Installing OS on firewire target

K

kshadlen

Registered
This note ultimately regards reinstalling the OS from the DVD on an iMac that has been booted in firewire target mode.

First, the background:
I have an iMac (with the Intel chip) running OS 10.4

When I boot the computer I get a grey screen with a flashing folder (with question mark in the folder).

I've tried to reboot with the alt/option key depressed, as the white book that came with the iMac suggests. I get a picture of a harddrive with the word Macintosh HD written beneath it, and a white arrow pointing up. When I click, however, instead of being taken to where I think I'm supposed to go (startup manager?), I get an entirely white screen and nothing happens.

I've tried to reset the PRAM. I get the second beep, but once I take my fingers off the keys I'm back to the white screen and flashing folder.

I've tried to restart with the Install Disk in the DVD drive and the C key depressed, but the computer spits out the disk and I get the flashing folder. I sense that my DVD drive may be faulty (when I put the DVD in my macbook it reads it fine).

I've connected the iMac to my macbook (also intel, and OS 10.4) and rebooted the iMac in firewire target mode. That works, and I've backed up important documents from the iMac onto the macbook.

I've run disk utility, from the macbook but selecting the iMac HD. I can verify and repair the disk, but the options for "verify disk permissions" and "repair disk permissions" are grey and unclickable.

A colleague (who knows much more about this stuff than I do, but unfortunately is now out town) walked me through some steps using terminal.app to examine the structure of the disk, and he suspects there is something corrupted in the iMac's HD, which is why we cannot change the repair permissions. He advised I put the Install disks in the DVD drive of the macbook and reinstall the OS on the iMac. However, I can't figure out how to do so, for when I put the disk in the macbook it seems to think i want to install the OS on the macbook, which of course I do not. Hence the question: how do I install the OS, from disk in macbook, on an iMac that is a firewire target?

Thanks.
 
Do you get to the screen, where you are able to select, which hard drive you want to install to?
 
I did not get to that screen because i, stupidly, was using the DVD from the iMac and receiving a notice that the software from the disk could not be put on the computer. Once I used the installation DVD from the macbook I was able to get to the screen you ask about and I've reinstalled the OS on the iMac. So the problem is resolved, or sort of... I am unable to open some apps (e.g. parallels desktop) and the when I open Internet Connect and click on Airport, the Status line is No AirPort Hardware Found. Yet the airport is clearly working, otherwise I wouldn't be able to send this messge to the forum from the macbook...
 
If you have some apps that won't open, that maybe corrupt, you can transfer known working apps from the Macbook to the iMac.
As far as the Internet connect... If it's not broke, don't fix it... ;)
 
thanks for that. I wasn't clear, the airport is NOT working on the iMac! What I meant to say is that I know the airport express works, because i have internet connection on the macbook, but there is no AirPort hardware found on the iMac, which is the machine with the re-installed OS.
 
Sorry about that. I read it wrong. Have you ran the airport setup assistant again? It's in the utilities folder. (applications/utilities)
 
Soulwar, you still missed what kshadlen needs. The iMac airport card is not even seen. (No Airport Hardware Found), but the wireless works from the Macbook.
Do I have that right now, kshalen?

That likely will be a bad wireless card in the iMac. (the Airport card internal to the iMac.)
 
Thanks Delta, I missed that. I was assuming it got turned off with the reinstall of the OS.
I apologize for misreading your post. I'm just trying to help as best as I can.
 
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