Macbook Pro stuck on restore disc 2

[lauralil83]

Hi all,

Bit baffled by the issue that I have at the moment. I have a refurbed 17" MP from a non-Apple company, couple of years old now, and it was getting a bit sluggish. Apple sent me out some restore discs for it and when I was restoring it (erase and install after backing up my data) it got stuck in the installation

It is stuck on the part where it asks you to install disc 2, which I did, but after a few noises of it reading the disc, perhaps 20 seconds or so, it spits it out!

Has anyone ever come across this problem before? I have scoured the Internet but I can't find anything.

Might also be worth mentioning that I was running Leopard, but Apple sent me out Tiger discs. Which I wasn't too fussed about, the MP is just a spare for my other half to use so he doesn't need to use my work iMac.

Hope someone can point me in the right direction!

Thanks

Laura

 

[revs]

I'm about 90% sure that CD 2 just has apps such as iLife on it, and that the whole OS is on CD1.

So you should be able to reboot the machine, then login etc, and then insert CD2 and manually run the software installer for ilife and other things on there.

 

[GoCubsGo]

That's right. DVD 2 is typically "extras".

 

[lauralil83]

Yes that is true with newer versions, 1 install disc and 1 software disc.

But this is a machine specific install with 2 discs for the OS. I don't know why but it will not let me reboot and login, it goes back to the setup screen again and again

 

[Ivan P]

I'm about 90% sure that CD 2 just has apps such as iLife on it, and that the whole OS is on CD1.

So you should be able to reboot the machine, then login etc, and then insert CD2 and manually run the software installer for ilife and other things on there.

On "older" Macs it ejects disc 1 and makes you put in disc 2 during the install process, otherwise it won't progress any further - it was like this on my iMac that I got in June 2008. My early 2009 MacBook Pro, however, is as you described.

 

[kryptonianjorel]

Maybe the disk is bad? Either contact apple or scour the net for tiger restore disks (please, no piracy argument, she HAS a license for tiger)


Only other thing I can think of is, did this MBP come with tiger on it when it shipped, or did it ship with leopard? I know that tiger shouldnt/wouldnt install if its not supposed to, but maybe it got through disk 1 and failed on disk 2?


Try wiping the drive again and reinstalling. Maybe the HD has some bad sectors or is even failing, causing all this

I'll stop myself before I suggest any more, As I could come up with 10 other slightly plausible ideas...

 

[lauralil83]

Maybe the disk is bad? Either contact apple or scour the net for tiger restore disks (please, no piracy argument, she HAS a license for tiger)


Only other thing I can think of is, did this MBP come with tiger on it when it shipped, or did it ship with leopard? I know that tiger shouldnt/wouldnt install if its not supposed to, but maybe it got through disk 1 and failed on disk 2?


Try wiping the drive again and reinstalling. Maybe the HD has some bad sectors or is even failing, causing all this

I'll stop myself before I suggest any more, As I could come up with 10 other slightly plausible ideas...

I really appreciate all the replies!

This is the 2nd set of discs that I've had, so I'm sure its not the discs.

How do I wipe the drive and reinstall from this point? Its stuck on the install page, no matter how many times I reboot I can't get past this page.

its funny, when you buy a mac you spend so long getting used to things not going wrong that when they do go wrong you don't know how to fix them! I was an expert at fixing windows systems back in the day! haha!

 

[lauralil83]

Should also mention that it was shipped out with Tiger, upgraded to Leopard by the people who refurbed it.....then I attempted to restore back to Tiger.

 

[davidlv]

Have you tried clearing the PRAM (Option-Command-P-R keys held down at startup)? That may get you back to the initial OS install screen, and then, before clicking the install button, you can use the pull down menu to open Disk Utility and initialize the disk, making sure the new partition is correct for the machine (GUID for Intel-based machines).
Also try booting up with the option key held down to allow you to select the DVD install disk as the boot drive.
Good luck