HELP having problems restoring

[thomasmith]

Apologies if this in the wrong place.
I am looking to sell my 2008 imac 8.1, i tried to do a clean install of snow leopard last night, wiping my hdd & installing the osx.
The install failed & since then every install i have tried has either hung for hours or greyed out on me.
As i wiped my hdd i now have no option but to boot from either from my leopard or snow leopard recovery disc - but this leads to nothing.

Any suggestions on how i can at least get an os back on my mac?!

 

[Brian33]

Hi. I've also got a 2008 iMac 8,1 but I'm not sure if I can help you. Here are my suggestions, in no particular order:

- even though I believe your machine should boot from the Snow Leopard install discs, try booting/installing from the original Leopard discs that came with the machine (if you haven't already).

- perhaps the problem has to do with the optical drive. My machine will boot from a USB "thumb" drive prepared with the Mountain Lion installer. If you have access to another Mac, prepare a USB flash drive with Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks (google for instructions).

- run the Apple Hardware Test (AHT) that came with the machine. Mine is on "Mac OS X Install Disc 1" and you "hold down the D key as the computer starts up."

- give more description of what happens when you try to boot and install. I suggest a new thread or changing the title of this thread to something like "2008 iMac 24" install (or boot?) fails with ..."