My Mac froze so I restarted it and was greeted with "?" folder. I tried internet recovery and my hard drives aren't showing up. I was going to reinstall OS X but both hard drives won't show up. Could it be a bad hard drive connector and if so is it something simple I can do myself?
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Mac mini (2012) hard drive problem
- Thread starter risk235
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No time machine backup. I did only iCloud. The hard drive makes a slight scratching noise then it stops.
risk235 wrote above:
[[ No time machine backup. I did only iCloud. The hard drive makes a slight scratching noise then it stops. ]]
You have an appropriate username. Too much "risk" the way you're doing things now.
Your situation as it stands now is why I recommend that all Mac users keep at least one BOOTABLE CLONED BACKUP created with either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper.
If had a bootable backup -- instead of the all-but-useless "cloud" -- you could be back up and running in about 3 minutes. And from that point, go forward to ascertain what the trouble is. Just connect the backup, turn on the Mac, and get to it.
Sounds like it could be a physical failure of the internal HDD. Internet recovery won't work if there isn't a physical drive upon which to install the incoming software.
If I was in your position, I'd suggest:
- A new drive (consider an SSD, I suggest Crucial)
- A USB3 enclosure (such as this one):
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003VKTJGW...UTF8&colid=R75PP4I2A0BE&coliid=I3DOKZ31SP7539
- Put the drive into the enclosure, retry internet recovery, and "aim" the software install at the new drive (you'll have to initialize it first)
- Boot the Mini externally for the moment, just to get it running.
- Get the data you need from the cloud and restore it to the external drive.
- Once everything seems OK, THEN consider installing the drive INTO the Mini.
If this works, get another drive for the enclosure, and create a bootable cloned backup to keep close by.
Then you won't have to face "I can't boot" situations, such as you have now!
[[ No time machine backup. I did only iCloud. The hard drive makes a slight scratching noise then it stops. ]]
You have an appropriate username. Too much "risk" the way you're doing things now.
Your situation as it stands now is why I recommend that all Mac users keep at least one BOOTABLE CLONED BACKUP created with either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper.
If had a bootable backup -- instead of the all-but-useless "cloud" -- you could be back up and running in about 3 minutes. And from that point, go forward to ascertain what the trouble is. Just connect the backup, turn on the Mac, and get to it.
Sounds like it could be a physical failure of the internal HDD. Internet recovery won't work if there isn't a physical drive upon which to install the incoming software.
If I was in your position, I'd suggest:
- A new drive (consider an SSD, I suggest Crucial)
- A USB3 enclosure (such as this one):
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003VKTJGW...UTF8&colid=R75PP4I2A0BE&coliid=I3DOKZ31SP7539
- Put the drive into the enclosure, retry internet recovery, and "aim" the software install at the new drive (you'll have to initialize it first)
- Boot the Mini externally for the moment, just to get it running.
- Get the data you need from the cloud and restore it to the external drive.
- Once everything seems OK, THEN consider installing the drive INTO the Mini.
If this works, get another drive for the enclosure, and create a bootable cloned backup to keep close by.
Then you won't have to face "I can't boot" situations, such as you have now!
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You've got two drives - but a system on only one? if you have access to another Mac you can put a system on a USB stick or external drive and then install a system on the good drive.
M.
