Trouble booting from Install Disk

[Paul Hibbert]

I'm trying to boot up from the Install disk that came with my mac (G5 tower running OSX 10.4.10) so I can run Disk Utility.

The disk mounts OK until I restart to boot up from the DVD.

I hold down the 'alt' key when booting up to get the options for which disk to boot up from. I select the DVD install disk and click the right arrow. The screen goes pale grey with the grey apple logo and after a couple of seconds this changes to a circle with a diagonal line through it (like a road sign). The the fan gets loud and I have to switch the machine off.

I've never seen this icon before but it obviously means something profound. If I needed to reinstall the system I'd be in trouble. Can anybody help?

 

[MisterMe]

To boot a Mac from the optical drive, press the [C] key at startup.

 

[Paul Hibbert]

Thanks, Mister Me for getting back to me so soon. Its early where you are. I tried the 'C' key thing and I'm getting the same result. I know the disk is OK because it mounts when I boot up normally.

 

[fryke]

That doesn't solve the problem, I guess, because pressing the "c" key does the same as selecting the DVD in the boot-dialogue that comes up holding down the option-key at boot time, which the OP did.

 

[jbarley]

I'm trying to boot up from the Install disk that came with my mac (G5 tower running OSX 10.4.10) so I can run Disk Utility.

The disk mounts OK until I restart to boot up from the DVD.

I hold down the 'alt' key when booting up to get the options for which disk to

Once the disk mounts there should be an option to "Restart" icon.
At this point your computer should restart from the CD without the need to hold any extra keys down.
If this does not work, then for some reason your CD is not being seen as "Bootable"

jb.

 

[fryke]

Okay, now we have a third option for telling the computer to boot from the CD/DVD. There's a fourth, of course: The Startup Volume system preference panel. Select the DVD in that prefpanel, and it should boot from the CD/DVD. However, as I've laid out before: I don't think any of those solve the problem the OP has described. The computer obviously _tries_ to boot from the optical drive, but can't. My guesses:

1.) That disc is not the original that came with that Mac.
2.) The disc has an error. Ask Apple or a store selling Macs about a replacement. Bring the original receipt for that Mac.

 

[jbarley]

My guesses:

1.) That disc is not the original that came with that Mac.
2.) The disc has an error. Ask Apple or a store selling Macs about a replacement. Bring the original receipt for that Mac.

As I mentioned in an earlier post...
If this does not work, then for some reason your CD is not being seen as "Bootable"

jb.

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

As I mentioned in an earlier post...
If this does not work, then for some reason your CD is not being seen as "Bootable"

jb.

Not so -- the disk is most DEFINITELY being seen as "bootable" since it shows up in various locations as a bootable disk (when holding 'option' upon rebooting, choosing it from the Startup Disk pane, holding 'c' and getting the grey Apple logo -- ALL of these confirm that the disk is being "seen as a bootable device")... the problem is that the computer is erroring WHILE BOOTING from the disk (hence, the "no smoking" symbol appearing).

Is it possible to do a verbose boot from an install DVD? I suspect it is... try this: boot from the DVD (using any of the methods above) and hold down command-v while you boot... it should do a "verbose" boot with tons of UNIX-y text all over the screen. My suspicion is that you're kernel panicking (or, more likely, experiencing some less-serious error) at the end, and perhaps a screenshot of that would help us better diagnose the problem.

The other really obvious answer, like Fryke said, is that the DVD is, in fact, NOT the DVD that originally came with the iMac, but rather a system disk from another model of Macintosh computer. The System Software Restore/Install CD/DVDs that come with Macintosh computers are system specific -- i.e., you cannot take a Mac OS X DVD that came with a MacBook and boot an iMac with it...