HELP PLEASE! I thought my HDD was dead!

jenno86

Right, so my 2012 Macbook Pro stopped working! Turns on, but can't see the HDD. Can boot into recovery, thats how I'm typing now.

Got the SDD drive today and put it into the Macbook and it still can't see it! This is the SSD

Can anybody help me?! What could the problem be?

Sad Professor

You can't see it Disk Utility?

jenno86

No I cant see it in Disk Utility, only the small recovery section thats built in.

ZENER

jenno86 wrote: »

No I cant see it in Disk Utility, only the small recovery section thats built in.

How are you seeing the recovery section? Is the original drive still in the machine ?

Ii know that drive will work in your MacBook because it's the same one I put in mine. Are you sure you've connected it properly ? Fully seated the connector?

Ken

yer man!

There's a known fault in these laptops with the HD cable, I've had to replace mine 4 times in 3 years. Apple know about the issue but they won't recall them. If you can't get it working for love nor money bring it into compu b or some Mac service centre. If you cannot see any HDD i'm almost certain it's down to the cable.

PS. The cable is generally pretty cheap (relatively anyway) bout €25 - €30, I didn't even bother leaving mine in last time just bought the part straight from them so I avoided the inspection fee and stuff, it's really east to fit too.

jenno86

ZENER wrote: »

How are you seeing the recovery section? Is the original drive still in the machine ?

Ii know that drive will work in your MacBook because it's the same one I put in mine. Are you sure you've connected it properly ? Fully seated the connector?

Ken

I think the recovery is built into the Macbook and not the HDD. It should be connected in fine.

jenno86

ZENER wrote: »

How are you seeing the recovery section? Is the original drive still in the machine ?

Ii know that drive will work in your MacBook because it's the same one I put in mine. Are you sure you've connected it properly ? Fully seated the connector?

Ken

I'll open it up and double check again

yer man! wrote: »

There's a known fault in these laptops with the HD cable, I've had to replace mine 4 times in 3 years. Apple know about the issue but they won't recall them. If you can't get it working for love nor money bring it into compu b or some Mac service centre. If you cannot see any HDD i'm almost certain it's down to the cable.

PS. The cable is generally pretty cheap (relatively anyway) bout €25 - €30, I didn't even bother leaving mine in last time just bought the part straight from them so I avoided the inspection fee and stuff, it's really east to fit too.

Thanks for the reply. If I get get it going tonight I'll bring it into Galmac tomorrow.

ZENER

jenno86 wrote: »

I think the recovery is built into the Macbook and not the HDD. It should be connected in fine.

Are you sure? Anything I've read says it's on the internal hdd? On my own MacBook of the same era the recovery partition is on the original hard disk. What size is the partition you're seeing in disk utility ?

Ken

yer man!

jenno86 wrote: »

I'll open it up and double check again



Thanks for the reply. If I get get it going tonight I'll bring it into Galmac tomorrow.

If it's in warranty and it is the HDD cable, you should get it back really quick as they always have them in stock. Mention the HDD cable anyway, it can cut off an awful lot of time.

jenno86

ZENER wrote: »

Are you sure? Anything I've read says it's on the internal hdd? On my own MacBook of the same era the recovery partition is on the original hard disk. What size is the partition you're seeing in disk utility ?

Ken

Its defo not on the HDD as its not in the Macbook! The recovery partition is less than 2gb.

Sad Professor

OS X Internet Recovery is built-in to the firmware on newer Macs. But it's not a drive or partition as such and wouldn't be visible in Disk Utility.

What's the name of the drive that the recovery partition belongs to? How big is it?

jenno86

Sad Professor wrote: »

OS X Internet Recovery is built-in to the firmware on newer Macs. But it's not a drive or partition as such and wouldn't be visible in Disk Utility.

What's the name of the drive that the recovery partition belongs to? How big is it?

disk0 - Mac 0SX Base System - 1.39gb

ZENER

There are 3 partitions on the internal drive of my 2012 MBP OS X 10.8.

disk0s1 EFI ~200MB

disk0s2 MacHD ~480GB

disk0s3 Recovery HD ~1.2GB

This seems to be the norm for this model - 15" Mid 2012 i7 MacBook Pro

Did you get a CDROM in your computer or is there another hard drive installed in its place by any chance ? If you check About This Mac under Serial-ATA what devices does it report ?

Ken

jenno86

ZENER wrote: »

There are 3 partitions on the internal drive of my 2012 MBP OS X 10.8.

disk0s1 EFI ~200MB

disk0s2 MacHD ~480GB

disk0s3 Recovery HD ~1.2GB

This seems to be the norm for this model - 15" Mid 2012 i7 MacBook Pro

Did you get a CDROM in your computer or is there another hard drive installed in its place by any chance ? If you check About This Mac under Serial-ATA what devices does it report ?

Ken

Ya the CDROM is still in it! No I dont have another HDD installed.

muggyog

The Recovery Partition IS on the HD. On newer Macs Internet Recovery is built into the firmware as mentioned earlier.

Since you are already in the Recovery Partition, go to the Terminal application ( in utilities in the top menu bar ) and type diskutil list. Report back the exact results.

jenno86

muggyog wrote: »

The Recovery Partition IS on the HD. On newer Macs Internet Recovery is built into the firmware as mentioned earlier.

Since you are already in the Recovery Partition, go to the Terminal application ( in utilities in the top menu bar ) and type diskutil list. Report back the exact results.

Im in internet recovery

muggyog

If you are using Internet Recover you wont have access to the Terminal app. For proper faultfinding you are going to have to work from a bootable external HD or USB stick ( I presume there is no DVD drive ).

You should use the diskutil command in the Terminal to get more information.

Nemeses

Thats incorrect, Terminal is in Recovery HD.... Go to utilities at the top in the menu bar and click on Terminal..

Also check Disk Utility and see if you can see the Internal Hard drive like this picture....

If you can, then you probably just need to erase / partition and re install OSX

jenno86

Nemeses wrote: »

Thats incorrect, Terminal is in Recovery HD.... Go to utilities at the top in the menu bar and click on Terminal..

Also check Disk Utility and see if you can see the Internal Hard drive like this picture....

If you can, then you probably just need to erase / partition and re install OSX

I cannot see the HDD it does not show up in Disk Utility! I have left it into Galmac now anyway so I'll report back with the problem!

Nemeses

Ah, if it didn't appear then Galmac is definitely the way forward!

muggyog

I stand corrected on the Terminal not being available in Internet Recovery. I was mistakenly of the opinion that due to the limited space in the firmware that the menu bar was not available.

Seems likely that it is the ribbon cable issue mentioned earlier

jenno86

It was the hard drive cable that had gone in it!

Got it replaced!

Thanks for all the replies!

Nemeses

I like a happy ending Good stuff