why can't i start-up on snow leopard disc?

[SPNarwhal]

I try to restart my computer and hold C on start up to start up on Snow Leopard Disc, and it begins to show the loading circle, but then comes down telling me to restart my computer by holding down the Power Button.

When I turn the computer back on and it loads to the OS, it tells me it shut down based on a problem or something like that and to "ignore, or report"

What is going on? It's worked before. It should start up to show options to install snow leopard and wipe the disc, etc etc. Fresh install or upgrade.

I tried startup with holding option and selecting the disc as well, no go. I cleaned the disc and it's not scratched or anything. What is going on?

 

[r.j.s]

Are you using a gray disc or retail?

If it is gray, is it the one that came with your machine?

 

[SPNarwhal]

It's a retail disc. It's white and has the snow leopard on it.
It's not the one that came with my machine since my machine was a 2010 model and came with Leopard.
But I have been able to boot to this disc before.

 

[Naimfan]

Your optical drive could be faulty--try an an external if you can.

Edited to remove scratched/dirty disc possibility.

 

[laflores]

Put your Snow Leopard disc in the drive. Turn off your computer. Press and hold the OPTION key and turn it on. Keep holding the OPTION key until you see the boot menu. Wait for some seconds, and your disc should show as a boot option.

 

[SPNarwhal]

Put your Snow Leopard disc in the drive. Turn off your computer. Press and hold the OPTION key and turn it on. Keep holding the OPTION key until you see the boot menu. Wait for some seconds, and your disc should show as a boot option.

I've done this, still does not work.

It starts to read the disc and will show the segmented circle loader thing, and it shows as if it's loading from the disc. But then a message appears saying to shut down the computer (in a bunch of different languages) and shoes a power symbol.

 

[Naimfan]

Try an external optical drive.

 

[adcx64]

Go to preferences ---- startup disk--- select the os x install disk.

 

[frankieboy]

My MBP 2011 won't start up off of SL retail discs either, because the 2011 MBP requires a special build of SL. Most SL retail discs are probably 10.6.3: the 20111 MBP requires a special build of 10.6.6 or 10.6.7.

So what you are experiencing may be perfectly normal, depending on your model. Use the disc that came with your computer instead.

 

[mr1]

My MBP 2011 won't start up off of SL retail discs either, because the 2011 MBP requires a special build of SL. Most SL retail discs are probably 10.6.3: the 20111 MBP requires a special build of 10.6.6 or 10.6.7.

So what you are experiencing may be perfectly normal, depending on your model. Use the disc that came with your computer instead.

What he said... no current retail discs will work with 2011 mbp.

 

[discounteggroll]

My MBP 2011 won't start up off of SL retail discs either, because the 2011 MBP requires a special build of SL. Most SL retail discs are probably 10.6.3: the 20111 MBP requires a special build of 10.6.6 or 10.6.7.

So what you are experiencing may be perfectly normal, depending on your model. Use the disc that came with your computer instead.

Good to know. Hope the 10.6.7 retail discs hit shelves soon

 

[keantan]

Would like to point out from experience that generally mac's won't boot from OS X disks that contain versions of OS X that are older than the its shipped version. I.e. a computer that shipped with 10.6.5 wont boot from a 10.6.0 cd. (I don't change computer too often but this has always been the case for me).

 

[snaky69]

I've done this, still does not work.

It starts to read the disc and will show the segmented circle loader thing, and it shows as if it's loading from the disc. But then a message appears saying to shut down the computer (in a bunch of different languages) and shoes a power symbol.

That's a kernel panic. Probably caused by a hardware problem seeing as it's on startup. You could have bad ram, an optical drive going bad or even a logic board problem.

 

[Mal]

It's not the one that came with my machine since my machine was a 2010 model and came with Leopard.

You actually have a late 2009 model, because the 2010 models came with 10.6.3.

My MBP 2011 won't start up off of SL retail discs either, because the 2011 MBP requires a special build of SL. Most SL retail discs are probably 10.6.3: the 20111 MBP requires a special build of 10.6.6 or 10.6.7.

So what you are experiencing may be perfectly normal, depending on your model. Use the disc that came with your computer instead.

And he definitely doesn't have a 2011 model, so this isn't accurate. The retail disk should work fine.

OP, as noted, you probably have a bad disk or optical drive. Could even be failing RAM, though it'd be unusual for it only to cause the kernel panic when you try to boot from the OS disk.

jW