Macbook Pro Mid 2009 won't boot, detect USB and can't reinstall OS on new SSD

[Trevstonbury]

Good morning,

I’m hoping someone can help me. I have a MacBook Pro Mid 2009, it’s no longer booting properly from the existing hard drive and just gets stuck at the loading screen and eventually reboots in a loop. Ive tried all sorts of things to repair it, as well as replacing the Hard drive with a Crucial MX500 SSD but nothing is working properly.

I suspect the current disk is failing, I can boot it into recovery mode but have only been able to run first aid on the disk once which failed. I’ve also gone in through safe mode to run the various verify and fsck-fy commands which are failing – so I think it’s a bad disk

Carried out PRAM & SMC Resets which have made no difference

I have replaced the hard drive with the SSD which at first wasn’t detected until I formatted it. Then I used TransMac with an El Capitan image, restored the image to a USB drive in an attempt to boot into recovery mode and install using the new image onto the new SSD, which fails to work.

Firstly, it won’t boot into recovery mode, I’m guessing it’s because there is no recovery mode available as it was on the old HDD and this older Mac has no internet recovery option. When I use the ‘Option’ key at boot to select a boot device it only detects the blank SSD, it doesn’t detect the USB. In fact, it doesn’t detect any external drive I've used with TransMac or a DVD with El Capitan on. The only USB drive it detects is a Transcend external USB which was used for time machine backups but as I can’t get into recovery mode with the new SSD I can’t restore it. When I've tried restore from time machine backup with the old hard drive in, no backups are detected. I’m not sure why it only picks up the Transcend drive…

I’ve tried to get into hardware diagnostics mode using ‘D’ but that doesn’t work
I’m really at a loss with what to try next, if I can’t get the MacBook the install media I can’t think of a way to reinstall on the new SSD.
Bit of background info, I don’t have a spare Mac or Apple device, Only a Windows 10 computer. Any help would be much appreciated!!

Kind regards

Trevor

 

[Ruggy]

Wow lots of problems there.
You changed the hard drive so you opened it up yourself and put the new hard drive in?
And you think the new hard drive is now failing too? That is odd.
Do you have a DVD rom drive on that model because you are right there’s no recovery partition on the new hard drive but there are recovery tools on the full installation disks if you can get your hands on some (and they can be bought second hand for a few dolllars. Any full ones will do then you can update by intenet afterwards.).

Did the old drive fail totally or was it just failing? Because if it still works you could perhaps put that back in then format the newer hard drive from usb or clone or something, then put the new one back in again.

If you go into the machine again, change the PRAM battery. I doubt it’s the problem but when things like external drives aren’t recognised this is something before the OS loads so it might be that.
Good luck, I hope that helps a bit

 

[Fishrrman]

Transmac probably isn't going to work.

Your problem illustrates the main reason why I ALWAYS recommend either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper instead of time machine. Just connect the cloned backup, and boot right up to the finder. Then "get to work". Not so easy with time machine. Not easy at all.

The SSD is already inside the MacBook, is this correct?
And the old HDD is now OUT of the MacBook?

Then... get either an external USB3 enclosure, or a USB3/SATA adapter/dongle, and try to connect and boot from the HDD that way. You MIGHT get a good boot if the HDD hasn't completely failed yet. If you do get a good boot, you might try to create a bootable USB flash drive installer using "DiskMaker X" (it's the easiest way). This assumes that you have already downloaded a copy of the El Cap install app.

Other than that, you're probably going to need another Mac to get things working again.
Or perhaps a USB flash drive with a copy of the OS installer already on it.
If you can't make one yourself, you can go on ebay and buy one "pre-made" -- there are sellers who offer these.

Having said all this, it might be time to start looking around at newer Macs...

 

[Trevstonbury]

Wow lots of problems there.
You changed the hard drive so you opened it up yourself and put the new hard drive in?
And you think the new hard drive is now failing too? That is odd.
Do you have a DVD rom drive on that model because you are right there’s no recovery partition on the new hard drive but there are recovery tools on the full installation disks if you can get your hands on some (and they can be bought second hand for a few dolllars. Any full ones will do then you can update by intenet afterwards.).

Did the old drive fail totally or was it just failing? Because if it still works you could perhaps put that back in then format the newer hard drive from usb or clone or something, then put the new one back in again.

