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rainman91

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 27, 2021
8
2
Help! Got past the spinning globe. Clicked on install Mountain Lion then computer. It asks what hard drive to install it on, but the hard drive is not listed in the box! How to get it listed so I can click on it??
 
Help! Got past the spinning globe. Clicked on install Mountain Lion then computer. It asks what hard drive to install it on, but the hard drive is not listed in the box! How to get it listed so I can click on it??
My thoughts are the internal drive has errors, formatted wrong, or has failed.

Were you trying to install Mountain Lion to fix a problem?
What Mac (model and year)?
What macOS were you using before trying to install ML?
What kind of internal/external drive do you have (HDD, SSD, or Fusion)?
 
It is a late 2012 macbook pro. Wanted to wipe it and start over. It originally had Mountain Lion so need to install that first, then will go to either High Sierra or Catalina.
 
It has 1 TB hard drive. The old fashioned type of hard drive. I am wiping it in order to return it to the EBay seller within the 30 day return policy. I need to edit videos but I am unable to comprehend how to do everything necessary at this time.
 
It has 1 TB hard drive. The old fashioned type of hard drive.

There is a way to do this, I will call their tech lady tomorrow am.

Unless someone knows how to get the hard drive to pop up into the box and can tell me today.

Thank you to anyone who might know how to do this, or link me a video.
 
Lets see if I got everything correct from your posts. I'll admit I'm a little confused because some information does not make sense.

You recently (within the past 30 days) got a late 2012 MBP from eBay. BTW - I only see a late 13" MBP with Retina listed (no DVD drive). Is that correct? If that is the model, then it only had Storage of 128, 256, 512, or 768 GB flash storage. No 1 TB hard drive (spinner).

You want to wipe the 1 TB old fashioned type of hard drive and install Mountain Lion and then High Sierra or Catalina.

You're wiping it in order to return it to the eBay seller within the 30 day return policy.

When you got the 2012 MBP, did it boot up okay and was it running Mountain Lion?
If the 2012 MBP was running Mojave or Catalina then the drive format would be APFS which is not recognizable by the Mountain Lion installer. The disk would NOT be a valid disk to install ML and would not show in the installer window. You would need to use Disk Utility to format the drive to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with a GUID Partition Map before installing ML.
 
Lets see if I got everything correct from your posts. I'll admit I'm a little confused because some information does not make sense.

You recently (within the past 30 days) got a late 2012 MBP from eBay. BTW - I only see a late 13" MBP with Retina listed (no DVD drive). Is that correct? If that is the model, then it only had Storage of 128, 256, 512, or 768 GB flash storage. No 1 TB hard drive (spinner).

You want to wipe the 1 TB old fashioned type of hard drive and install Mountain Lion and then High Sierra or Catalina.

You're wiping it in order to return it to the eBay seller within the 30 day return policy.

When you got the 2012 MBP, did it boot up okay and was it running Mountain Lion?
If the 2012 MBP was running Mojave or Catalina then the drive format would be APFS which is not recognizable by the Mountain Lion installer. The disk would NOT be a valid disk to install ML and would not show in the installer window. You would need to use Disk Utility to format the drive to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) with a GUID Partition Map before installing ML.
I didn't say it was a retina model. It's not. As I stated it is a late 2012 with the old fashioned hard drive.

So I called Apple and was initially on the phone with a friendly helpful representative. She got all of the information and then put me on hold to talk with a senior product specialist.

So the solution was to shut down the computer by clicking on the apple icon, then clicking shut down.

Wait a few moments. To be safe I waited almost a minute.

So now simultaneously hold down the command key, the option key and the R key with one hand. Press the power button with your other hand. Wait until you see the globe spinning, then you can release the three fingers holding those three keys.

When you get past the globe it bypasses old OS like Mountain Lion and High Sierra. So you click on install OS X. It then shows Catalina OS. Click on that and then it will show the hard drive which you select and then you can download Catalina.

Easy peasy. :cool:
 
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