Messed up Hard Drive... use for external?

[wflaw]

I had a blinking question mark every time i tried to boot up my macbook. I figured it was the hard drive, and wanted to get a bigger one. My wife thought it a good idea to get a "fix me stick", thought (at first) it helped her MBP. Then when I tried it on my macbook it wouldn't boot and hers started having problems too. I emailed fix me stick, they told me that it had probably quarantined something from the start up disc. All I need do was install fix me stick and undo what was done before. Someone must have thrown out the stick so....My question is do you think it possible to hook up hard drive externally and re-format the drive to use it for a boot drive to install apps and use for storage?

Thanks
Walt

 

[cwanja]

Are you tying to reformat the internal harddrive or the external one? It sounds like the internal harddrive is shot.

You can use an external drive for everything - OS, data, apps, etc. Dependinf on your Mac, use CMD+R and get into the recovery partition. From there you can use Disk Utility to check on the harddrive and or reinstall macOS to the internal (if working) or external drive.

 

[Audit13]

What is the specific model for the Macbook?

 

[wflaw]

Are you tying to reformat the internal harddrive or the external one? It sounds like the internal harddrive is shot.

You can use an external drive for everything - OS, data, apps, etc. Dependinf on your Mac, use CMD+R and get into the recovery partition. From there you can use Disk Utility to check on the harddrive and or reinstall macOS to the internal (if working) or external drive.

I guess I was unclear, the hard drive is no longer in the macbook The fix me stick messed it up, so I swapped in a new hard drive. My question is, can I re-format the old one to use as external hard drive. Apparently fix me stick quarantined some of the start up drive on the os so that it no longer booted, and since we couldn't find the fix me stick to try to undo whatever it did, I replaced it with a new one. I did'nt know if I could just erase the whole thing and use it for external storage or backup.

 

[Audit13]

You can connect the disk to the Mac and use disk utility to delete partitions, create new partitions, and format the drive.

 

[wflaw]

You can connect the disk to the Mac and use disk utility to delete partitions, create new partitions, and format the drive.

Thanks for that, I wasn't sure if I could just erase it. I couldn't do anything while it was in there for some reason. I thought maybe I'd hook it up externally so that i could use it to clean install OS, or partition it us some for that and another for backup. I may have 2 to play with as that fix me stick messed my wifes MBP's also. I learned not to use those kind of things to "clean up my mac". I had one "sweeper type" a long time ago and it didn't help the workings of the mac either (OS 9 if you remember).

 

[Audit13]

Personally, I keep TimeMachine backups so, when I run into an issue, I just wipe and restore. This saves a lot of time messing with the system and possibly making things worse.

 

[cwanja]

You can connect the disk to the Mac and use disk utility to delete partitions, create new partitions, and format the drive.

As @Audit13 mentioned, you can definitely just wipe it, partition it and use it for whatever purposes you need. A good suggestion would be to get a case, sled or something to protect the exterior of it. Never a good idea to just have the bare metal drive sitting out there.

 

[Fishrrman]

OP wrote:
"I guess I was unclear, the hard drive is no longer in the macbook The fix me stick messed it up, so I swapped in a new hard drive. My question is, can I re-format the old one to use as external hard drive."

Just connect the old hard drive to the Macbook.
You could use something like this (I have one and it works fine):
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-2-5-...478&sr=1-2-spell&keywords=sabremt+usb3+to+ssd

Once connected, open Disk Utility and select the old drive.
Then ERASE it to Mac OS extended with journaling enabled.

If it erases ok, I suggest you run Disk Utility's "repair disk" button on it.
Do you get "a good report"?

If so, REPEAT the repair disk function FIVE TIMES in succession
Do you get a good report every time?

If so, I'd continue to use the drive for external storage.

 

[Weaselboy]

I had a blinking question mark every time i tried to boot up my macbook.

If it started doing this all on its own without you installing any hardware or software that caused this, you likely have a failed drive. I would not risk using it even as an external.

 

[Gregg2]

Would you keep a car with chronic mechanical problems to use for short errands?

 

[wflaw]

Would you keep a car with chronic mechanical problems to use for short errands?

Yup I would, I'm a mechanic... However it probably was the fix me stick that messed it up. BUT, I bought a insignia docking station and that drive won't mount, just buzzes so it's probably toast.