If you go into the machine again, change the PRAM battery. I doubt it’s the problem but when things like external drives aren’t recognised this is something before the OS loads so it might be that.
Good luck, I hope that helps a bit

Agreed! It's not my Mac but it would have helped! Ive tried to clone the existing HDD ->SSD using EASEUS software which completed OK but when I put the SSD in the Mac I get a white screen the the directory question mark error, can't get into recovery mode or anything.

The new SSD drive is fine, the old one hasn't fully failed but is failing. Thing is ive tried to do a reinstall of OSX from the recovery console with the old HDD in but it fails. I can't get any external USB devices or DVD's with El Capt using transmac to be detected.

I might try the PRAM battery

Thanks!
[automerge]1571419723[/automerge]

Transmac probably isn't going to work.

Your problem illustrates the main reason why I ALWAYS recommend either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper instead of time machine. Just connect the cloned backup, and boot right up to the finder. Then "get to work". Not so easy with time machine. Not easy at all.

The SSD is already inside the MacBook, is this correct?
And the old HDD is now OUT of the MacBook?

Then... get either an external USB3 enclosure, or a USB3/SATA adapter/dongle, and try to connect and boot from the HDD that way. You MIGHT get a good boot if the HDD hasn't completely failed yet. If you do get a good boot, you might try to create a bootable USB flash drive installer using "DiskMaker X" (it's the easiest way). This assumes that you have already downloaded a copy of the El Cap install app.

Other than that, you're probably going to need another Mac to get things working again.
Or perhaps a USB flash drive with a copy of the OS installer already on it.
If you can't make one yourself, you can go on ebay and buy one "pre-made" -- there are sellers who offer these.

Having said all this, it might be time to start looking around at newer Macs...

Transmac probably isn't going to work.

Your problem illustrates the main reason why I ALWAYS recommend either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper instead of time machine. Just connect the cloned backup, and boot right up to the finder. Then "get to work". Not so easy with time machine. Not easy at all.

The SSD is already inside the MacBook, is this correct?
And the old HDD is now OUT of the MacBook?

Then... get either an external USB3 enclosure, or a USB3/SATA adapter/dongle, and try to connect and boot from the HDD that way. You MIGHT get a good boot if the HDD hasn't completely failed yet. If you do get a good boot, you might try to create a bootable USB flash drive installer using "DiskMaker X" (it's the easiest way). This assumes that you have already downloaded a copy of the El Cap install app.

Other than that, you're probably going to need another Mac to get things working again.
Or perhaps a USB flash drive with a copy of the OS installer already on it.
If you can't make one yourself, you can go on ebay and buy one "pre-made" -- there are sellers who offer these.

Having said all this, it might be time to start looking around at newer Macs...

Transmac probably isn't going to work.

Your problem illustrates the main reason why I ALWAYS recommend either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper instead of time machine. Just connect the cloned backup, and boot right up to the finder. Then "get to work". Not so easy with time machine. Not easy at all.

The SSD is already inside the MacBook, is this correct?
And the old HDD is now OUT of the MacBook?

Then... get either an external USB3 enclosure, or a USB3/SATA adapter/dongle, and try to connect and boot from the HDD that way. You MIGHT get a good boot if the HDD hasn't completely failed yet. If you do get a good boot, you might try to create a bootable USB flash drive installer using "DiskMaker X" (it's the easiest way). This assumes that you have already downloaded a copy of the El Cap install app.

Other than that, you're probably going to need another Mac to get things working again.
Or perhaps a USB flash drive with a copy of the OS installer already on it.
If you can't make one yourself, you can go on ebay and buy one "pre-made" -- there are sellers who offer these.

Having said all this, it might be time to start looking around at newer Macs...

Yep SSD is in the MacBook and the old one is out. Coulod get the USB enclosure, may be worth a try or use someone else's Mac. Can I make the USB installer in Windows?

Thanks!

 

[Audit13]

Possibly a failed/failing hard drive cable?

 

[Mr_Brightside_@]

Possibly a failed/failing hard drive cable?

came here to post this

 

[Trevstonbury]

Thanks guys, is this possible? I can get it to see the new HDD and it sees the old but it will only see the external drive previously used with the Mac and no others. Like I said the previously used external drive is supposed to have a time machine backup up but the Mac fails to find any on it.

 

[Ruggy]

If the external drive is in a new external drive box, maybe it's worth putting it into the box that works- if that is possible-as it might be a power or control thing. Otherwise, yes try a new cable.
If you can get the OS to load properly, then going into disk utility in the applications- utilities should be able to mount a time machine sparse bundle and mount the drive or repair it if it can see it.
That's about all i can think of.
Good luck.