Utility Disk is not giving me the option to erase my MacBook '11 hard drive

Question

Level 1

8 points

Utility Disk is not giving me the option to erase my MacBook '11 hard drive

I recently erased the Bootcamp partitioned drive on my MacBook '11 laptop (ver. 10.10.5 Yosemite) and when I went back to try & launch Mac OS Diagnostic, I was unable to get back to that utility at boot up (after many unsuccessful attempts via Command+R keys and Command+Option+Shift+R). When I go to Utility Disk to try and erase the hard drive from there, the option to Erase is not available.

Can someone provide guidance/insight on how I can wipe my MacBook hard drive some other way? Can I try from a another Mac computer and connect via Firewire?

MacBook

Posted on Nov 3, 2020 8:56 AM

Reply

Answer 1

renmag00 Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 4, 2020 6:47 PM in response to Lanny

I was able to find another use case similar to my MacBook (2009). I ended up pressing down the Option+Command+R keys at startup. Kept them pressed until I saw my monitor change to a light grey-ish color. And then the Mac OS Diagnostic launched & I was able to safely erase my main hard drive

Reply

Answer 2

Lanny

Level 6

13,207 points

Nov 4, 2020 6:24 PM in response to renmag00

The only proper way to erase or remove a Bootcamp partition is to use the Bootcamp Assistant app. If you used Disk Utility on it, you'll probably have to erase or repartition the entire drive.

Reply

Utility Disk is not giving me the option to erase my MacBook '11 hard drive

Similar questions