what, I'd suggest you go back to SL. Boot from SL for a few days and prove that it's working fine. When you do decide to go back to ML, the OS will try to create a recovery partition. This could set up another stumbling block for you so I suggest you prove your drive works before moving on. I can say that I only had problems installing OSX on one SSD out of over half a dozen I've installed and I took that drive back promptly. Crucial M4 is a good brand so I'm surprised you're having problems.

So I would put your original drive back in. Why? Because you're getting blinking ?-marks on both your old drive and on a brand new SSD. Then perform all your troubleshooting using an SATA to USB cable. If you can't get the SSD working, even if you think it's something wrong with your Mac, take it back. Pick one up later when you get your machine working properly. With the original drive in the machine, I suggest you make a genius bar appointment. They will look at an older out-of-Applecare machine for up to 1/2 an hour at no charge and they can do a lot in half an hour. When I was having problems with a Agility 3 SSD drive, they booted from an OS image over the network in the Apple store and proved to me the hardware in my Macbook was fine and it was either the drive or a corrupt OS image. I didn't care which and I took it back.

Hope this helps...