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Pures

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 23, 2009
20
0
British Columbia, Canada
Hi guys, well I'm new to the forums. Today I just replaced my old Fujitsu 160GB HD for a WD 320BEVT. I have a white 2.4GHz MB got it around Aug 08. I have gone through the steps of how to install the new HD into the MB and I did everything correctly. But when I try to power on the MacBook, the MB does not recognize the HD. I have taken out the HD and putting it in more securely about 5 times, but there is no luck... I also went into Disk Utility and I only see the Mac OSX CD and no HD. I even tried going in to the Disk Profile and lucky it has the HD and some of it's specs. I also tried holding down Alt when it boots, but I see a "Flashing Earth" symbol. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Or is the HD faulty even though I see it in Disk Profile. Help would be appreciated and thanked.
 

FieryFurnace

macrumors 6502
Sep 19, 2008
359
0
Berlin, Germany
How do I format it if the Hard Drive is not detected? :confused:
I just bought this Hard drive today and I thinking it is DOA, but I can see it in System Profiler.

Don't you have a USB-SATA external enclosure?
If you put it in there, you still cannot see the new HDD in DiskUtility?
 

JMP

macrumors member
Oct 27, 2007
96
5
I will try that out once I get my enclosure. Thanks you for all the advice. Much is appreciated.

You have to put your new HD in an external enclosure and format it using the GUID partition table.
Once it's done, you can put it back in your MacBook.
 

Pures

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 23, 2009
20
0
British Columbia, Canada
You have to put your new HD in an external enclosure and format it using the GUID partition table.
Once it's done, you can put it back in your MacBook.

So, basically when I get my enclosure, I just boot the hard drive with the DVD and open Disk Utility and format + partition from there? If that is not correct, please tell me how. Thank you so much everyone.
 

catalyst11

macrumors newbie
Mar 18, 2009
9
0
Mpls
When I replaced my hard drive (without an external enclosure), I just had to go into disk utility and format it, then OS X would install. I'm not sure why it wouldn't work in your Macbook right now. It's odd that it wouldn't even see it in disk utility.
 

alphaod

macrumors Core
Feb 9, 2008
22,183
1,245
NYC
When you boot, press and hold down the OPTION key on your keyboard (right when you hear the optical drive); when it shows the boot menu, release the OPTION key and choose your internal HDD. When you boot into OS X and log in, go to :apple:—>System Preferences—>Startup Disk and then choose your internal disk.

mr_choose_startup_disk-7336955.png


Restart your computer and it should now boot into your internal HDD by default.
 

jw2002

macrumors 6502
Feb 23, 2008
392
59
You have to put your new HD in an external enclosure and format it using the GUID partition table.

Why? Can't you just physically install the drive and then boot with the OS X install dvd? If the installer doesn't offer to properly partition and make the file system, then run Disk Utility and do it manually.
 
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