Mac Disk bootable

[Joshua Boyd]

What makes a Mac disk bootable?  I have a SATA WD800 that has been my  
system disk for quite some time, but it seems to have a damaged file  
system[0].  I'm trying to use carboncopycloner to copy the contents  
to a Apple labeled WD1600 SATA drive.  CCC says it was successful,  
but then the machine refuses to boot from the new drive when I  
disconnect the old one.

As these are SATA drives, I don't have a firewire case to try booting  
externally from.

Are there any utilities on the install DVD that might help?

This is a Tiger machine, BTW.  10.4.11 to be exact.

Also, for a bit of background, the machine had started acting like it  
had a failing disk a few weeks ago (IO errors in dmesg), but when I  
tried moving it to a USB cable to rescue files, it operated  
perfectly.  Then, as a last ditch effort, I let it upgrade from  
10.4.10 to 10.4.11, and that made the disk mostly start behaving,  
except for the troubles I'm now having.  However, it certainly is no  
longer griping in dmesg.

[0]  I'm having two problems, which I'm hoping are connected.  First,  
there are 3 directories that I can't delete.  Finder and rmdir both  
say the directories aren't empty, but ls -al says they are empty.  
Second, there are three errors on the disk that disk can't correct in  
the extents overflow file.  Third, the machine says that the disk is  
full so it can't page anything more from memory, so what program do I  
want to kill?  However, the disk is only half full, and I've been  
keeping Activity Monitor open, and it says that there is 250-300 megs  
of inactive pages, so it isn't really out of memory even.  BTW, I  
don't know if this is an anomaly, but Activity Monitor often says  
that my VM size exceeds 12 gigs.
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[Chris-224]

Don't you have to bless the disk, or am I thinking of the pre-OS X days?

Which machine is it specifically? Sawtooth, Quicksilver, MDD? Macs have  
all sorts of voodoo to perform when they misbehave...

On Fri, 23 May 2008 07:44:34 -0500, Joshua Boyd <jdboyd@...> wrote:

> What makes a Mac disk bootable?  I have a SATA WD800 that has been my  
> system disk for quite some time, but it seems to have a damaged file  
> system[0].  I'm trying to use carboncopycloner to copy the contents to a  
> Apple labeled WD1600 SATA drive.  CCC says it was successful, but then  
> the machine refuses to boot from the new drive when I disconnect the old  
> one.
>
> As these are SATA drives, I don't have a firewire case to try booting  
> externally from.
>
> Are there any utilities on the install DVD that might help?
>
> This is a Tiger machine, BTW.  10.4.11 to be exact.
>
> Also, for a bit of background, the machine had started acting like it  
> had a failing disk a few weeks ago (IO errors in dmesg), but when I  
> tried moving it to a USB cable to rescue files, it operated perfectly.  
> Then, as a last ditch effort, I let it upgrade from 10.4.10 to 10.4.11,  
> and that made the disk mostly start behaving, except for the troubles  
> I'm now having.  However, it certainly is no longer griping in dmesg.
>
> [0]  I'm having two problems, which I'm hoping are connected.  First,  
> there are 3 directories that I can't delete.  Finder and rmdir both say  
> the directories aren't empty, but ls -al says they are empty.  Second,  
> there are three errors on the disk that disk can't correct in the  
> extents overflow file.  Third, the machine says that the disk is full so  
> it can't page anything more from memory, so what program do I want to  
> kill?  However, the disk is only half full, and I've been keeping  
> Activity Monitor open, and it says that there is 250-300 megs of  
> inactive pages, so it isn't really out of memory even.  BTW, I don't  
> know if this is an anomaly, but Activity Monitor often says that my VM  
> size exceeds 12 gigs.
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue

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[Joshua Boyd]

On May 23, 2008, at 8:52 AM, Acheron wrote:

> Don't you have to bless the disk, or am I thinking of the pre-OS X  
> days?
>
> Which machine is it specifically? Sawtooth, Quicksilver, MDD? Macs  
> have all sorts of voodoo to perform when they misbehave...

