No Boot Disk?

[Kirkle]

I have a 2013 iMac. Turned the iMac one, start-up sound plays -- gray screen for a long time (but often this does take a long time); goes to black screen, no boot disk.

Dead hard drive? Any suggestions?

 

[GGJstudios]

This may help, if you haven't seen them already:

• Mac OS X: Gray screen appears during startup
• Troubleshooting: My computer won't turn on
• Mac doesn't boot
• A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac
• OS X Mountain Lion: If a flashing question mark appears
• Mac OS X 10.6: If a flashing question mark appears

 

[Kirkle]

Thank you. Going through Apple's painfully slow re-install process right now, I'm just curious if the reason it happened in the first place is because the hard drive is going out.

 

[GGJstudios]

Thank you. Going through Apple's painfully slow re-install process right now, I'm just curious if the reason it happened in the first place is because the hard drive is going out.

That may certainly be a possibility. As soon as you're back up and running, it would be a good idea to get a current backup, just in case.

 

[Kirkle]

It's still under Applecare so I would suppose that I could get the HDD replace, correct? Not that there would be any point in doing so: I've been meaning to replace the internal HDD with an SSD eventually anyway (might be a good time to do it). I don't suppose there is any way I could take the iMac in and say, "Here take out the old hard drive that failed, and put in a new SSD that I bought."

Just kidding, I'm sure that breaks all kinds of Apple kosher.

 

[old-wiz]

If you take the iMac in to the Apple store they will replace the HDD with an identical HDD. They will NOT install anything you bring in.

Since the iMac is less than a year old I would get the HDD replaced regardless of whether or not you intend to go to SSD. This will give you a working HDD you could put in an external enclosure.