a few hours ago my mac froze up so i reset it but when i turned it back on it was just gray with a folder icon with a question mark in the middle blinking. i then turned it off and left it alone for a few hours and when i went to turn it on again the screen is just gray with the apple icon and the loading icon under it, which is what always comes up when i first turn it on but it wont change, its been the same for like a half hour now.
I purchased my PowerMac G5 in 2003 and no problems till now. My problem is that on startup, the display first shows gray screen with a globe in a white box flashing in the center of the screen. This continues for about 90 seconds --- then the globe in box icon changes to a small file folder icon with alternating face/question mark flashing in the file folder. At about the same time, the fan speeds up dramatically. The fan continues to run at this high speed for about 90 additional seconds, then the fan returns to normal speed, and the startup continues normally to the blue screen. Once startup is complete, computer runs okay. The whole process takes about 4 minutes.
Information: PowerMac G5, 1.8 Ghz, OS X 10.2.8 Mac OS X (10.2.x)
Basically, the iBook G4 (last revision) will not turn on. What is happening I press the power button, the iBook chimes, HDD makes its regular "computer was just turned on" noises and then the computer sits at the Grey Screen and the little swirly loading thing comes up and nothing else happens. What happened before the issue I was browsing the web last night and before turning it off for the night I ran MainMenu's batch tasks. I have been using MainMenu for several months with zero issues up till now. My sister said she needed to use my computer for a few minutes so I turned it back on. It sat at the Grey Screen for 15 minutes so I force shut down and tried again. After another 15 minutes I went to bed (it was getting late) and left it to see what happened over night. Somewhere in my 8 hours of sleep the computer gave up and turned itself off. I have not heard any tell-tale signs of an HDD failure - no clicking, buzzing or scratchy noises. Possible Culprits UNO - has been installed for over a month but it does have access to system files so I'm not clearing its name. MainMenu - Been using for a while but it was the last thing I did before the problem arose. What I've done to fix it - Reset the PMU by pressing Shift + Option + Control + Power Button - Boot off restore disk and repaired the disk in Disk Utility. The volume bit map and volume information needed repair. is the poor sucker dead?
Unfortunately I bumped the switch on the power strip that my Mac Mini (1.42ghz G4, OS X 10.3) is plugged into while it was running. Now it won't boot up. All I get is the gray screen with the gray apple logo and the spinning wheel but no OSX.
Recently my event clips and timeline clips have turned grey and no video imagery shows unless I pass the cursor over the individual clip. I was close to finishing this project and it plays in the viewer but making adjustments etc seems impossible. FCP is updated and I have restart the computer several times. I have used FCP for 3 years and have never had this problem.
Info: Final Cut Pro X, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5)
My Mac all of a sudden turned off and when I turn it on only a grey loading bar pops up and then it's his down. I went to recovery mode and it says Disk Utility has stopped repairing my hard drive. Then it tells me to back up my files and restore. I need to get some of the files I had on my Hard drive but I don't know how to get them.
Info: MacBook (13-inch Late 2009), OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)
I used my macbook charger to charge a mac book pro and now my macbook will not turn on. The green light shows on the charger but it will not turn on. I am not sure it is related but what should I do?
upon startup i see a gray screen, the apple logo, and spinning gears. Then the apple logo turns into a circle with a line through it and stays that way forever. I call apple support. They got me to run disk utility by booting from install disk. Then running repair disk and repair permissions. Then boot into safe mode and computer works fine...for a few restarts then does the same thing.
Something strange happened to my Mac, I use a USB modem by Orange il. Mac recognized it with no problem and installed the installation package. After installation when Mac recognized the modem again a gray screen appeared and asked to do Hard Reset. I'm using Snow Leopard 10.6.2 and I had no such problems with it. It happened to me once when I had version 10.5 and changed Drivers for usb to use Dfu. I checked the computer, and to be sure I downloaded the new drivers and reinstall it and it still happens when I insert the modem. As soon as I uninstall the modem I can insert it without a problem until I install the drivers and then this Crash happens again.
I have an 2008 iMac that displays a gray screen. I cannot get rid of it. I have done a forced shut down but it wakes up when a key is depressed. I have turned off the power. It will chime but a gray screen, not a spinning wheel or anything else. I was told it might be VMWare Fusion at fault so I uninstalled the program a month or so ago. It was fine until a few days ago. Has the display panel died? If so, is this a dyi or should I pay $$$ to repair it.
When I started my Macbook up, after the gray screen with the apple sign, a stop sign appeared on the screen and I couldnt use my laptop as normal. Does anyone know what the problem is and how to fix it?
