How do I completely format my drive?

K

kiddo

Registered
I'm having trouble starting up. It brings me to the screen with the apple and the spinning wheel, and it just stays there and OSX does not load at all. I'm not to attached to anything I have on my hard drive right now so I think the easiest thing might be to just completely wipe it out. The problem is that I currently have a cd stuck in my drive and I have no idea how to eject it outside of OSX. So I'd have to figure that out before I tried running anything from the install disc. I seem to be able to get into Single-User mode, but not Safe mode. Any idea what I can do from here? Help would be greatly appreciated!
 
Eject the CD by holding down the mouse button when you first startup the Mac. Be patient; it will eject the CD before it begins the booting process.

Do you know "fsck -fy"? If so, do it. If not, boot from the OSX installer CD, select "Disk Utility" from the Installer menu, and "fix disk". Then "repair permissions". Quit and then quit the Installer (and restart). If that doesn't resolve the issue, boot from the Installer once again and do an "archive and Install" (preserve users and network settings). You might also try Disk Warrior (it works wonders).
 
I actually get an error when trying to repair the disk. Will the archive and install fix this (or get around it, anyway)?
 
You would want to do erase and install - actually use the disk utility program to format it as Mac OS Extended (and your choice on journaling), and repartition it. Then install the OS again. - Archive and install won't do you any good if there are errors on the volume.
 
I'm trying to reformat my mac Ibook. Everytime I shut it down and hold the c button it comes back on telling me I have to restart again.
 
Are you trying to boot it off your Installation Disk? If you are not, and your volume is frelled on your HD, your Mac is unable to find a disk to boot off of.

--J.D.
 
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