DA with a SIIG SATA card.
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[Nadine Miller]

Joshua Boyd wrote:
> On May 23, 2008, at 8:52 AM, Acheron wrote:
>
>> Don't you have to bless the disk, or am I thinking of the pre-OS X days?
>>
>> Which machine is it specifically? Sawtooth, Quicksilver, MDD? Macs
>> have all sorts of voodoo to perform when they misbehave...
>
> DA with a SIIG SATA card.

I believe you still have to bless the disk after restoring, just like
you'd have to write a boot block on a Sun box.

You should be able to get a terminal up on the box after booting an OS
CD/DVD so you can run the bless command.

=Nadine=
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[Joshua Boyd]

On May 23, 2008, at 6:05 PM, Nadine Miller wrote:

> Joshua Boyd wrote:
>> On May 23, 2008, at 8:52 AM, Acheron wrote:
>>> Don't you have to bless the disk, or am I thinking of the pre-OS  
>>> X days?
>>>
>>> Which machine is it specifically? Sawtooth, Quicksilver, MDD?  
>>> Macs have all sorts of voodoo to perform when they misbehave...
>> DA with a SIIG SATA card.
>
> I believe you still have to bless the disk after restoring, just  
> like you'd have to write a boot block on a Sun box.
>
> You should be able to get a terminal up on the box after booting an  
> OS CD/DVD so you can run the bless command.

I can't boot from the DVD.  It crashes everytime.  I don't have any  
other PPC macs around to test my disk on.

Is it possible to run the bless command when booted from another  
harddrive?  The name of the new disk is DA G4.  I'm trying this  
command in Terminal.app while booted from another disk:
sudo bless --verbose --folder "/Volumes/DA G4/System/Library/
CoreServices" --bootinfo --setBoot

It makes some slightly worrisome comments about:
Device IS NOT whole
Apple_HFS partition. No external loader
Device IS NOT whole
Apple_HFS partition. No external loader

But, it then appears to be setting openfirmware.

However, when I reboot, it fails to boot unless I reconnect the old  
disk (in which case it boots from the old disk).  Holding down the  
option key doesn't show me the new drive as a choice.

I forget if I mentioned, but the old drive is a retail drive, but the  
new one is from a G5 I believe (although I reformatted it).
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[Jonathan C. Patschke]

On Sat, 24 May 2008, Joshua Boyd wrote:

> Is it possible to run the bless command when booted from another
> harddrive?  The name of the new disk is DA G4.  I'm trying this
> command in Terminal.app while booted from another disk:

Is the disk partitioned with an Apple_Partition_Map as opposed to a GUID
partition table or MBR?

--
Jonathan Patschke | "There is more to life than increasing its speed."
Elgin, TX         |                                   --Mahatma Gandhi
USA               |
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[Joshua Boyd]

On May 24, 2008, at 2:55 AM, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:

> On Sat, 24 May 2008, Joshua Boyd wrote:
>
>> Is it possible to run the bless command when booted from another
>> harddrive?  The name of the new disk is DA G4.  I'm trying this
>> command in Terminal.app while booted from another disk:
>
> Is the disk partitioned with an Apple_Partition_Map as opposed to a  
> GUID
> partition table or MBR?

Since the drive was a pull from an iMac G5, I would have thought it  
would have had a Apple_Partition_Map (unless they stopped using that  
when they went to G5s).

I couldn't figure out how to check that, but I did figure out how to  
use diskutil to force that.  The drive is now being copied over  
again, then I will try running bless again (although it still seems  
odd to me that CCC would state the copy will be bootable if I still  
have to run bless manuall), followed by actually retrying to boot  
from the drive.

Thanks.
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[Mark Benson-2]

On 24 May 2008, at 17:06, Joshua Boyd wrote:

> On May 24, 2008, at 2:55 AM, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 24 May 2008, Joshua Boyd wrote:
>>
>>> Is it possible to run the bless command when booted from another
>>> harddrive?  The name of the new disk is DA G4.  I'm trying this
>>> command in Terminal.app while booted from another disk:
>>
>> Is the disk partitioned with an Apple_Partition_Map as opposed to a  
>> GUID
>> partition table or MBR?
>
> Since the drive was a pull from an iMac G5, I would have thought it  
> would have had a Apple_Partition_Map (unless they stopped using that  
> when they went to G5s).

