Fixing the MacBookPro after failed Mavericks install (HD damaged and can’t be repaired). I decided to post this because I spent a day exploring several options in the knowledge base and I had to develop my own procedure to fix the problem.
Summary of the problem:
- Attempting to install Mavericks from OSX 10.6.8 on a MacbookPro
resulted in the following message: “The OS X upgrade couldn’t be
started because the disk Macintosh HD is damaged and can’t be
repaired…”
- Restarting computer only causes OS X installer to run again with the
same message
- No backup available and restore partition not available
for OS X 10.6.8
- Disk utility from the OS X installer doesn’t allow
repair of the damaged disk (greyed out)
The solution. Try these options in the following order (option 2 worked for me).
Option 1: Boot from your Snow Leopard install disc and run disk utility. Try verifying and repairing the start-up disk there. The repair option should not be greyed out. If it works, then restart and see if that fixes your problem (this option did not work for me after several attempts at running repair). Since the disk cannot be verified, any attempt to create an image (.dmg) will fail with an input/output error.
Option 2: This one worked, but took a few hours. Install OS X on an external drive, transfer information from the “damaged” disk, then install OS X back on the internal drive, and transfer the information back.
- Boot from Snow Leopard install disc (insert disc, restart and press “c”. If that doesn’t work, restart and press “option” and select the install DVD)
Connect external disk and reformat it using disk utility
- Click utilities -> disk utility
- Select the external drive (do NOT select your internal drive, otherwise you will lose all of your data)
- Click Partition
- Select “1 partition”
- Options: GUID Partition table
- Format as “Mac OS Extended (journaled)
- Apply
- Quit
Run the OS X installer and select your newly formatted external drive as the target
- When the install is complete, you will get an option to transfer information from another volume.
- Select the internal volume (this is the “damaged” disk) and select all items
- Transfer process will run for an hour or two and hopefully all of your settings, applications, users, and documents will transfer without problems
- Complete the registration process and eject the install dvd
- Run SW update to bring OS X to 10.6.8 (repeat SW update until all the SW is updated). Your external drive should now be a clone of your internal drive. Play around to see if there’s anything missing.
Now you will reverse the process to put everything back on to your internal drive
- Boot from install DVD, start disk utility, and verify the external disk that you just created (all should be ok)
- Perform a clean install of Snow Leopard http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3910
- When erasing the Macintosh HD disk, format it as “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)”. I noticed that the original format was not journaled, which may have contributed to the problem in the first place.
- Stop at Part Three Step 4 (instead, when the migration screen appears, select transfer info from another volume)
- Select the external volume that you just created
- Transfer process will now move all of the information back onto your internal drive
- Run software update to bring your internal drive back up to 10.6.8. Keep repeating until no more software to update (2 or 3 times)
- Ensure that everything is working ok before proceeding to next step
Optional: Configure your external drive for Time Machine backups
- Erase the drive using disk utility
- After the erase, the system will automatically ask you whether you want to use the external drive for Time Machine backups. Respond to the prompts, or start Time Machine and manually configure it
Summary: There is something wrong with the Mavericks OS X installer when trying to upgrade from OS X 10.6.8 on an “older” MacbookPro. It seems to corrupt the internal start-up disk in such a way that disk utility can’t verify or repair it. The data on the disk appears to be OK since a fresh install of OS X on an external drive and using the installer to transfer information from the “damaged” disk to the external drive appears to work without a problem.