Spinning beach ball, I've tried everything..

[Nickxyz]

If reinstalling OS X gets your internet working again, then the 10.6.8 update can be through your Software Update. Your internet connection would have to be working to download from that link, so you may as well let the system do the download for you.

I backed up then did the hardware check from installation disk, all OK.
Can't reinstall though, it says "cannot install on this disk" (Macintosh HD) "cannot start up from this disk" despite 27GB free.
Huh?
[doublepost=1486255056][/doublepost]

I backed up then did the hardware check from installation disk, all OK.
Can't reinstall though, it says "cannot install on this disk" (Macintosh HD) "cannot start up from this disk" despite 27GB free.
Huh?

Hmm, after clicking OK and going back, it's seemingly continuing the installation regardless, half way through install so 34 min remaining... Hmm

 

[DeltaMac]

Ah, OK!
Open Disk Utility.
Select your hard drive. It will be the line that shows your hard drive model information, not a line that shows the name of your partition. It's probably the very top line.
Look at the info near the bottom of that window.
What is listed for your Partition Map Scheme?
If it is anything other than GUID Partition table - you may be bootable, but the installer won't let you install OS X.

I see the rest of your last post now. It's working. Be patient, my friend.

It's very possible that your hard drive was simply slow to be recognized, and may be another indication that your hard drive is not working as well as you would like.

 

[Nickxyz]

Ah, OK!
Open Disk Utility.
Select your hard drive. It will be the line that shows your hard drive model information, not a line that shows the name of your partition. It's probably the very top line.
Look at the info near the bottom of that window.
What is listed for your Partition Map Scheme?
If it is anything other than GUID Partition table - you may be bootable, but the installer won't let you install OS X.

I see the rest of your last post now. It's working. Be patient, my friend.

It's very possible that your hard drive was simply slow to be recognized, and may be another indication that your hard drive is not working as well as you would like.

It is GUID partition table.

After being away for over half an hour, the progress was still at 34 min, so I turned it off (before I saw your post. Oops)

Do you suggest I try Mac OS installation again? How long should I wait for the progress bar?

Thanks again

 

[DeltaMac]

Try to be patient.
I would let it go for an hour, then give it 15 minutes more before calling it quits.

But, how long will you wait (and how many times does the install have to fail) before you try replacing the hard drive?
It's kind-of a rhetorical question. It's 8 years old, so, if it is still working, that's a Good Thing™, but you should not be surprised if it is simply a hard drive close to failing. Hard drive in a 2009 iMac is not a difficult one to replace. Given tools and decent instructions, (and a little boldness!) there's a new hard drive (or even better, an SSD) within 30 minutes.

 

[Nickxyz]

Try to be patient.
I would let it go for an hour, then give it 15 minutes more before calling it quits.

But, how long will you wait (and how many times does the install have to fail) before you try replacing the hard drive?
It's kind-of a rhetorical question. It's 8 years old, so, if it is still working, that's a Good Thing™, but you should not be surprised if it is simply a hard drive close to failing. Hard drive in a 2009 iMac is not a difficult one to replace. Given tools and decent instructions, (and a little boldness!) there's a new hard drive (or even better, an SSD) within 30 minutes.

When I tried reinstalling from original dvd's the first time, I loaded it from Finder, and then the 34min remaining came after it had restarted etc.
When I try it booting on the original dvd (holding c on the keyboard), you cannot start the process at all.
This is why I think it was never going to get past the 34min.

I have now got a workaround - I can get internet on the mac by making a bluetooth connection to my phone (with tethering) - slow and tedious but it means my mac is fully functional. That kind of makes me skeptical that it could be a hard drive problem. But it is strange that it won't let me reinstall (error message stated and photographed in previous message doesn't really give any clues).

Anyway the beachballs problem is something to do with the wifi / airport. I can use it for a very short period (managed to download a file or two off dropbox through wifi) but it usually gets beachballs within a minute, meaning I have to hold the mac power button and turn it off.

 

[Nickxyz]

So as I described earlier, the spinning beach ball happens after I have internet (airport / wifi) enabled for a few minutes, and never happens without internet (eg, in safe mode, or with airport turned off). It happens within a minute or so of me connecting to the internet on my home router.



I took it into the apple shop and he went into Settings > Network > Location set to Automatic and the problem did not happen. However, the problem was never reproduced in the apple shop (on their wifi network, and also their ethernet network), but either way we assumed that change he made fixed the problem. Several minutes of web browsing and no problems, and it always crashes within a minute or so at home.



When I took it home I realised the problem was still happening. So it seems there is some software (??) issue with the internet connection.



However, I have been using bluetooth via tethering on my phone to connect to my iMac to the internet without any problems (except it is slow and annoying).



I decided to buy some hardware in case it fixed the problem. I bought a TP-link wifi range extender.



First I connected my tplink to the router using wifi and the configuration page on the tplink, so I could type in the router password. From now on the tplink has access to the internet through my router, and I connect to the tplink.



I tried connecting my iMac to the tplink over wifi, and it made the spinning beach balls.



Then I tried connecting my iMac to the tp link by ethernet cable (with airport turned off), and it still made the spinning beach balls.



So it turns out it is not a problem with my iMac airport, but some funny network issue that seems common to my router.



The router has not caused any problems on my android phone, iPad, or my flatmates MacAir. I checked my iMac wifi settings and they were the same as the MacAir which has had no problems (except the IP address, which is dynamically allocated, and just same.same.same.different as you'd expect).



All I can think of trying now is taking my iMac to other networks and trying to reproduce the problem (a little inconvenient as it is not a laptop), or buying a new router to replace the home router (don't really want to spend money for no reason).



Any other ideas??

 

[Nickxyz]

ooooh, this is EXCITING!!! after a few months, have finally got the mac back online!! I've been on 5min without it crashing - seems that strange problem was related to the BELONG router, now it has been replaced with a $20 gumtree jobbie (dlink) worth the $5 tip I gave him I reckon!!

To recap - before, when I connected to my home wifi network, it crashed.
I brought it into the apple shop and they did not replicate the problem.
I could always run it in SAFE mode (disables wifi/airport), without it crashing. The problem happened whenever I connected to the router via ethernet or wifi.
The same router did not cause any problems with any other devices (macair, iphone, android phone, windows laptop).
Now I have replaced the router (out with Belong/Telstra, in with a 2nd hand D-link DSL-2750B) and it works fine - well so far so good!!

 

[nicmalone]

Now I have replaced the router (out with Belong/Telstra, in with a 2nd hand D-link DSL-2750B) and it works fine - well so far so good!!

I’m very late to this party but my answer might help anyone still tinkering with these old Macs. Yes it is a router issue - sort of. It is actually an IPv6 issue. I just solved this problem with my old 2006 12” Powerbook (OSX Leopard) but I got the idea from someone who fixed the same problem on a Lion Intel Mac, so it will work on those too. If the spinning beach ball soon after booting up issue only started happening after you switched internet providers (and therefore you have a new router), try going into System Preferences > Network > Airport > IP/TCP and change the IPv6 setting from ‘automatic‘ to off. You’ll need to do the same for the Ethernet settings too. Weird to think your router can cripple your computer but, having tried everything already suggested here, this is the solution that finally worked for me.