I posted this in the emac forum, but since it concerns the OS....thought I'd also post here. have an older emac 700 that used to work, but now when I try to boot ...after the apple screen with spinning wheel I get the gray screen of death. I have tried lots of things, including reinstalling OS from a retail purchased 10.4 dvd. THe OS install *looks* like it is working until it goes to reboot at the end, & then hangs again. I have also tried booting off a firewire drive, again, hangs. I know that there are boot cmd-v or -s options that give readouts of what's happening, but I don't know how to pause the process & whatever messages of relevance may be present near the end disappear quickly when the screen turns gray. In the process I have also zapped the pram/nvram.....& have reset the pmu button. I'm at the end of my rope, as I'm all out of things to try. As for what I was doing when the whole thing went south on me.. I was playing with a newer Belkin usb wireless adapter & trying to find the right driver. I downloaded the Zydas zd1211 driver set, but inadvertently unpacked the 10.3 version instead of the 10.4 (which is what this emac has). It went into auto reboot & that was that.....gray screen of death. Coincidental? I dunno. I just include the detail.
last night i changed the permissions on my macbook to stop my files being shared. now when i log in i cant get past the grey boot up screen. i was told its because of problems created from changing the permissions. i booted up holding shift and nothing happened i booted up in in verbose and it says theres no posix_spawnp("/usr/sbin/mDNSresponder", ...) over and over i booted up with cmd+s and got If you want to make modifications to the files
/sbin/fsck -fy /sbin/mount -uw
If you wish to boot system exit. I dont want what to do here, Im afraid to start messing with it. I really need to get the files in my HD, I'm doing finals right now!!
im getting a message on a grey screen asking me to restart my computer when i'm trying to start my imac? So, i hold down the on / off button to do a hard restart and i get the same message again.
I have an Intel Mac Mini that I use with a Viewsonic DVI LCD. My problem is that the gray boot screen doesn't ever appear. The computer starts up, but the display doesn't come on until I unplug the monitor and plug it back into the mini, then it comes on and I see the login window. Anyone have any tips for me? I've tried the cmd-opt-p-r, and resetting it via plugging in the power while holding the power button, but to no avail.
I am running Snowleopard on a 24" white imac bought in 2007. My system has been somewhat temperamental for a few weeks, crashing out on me when waking up and generating random artifacts onscreen during use. I noticed also that the hardrive recently renamed itself as "EMI Boot" when booting using the option key (although it worked fine). Now, when booting, the apple logo appears, followed by the spinning wheel and a blank gray screen. Then nothing. The same thing happens when I try to boot using a mirrored backup drive or a separate bootable drive with a different version of OSX. The imac drive will, however, launch using a MBP in terminal mode without problem. I have run Diskwarrior and fsck on the drive. No difference. I've tested the RAM using memtest in single user mode. RAM seems OK. I dont have the original installation disks, so cannot run the diagnostics.
After installing updates, I restarted my Mac and it ends up with a matte gray (cloth-like appearance) with a gray Apple logo, but does not get to the desktop. I can open/close the DVD tray, and have cursor control, but nothing else seems to work. Short of reinstallation of Snow Leopard, what are my alternatives. I did the Lion update online but do not have a system disk, hence reversion to Snow Leopard is my only option.
Tried all the tips I can find but no joy. Able to boot in safe mode but nothing else. Can't use Lion Recovery and unable install Snow Leopard from disk as it gets stuck on the gray screen again.
Well gang the problem has been resolved by starting up while pressing command V. Worked like a charm. I don't know why the "genus bar" folks did't try it but it worked...I'm just saying.
Info:MacBook Pro with Retina display, Mac OS X (10.7.3), in safe mode QT,Iphoto,photo booth
Last week when starting my Mac Book Pro I was faced with a gray screen. On start up the it won't boot fully. Turn onGray Screen with apple logo - loading bar and wheelOnce fully loaded it turns itself off..I have tried control R to do a reinstall of the OS, however it won't let me complete it saying Apple account does not match (yet there is no login for this).
I've been experiencing the "gray screen of death" every time I've turned on my laptop. What would occur is that after I press the on button, I would hear the two dings and a gray screen with a metallic apple logo and a gray pinwheel would appear. It would stay on for however long I've had the patience for it (more than an hour) and disabled me from using my computer. After doing some research, I've tried everything I could besides for rebooting the computer to factory mode. I've tried doing a safe boot by pressing the shift button upon turning on the computer but this didn't work because the booting loading bar would appear and then disappear midway. I've tried doing a repair on my hard drive using disk utility.I've even tried reinstalling Mac OS X (Snow leopard), which was successful, but upon restarting my computer, I was greeted with the same gray screen and nothing appeared to have changed. I have also tried resetting the PRAM but that didn't work either.
My daughter has dropped her ageing MBP, bent the screen lid and now the screen is no longer usable. We have other Macs available to access the data on the screen if we could turn on Screen Sharing on the damaged MBP running Snow Leopard.
Computer starts (keyboard lit, music plays, caps lock light on), but no screen. I need to open and close 2 - 30 times before the screen will turn on. Once on, the computer works perfectly. I've tried PRAM and safemode reset.
I have my mac pro finder screen it has a question mark in the gray bar I can't get rid of it.
I created the problem by downloaded a few hundred screen saver photos. they were a mess.
after weeks of deleting cloning and fixing files. I had everything removed except on the finder bar a little Flag of Israel . I managed to get rid of the little flag but now have a question mark instead. If I click on the mark it says the item can not be found.
