Issues with target disk mode

[fkhuk]

I have a whitebook (circa early '09, still using Leopard) that has the flashing question mark folder. I am linking it to my MBPro that has Lion. I connect my firewire cable and hold down the t button on my whitebook. It goes into target disk mode but I can't find anything on my host computer to be able to access the files from the target computer.

Am I doing something wrong? I shut down both computers, connect the firewire cable, turn on the host computer, turn on the target computer and hold t until the firewire icon appears, and nothing happens after that.

 

[fkhuk]

bump...

 

[quasinormal]

Sorry. The folder with a question mark pre-boot suggests that that your Macbook's hard drive is dead. Try restarting with the option key held down and see if your HD appears.

 

[chibiterasu]

Sorry. The folder with a question mark pre-boot suggests that that your Macbook's hard drive is dead. Try restarting with the option key held down and see if your HD appears.

The folder means it can't find the file to boot from. The HDD won't appear on the option boot menu due to it begin a non bootable drive (hence question mark) you do need to be patient for the target disc to appear on the macbook pro it should show up under devices this can take a few mins and is not instant. I recently did with my iMac G4 and at first I thought it wasn't working. Hope this helps

Edit also you can (if you have it) put the mac osx disc in the mbp and boot that in to target mode by holding T and also boot the macbook into the option menu and wait for the disc to appear, click on it and wait then go to then utilities, then disc utility and see if the internal HDD in the mac book shows up.