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davshev

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Dec 31, 2022
12
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I have a 2009 iMac which was in my son's possession. Somehow the OS was wiped clean. I'm trying to reinstall High Sierra and have created a bootable disk on a flash drive. When it comes time to select the drive for installation, the only choice given is the flash drive disk...which says "this disk it is locked."
 

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I m very sure you need a copy of snow leopard to reboot or install anything on a Mac from that era,, pre Lion OSX.
I would suggest using the "internet recovery" method (command + R at startup)
which should reinstall to factory settings.
unless someone made a "Time Machine" back up of the iMac.
 
I m very sure you need a copy of snow leopard to reboot or install anything on a Mac from that era,, pre Lion OSX.
I would suggest using the "internet recovery" method (command + R at startup)
which should reinstall to factory settings.
unless someone made a "Time Machine" back up of the iMac.
It already had High Sierra on it and was working fine....until my son got hold of it.😞
 
It already had High Sierra on it and was working fine....until my son got hold of it.😞
that was installed onto Snow Leopard, then probably mavericks or Mt Lion.
My 2010 MacBook Air needs a fresh install of Snow Leopard when I get a new ssd drive.
even with using Internet recovery
 
The drive is listed under "Internal" ...
It's the device listed as "ST_M13FQBL Media"
The drive that you see (the disk is locked), is your USB flash drive, the one you are using for the installer.
So, you COULD try to erase the ST_M13FQBL Media.
Although that will likely end in an error of some kind. It appears to be a typical failure indication on an older Seagate hard drive.
 
The drive is listed under "Internal" ...
It's the device listed as "ST_M13FQBL Media"
The drive that you see (the disk is locked), is your USB flash drive, the one you are using for the installer.
So, you COULD try to erase the ST_M13FQBL Media.
Although that will likely end in an error of some kind. It appears to be a typical failure indication on an older Seagate hard drive.
Yes, I tried but got an error message..."erase process has failed."
 
That is your sign that the drive needs to be replaced.
And, I suggest that replacing that old spinner with with an SATA SSD will be a Good Thing™
 
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On the upside, you won't have to break through any stickies/paste to get into that model of iMac. The front glass is held on with magnets.
 
On the upside, you won't have to break through any stickies/paste to get into that model of iMac. The front glass is held on with magnets.
I don't think it's worth the trouble. You can get an 2009 iMac on Ebay for about the cost of the hard drive.
 
Failed internal drive.
Unless you really have a need for this iMac for some reason or other, best not to spend any money on it...
 
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@davshev First Aid did nothing?

Last resort, try from Terminal:
- list disks
Code:
diskutil list physical
- format internal disk as HFS+
Code:
diskutil eraseDisk JHFS+ Name GPT disk0
where disk0 is the internal disk identified from the previous command.
 
I don't think it's worth the trouble. You can get an 2009 iMac on Ebay for about the cost of the hard drive.
Not likely. eBay charges taxes now. Plus there's the shipping.

Not saying that it's worth your time or money to repair this machine, more so just that eBay is a ripoff in many cases.
 
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