PPC = APM
x86 = GUID

That's how partition maps pan out on Apple machines. I'm a bit fuzzy  
about booting across platforms though, AFAIK Intel machines only  
*boot* GUID and PPC only *boot* APM, because of what the firmwares are  
setup to recognise. They will both *mount* both types once booted into  
OS X however.

> I couldn't figure out how to check that, but I did figure out how to  
> use diskutil to force that.  The drive is now being copied over  
> again, then I will try running bless again (although it still seems  
> odd to me that CCC would state the copy will be bootable if I still  
> have to run bless manuall), followed by actually retrying to boot  
> from the drive.

In the OS X Disk Utility.app (accessible from either the boot DVD or  
the OS) you can see at the bottom of the window when you select a  
drive what partition map it has installed. A G5 iMac should have been  
using APM. A friend of mine had issues, however, taking an APM  
partitioned drive from another Mac and trying to use it as a boot  
drive on a PowerMac G5, so there may be some voodoo between G5s and  
other machines? Dunno for sure.

My advice would be if possible erase the entire drive, preferably  
changing the partition map at the same time, in the G4 you are using  
it with.


--
Mark Benson

My Blog:
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Visit my Homepage: <http://homepage.mac.com/markbenson>

"Never send a human to do a machine's job..."
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[Joshua Boyd]

On Sat, May 24, 2008 at 05:34:42PM +0100, Mark wrote:

> >Since the drive was a pull from an iMac G5, I would have thought it  
> >would have had a Apple_Partition_Map (unless they stopped using that  
> >when they went to G5s).
>
> PPC = APM
> x86 = GUID
>
> That's how partition maps pan out on Apple machines. I'm a bit fuzzy  
> about booting across platforms though, AFAIK Intel machines only  
> *boot* GUID and PPC only *boot* APM, because of what the firmwares are  
> setup to recognise. They will both *mount* both types once booted into  
> OS X however.

That's kinda what I thought, but then I wondered if the stuck with APM
once they stopped being able to boot Classic.

> >I couldn't figure out how to check that, but I did figure out how to  
> >use diskutil to force that.  The drive is now being copied over  
> >again, then I will try running bless again (although it still seems  
> >odd to me that CCC would state the copy will be bootable if I still  
> >have to run bless manuall), followed by actually retrying to boot  
> >from the drive.
>
> In the OS X Disk Utility.app (accessible from either the boot DVD or  
> the OS) you can see at the bottom of the window when you select a  
> drive what partition map it has installed. A G5 iMac should have been  
> using APM. A friend of mine had issues, however, taking an APM  
> partitioned drive from another Mac and trying to use it as a boot  
> drive on a PowerMac G5, so there may be some voodoo between G5s and  
> other machines? Dunno for sure.
>
> My advice would be if possible erase the entire drive, preferably  
> changing the partition map at the same time, in the G4 you are using  
> it with.

I used diskutil to write a new partition map (APM), repartition, and
reformat.  When I left to go to work, I left CCC copying the old disk
over (set to ignore the problem directories).
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[Joshua Boyd]

On May 24, 2008, at 2:55 AM, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:

> On Sat, 24 May 2008, Joshua Boyd wrote:
>
>> Is it possible to run the bless command when booted from another
>> harddrive?  The name of the new disk is DA G4.  I'm trying this
>> command in Terminal.app while booted from another disk:
>
> Is the disk partitioned with an Apple_Partition_Map as opposed to a  
> GUID
> partition table or MBR?

Yay!

As I mentioned in my first reply, I tried resetting everything with  
diskutil from the command line.

And it worked now!

Hopefully this fixes all of my biggest problems.  It has definitely  
fixed the fdisk errors and the un-delete-able directory issues.  I'm  
just hoping it fixes the memory issue (the error I was getting was  
complaining about being out of disk space for swap, meanwhile  
activity monitor would show 250-300 megs inactive while also the disk  
was only half full).
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