Error trying to re-install Mac OSX on Macbook Pro

You probably partitioned the drive as Apple Partition Map mode which works only with Power PC chip Macs. Intel chip Macs require GUID Mode to be bootable.

Reformat the drive and this time, click on the Partition button to format/partition your external drive as GUID.

Meant your internal drive, not external. Sorry. In any case it has to be formatted as Apple Extended Format - Journalled and partitioned as GUID.

cheers guys,

In relation to the disc I'm almost certain that its an intel specific disc because it came packaged with the mac. I've also tried numerous other intel discs thinking that there was a problem with mine.

I did re-format the hard drive and I think Strung might have it there, I'll reformat it tonight as Apple Extended and partition as GUID and get back to you.

hi guys, I re-formated the HD using Mac OS Extended (journaled) and then created a partitiion using the GUID option.

This gives me the same problem as before, the OS will not install on my machine.

I ran a disk verification on the Mac OS Install Disc and it came up with an error along the lines of...

"error: the underlying task reported failure on exit"

Have no idea if that helps in any way though?

Sounds like the install disk is damaged.

agreed, if you're pretty sure you're using either the DVD that came with the Mac (whatever version shipped with yours), or a Leopard Upgrade DVD, it should install OK.

now that the disk verification failed, this is almost certainly the reason.

i'd never encountered a 'disk verification' function in other/non-Apple products before.  when a MacFanBoi friend watched me install my Leopard upgrade, i went to bypass this disk verification step (which takes an HOUR or more!) because it seemed "stoopid", but he insisted on it! <shrugs>

must be all part of the Apple Special Sauce :(

Could it be anything else other than the disc, the only reason I'm asking is because I've tried using other discs with the same response (the whole "error - MAc OS cannot be installed on this computer" effort).

I guess I'll try and look for one more set of leopard install discs and failing that it might be a trip to the apple store. Damiit.

I'm pretty sure its something other than the disc, I tried my fourth install disc this time with vers 10.4.8 and had the same results. I've set the erase off using disc utility to do a 7 pass erase and then I'll try again, kinda hoping that a clean HD might in some way help.

Did you consider the possibility that your internal DVD drive is the culprit? One way to get around that would be to use another startup device. Do you have access to an external DVD drive? If not, can you make a disk image of the install DVD and copy it onto an external HD (Press and hold Option at startup to mount all available bootable devices)? You can start the installation process from the mounted image on the external drive. Lastly, if you have access to another Mac, you can use Target Mode to load the install disk.

I hadn't considered that, but that could also explain the disk verification errors.... I have another slightly newer macbook pro which I can boot the disk from, I'll look into Target Mode and get back to you tomorrow (unfortunately I dont have both with me right now.)

cheers

interesting.  yeah if more than 1 install disk set fail 'disc verification', it goes back to pointing at hardware.

did you have any problems with the DVD drive prior to wiping the system?

at what stage / how long after the power-on sound does this install error come up?

have you cleared the PRAM/NVRAM & reset the SMC ?

has the drive been partitioned with just 1 active partition in a GUID scheme?
(i can't be sure from above comments whether the OS X DVDs are booting as far as the drive preparation stage (where you choose where to install, & can run Disk Utility to repartition & reformat the HDD if necessary), or you've got a 3rd-party bootable utility disc? )

The DVD drive didn't appear to have any problems prior to reformatting, but I'll be perfectly honest, I hardly ever used it so i may not have noticed...

In regards to the time between powering on and the error it only gets as far as prompting me to select a language, after selecting a language it then displays the error. I can then either restart or remain in the disk utility interface, so I do have access to reformatting/imaging etc.

"Have you cleared the PRAM/NVRAM & reset the SMC ?" - Can I perform those actions via Disk Utility because thats all I ave access to once the error has displayed.

ok I've reset the NVRAM/PRAM and also reset the SMC. However still no change in the error.... still get the:

"Preparaing installation"

then

"Mac OS X cannot be installed on this computer...."

I'll reformat now and partition the drive, I'll just write a litle step by step of how I'm doing it.... im no expert so theres probably something glaring that I'm missing.

- Inside the Mac OS X Installer (after the error)

- Select OK and go to Utilities/Disk Utility.

- On the left hand side i see my hd "74.5 GB FUJITSU MHV2080..." and underneath that is Untitled (partition). Underneath those is the DVD drives "MATSHITA DVD-R UJ-857" followed by "Mac OS X Install Disc 1"

- I'm going to reformat the FUJITSU drive delete the partition and create a new one using the GUID scheme.

- So I select the FUJITSU drive..

- I select the Partition option.... and remove the Untitled volume.

- I select the Erase option now and make sure the Volume format is "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)"  and the name is "untitled". Then hit the erase button.

- The erase creates its own partition but just to make sure that it is using a GUID scheme I remove the current partition and create a new one selecting GUID from the options check list.

- I now go to th First Aid section and run "Verify Disk" on the new volume, to which the report is "The volume Unititled 1 appears to be OK" in green writing.

I've checked the installer log and the following relates to the installation and error.

OSInstaller[148]: Mac OS X Installer application started
OSInstaller[148]: 1 display(s)
OSInstaller[148]: Display [1] is using OpenGL Acceleration
OSInstaller[148]: @(#)PROGRAM: Install PROJECT:Install -374
OSInstaller[148]: @(#)PROGRAM: Mac OS X Installer PROJECT:OSInstaller-88.1
OSInstaller[148]: Hardware: MacBookPro1,1 @ 2.00 GHz (x 2), 1024 MB RAM
OSInstaller[148]: Running OS Build: Mac OS X 10.5 (9A3129)
OSInstaller[148]: Opening OSInstall package '/System/Installation/Package/OSInstall.mpkg' .
OSInstaller[148]: Installation checks failed
OSInstaller[148]: Installation check failures: This software cannot be installed on this computer.

So is there anything in the above that Im doing wrong?

I'll have a look at the discs I've used so far, I've tried quite a few including the ones that I'm positive came with the machine (I could be wrong though).

What may cancel this solution out is that I've even tried Leopard, so the latest version of OS X. I'll double check those discs when I get home anyway,

ok, got it working.... found an old set of discs, version 1.3 mac osx 10.4.6 and after re-formatting again we're back in business.....

Strung and TechyDude71 have been the biggest contributors to this thread so I'm going to split the points 250/250 if thats ok...

Thanks for the advice..