Has my Macbook had it?

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Can anyone help me please?

I’m trying to sort out a friend’s Macbook. (about 3 years old -OS X).
There is a major boot problem and it just gets the dreaded flashing question mark.

I have looked at various postings and tried them all to no avail so am I right to suspect a hard disk failure?

With the Re-install disk in this is what happens....
At the Mac OS X Installer Window, I go into Utilities/Disk Utilies from the top toolbar, machine making lots of rattling noises and eventually a new Disk Utility window opens.
On the left hand side of this screen the hard disc icon says 4.7 GB MATSHITACD-RW CW-8221
Below this appears the Mac OS X install disk
If I highlight the Matshitacd , and then click FIRST AID, the only option I get is VERIFY DISK PERMISSIONS, all other options are greyed out. If I click this I get a message saying First Aid Failed....No Valid packages.

(This doesn’t surprise me as I can’t believe that this is the main hard drive as it says total capacity 4.7GB and against Write Ability is says Read Only - Unknown).

Has anyone any other ideas please?
 

dtravis7


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The Hard Drive is not showing up. It's dead. If it will not show in Disk Utility, it's toast.

That 4.7GB is the DVD in the DVD drive. The first entry is the optical (DVD) drive (Matsushita) and the entry below is the actual OSX DVD in the optical drive.

The machine needs a new 2.5" SATA hard drive. Then the Install will continue. It's trying to install to the DVD which is can't of course.

If you go with a new Hard Drive which would suggest, BE SURE when you get to that install screen, look up top for the Utilities drop down and open Disk Utility and partition the drive. Be sure GUID is set for the partition type. You get to that after you select new partition then an Options button will show.

If you need any farther help let us know.
 
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Thanks for this. It was what I really suspected but hadn't figured that that it was showing was the DVD drive. It makes sense now.
Do you think it's likely that any files can be salvaged from the failed drive?
Thank you.
 

dtravis7


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With all that clicking and not showing up in Disk Utility, one could only guess. What I would do is once the new drive is installed and OSX back up and running, get a cheap external hard drive case and put in the old drive. Be sure the case supports 2.5" SATA drives. Then try and mount it in OSX. If it mounts, you can probably save some data at least.
 

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