Hi Alan,

Might be time to call in your Apple Consultant / Technician as the Hard Drive 
might be failing and need replacing.

You mentioned some time ago both your iMacs 2009 & 2012 are running OS X 10.9 
Mavericks

As your newer iMac 2012 has Thunderbolt connection - your older 2009 has FW800 
connection

Do you have Disk Warrior v4.4 installed in Utilities on the 2012 iMac? If you 
have v4.3 installed in Utilities you can use the free updater  
<http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/diskwarriorupdate.html>for existing owners 
of DiskWarrior 4 versions 4.0-4.3 to download version 4.4 (you need your serial 
number)

You could then use Target Disk Mode by connecting both iMacs via Thunderbolt to 
Firewire Adaptor cable.
First: Have both iMacs connected to Power & Disconnect anything connected to 
your iMacs other than Keyboard & Mouse

Target Disk Mode:

Shutdown target 2009 iMac - Your 2012 ‘host’ iMac can be running.

1. Connect two iMacs with a Thunderbolt to FireWire cable where the 2012 iMac 
is the “host” and the 2009 iMac is a “target”. 

2. The host 2012 iMac should be running an OS X in which DiskWarrior 4.4 runs. 

In this scenario, the target 2009 iMac is the Mac whose disk you are trying to 
fix/rebuild. 
3. Start the 2009 iMac and immediately Press & Hold the “ T “ key down until 
the Firewire icon appears

4. The target Mac’s drive will appear as a usable drive on the host Mac.

5. Run DiskWarrior from the host Mac and rebuild the target Mac’s disk. 

Cheers,
Ronni


> On 23 Nov 2014, at 6:30 pm, Alan Smith <sma...@iinet.net.au> wrote:
> 
> Hi Ronni
> 
> No joy I’m afraid.
> 
> Also no chime at startup this time - just a litle squeak.  But loaded Boot 
> Manager OK.
> 
> Using Recovery HD, SMART was shown as “verified”.  Ran DU Repair Disk twice 
> but had same error message each time “Disk Utility can’t repair the disk - - 
> reformat”.  No errors noted as fixed.   Verify and Repair Permissions 
> remained greyed out.
> 
> I have Disk Warrior 4.3 on a CD - some years old now.   The only CD drive is 
> on the faulty Mac!
> 
> Cheers
> Alan
> 
> 
> On 23 Nov 2014, at 4:17 pm, Ronni Brown <ro...@mac.com 
> <mailto:ro...@mac.com>> wrote:
> 
>> Hi Alan,
>> 
>> If you don’t have DiskWarrior on another Mac that you could boot from and 
>> try to Repair the iMac’s Hard Drive.
>> 
>> First:  Disconnect all devices connected to your iMac - only leave connected 
>> Keyboard & Mouse.
>> 
>> Boot to the Recovery HD: Restart the computer and after the chime press and 
>> hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. 
>> Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down 
>> the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD 
>> and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
>>  
>> Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions: Upon startup select Disk Utility from 
>> the main menu. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions as follows.
>>  
>> When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select 
>> your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side 
>> list.  In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status 
>> of the hard drive.  If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is 
>> failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB 
>> drives.) 
>> 
>> If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the 
>> left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then 
>> click on the Repair Disk button. 
>> 
>> If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until 
>> no errors are reported. 
>> If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until 
>> the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu.
>>  
>> Reinstall Mavericks: Select Reinstall Mavericks and click on the Continue 
>> button.
>>  
>> Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet 
>> if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.
>> 
>>> On 23 Nov 2014, at 3:46 pm, Alan Smith <sma...@iinet.net.au 
>>> <mailto:sma...@iinet.net.au>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Update on issue - - -.
>>> 
>>> Booted from a 4-week old SuperDuper backup (on a Firewire drive).  Held 
>>> Option key while powering on.  Operations are very slow and I don’t know if 
>>> I’m responding to the SuperDuper or iMac messages.   Got boot disk options 
>>> - Macintosh HD; recovery disk and SuperDuper disk.  Selected SuperDuper and 
>>> logged in. 
>>> 
>>> Got information message: “OSX can’t repair the disk Macintosh HD … you can 
>>> still open or copy files … backup and repair a.s.a.p."
>>> 
>>> Started Disk Utility and Verified disk Macintosh HD.  After step “check 
>>> catalog file” got messages in red:  Invalid key length. The volume 
>>> Macintosh HD could not be verified completely.  Error: this disk needs to 
>>> be repaired. Click Repair Disk.
>>> 
>>> Did Repair Disk and got message “Error: Disk Utility can’t repair the disk 
>>> - - - reformat  - - - and restore files from backup.”
>>> 
>>> Sounds rather serious.  I did not reformat disk.  Any advice (apart from 
>>> having a strong coffee - - -)?
>>> 
>>> Cheers (sort of)
>>> Alan
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On 23 Nov 2014, at 1:40 pm, Alan Smith <sma...@iinet.net.au 
>>> <mailto:sma...@iinet.net.au>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> Help please!
>>>> 
>>>> My late 2009 iMac 21.5" Intel Core 2 Duo 3.06GHz 12G RAM with OSX 10.9.5 
>>>> Mavericks fails to complete the start-up sequence.  
>>>> 
>>>> Mac was powered off via Apple - Shut Down.   Power-up sequence starts 
>>>> normally: chime and grey screen, then the Apple logo and daisy wheel.  
>>>> Then I get a progress bar as if it is loading something (I don’t recall if 
>>>> this is normal).  After about 5 percent progress the bar disappears, the 
>>>> daisy wheel continues for a second or so and then the screen goes black 
>>>> plus silence from the internal hard drive.   
>>>> 
>>>> The only wired peripherals are two WD My Book Studio Firewire external 
>>>> hard drives in tandem (one cable from Mac).  Tried powering up with the 
>>>> Firewire cable plugged in (normal) and then unplugged.  No joy.
>>>> 
>>>> I tried starting in Safe Mode but could not do so.  There was no change, 
>>>> but possibly a slightly longer time interval between chime and daisy wheel.
>>>> 
>>>> Other observations, but may be red herrings.  I used AirDrop to move EyeTV 
>>>> recordings to the iMac this morning.  Came back 30 minutes later to move 
>>>> the videos to a WD My Book Studio for iTunes.  Noticed that one of the two 
>>>> external drives did not show in Finder.  I powered off the iMac so I could 
>>>> access the drives, power cords, etc.  Then a few minutes later I attempted 
>>>> to start up the iMac - - -.
>>>> 
>>>> Regards, 
>>>> Alan
>>>> 
>> 

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