OS X V10.4 :: Old IMac Won't Start Up And Stuck In Gray Screen With Spinning Wheel
Apr 24, 2012
I have a very old IMac which I purchased back in 2005, and has been working fine. I have left it in storage about 1 and 1/2 years ago. Just now I try to restart it, the screen is forever stuck in the grey screen with the spinning wheel. I tried many times off-on, hold down the apple function key but none worked. I no longer have the rebooting CD with me. I wonder whether the computer can still be saved? I have already backed up the contents so it doesn't matter if fixing the computer requires me to delete all my old files. I think it's tiger or earlier that it's using.
I was away at a friend's yesterday and left my computer on and downloading a torrent (I have done this before and everything has been fine). When I came back today, I noticed that my computer was working very slowly so I restarted it. However, it would just stay at the grey screen with the wheel spinning forever instead of moving on to the blue screen.
I know that this has been reported many times before, even on this forum, but everything I tried does not work. I tried:
Holding down Command+S at startup and entering the command fsck -fy. Did not fix the problem Opening the Install Disc and going into Disk Utility. I repaired the permissions and verified that the HD has no problems but the problem persisted.
Going into Safe Mode. This actually works fine, but unfortunately offers an extremely limited functionality of my computer.
my 2006 macbook has not been able to start. First it didn't even have the chime, then I read through some threads in this forum and figured out that one of my RAMs was not properly put in. I fixed that, now I get the chime, the apple sign, and a spinning wheel and I am stuck there forever.
I tried:
resetting PRAM, didn't help.
start from safe boot, still stuck with apple sign and spinning wheel.
boot from installation CD by holding either the "C" or "D" key, it would not start from the CD.
Curiously, I can start it in Windows and I am using Windows right now. Some threads said that it could be a hard drive problem, but if I am using Windows, does it mean that my hard drive is fine?
I've already spent 800+ fixing the logic board in 2008 b/c of a water spill and really don't want to spend any meaningful amount of money to fix this 1000 bucks or so laptop. If any hardware is in jeopardy, I'd rather just throw it away. However, I would like to at least be able to start it in Mac OS once so that I can back up my documents.
I think my hd went out. I have a G4 dual 1ghz (pretty sure, can't see it right now) mdd, os 10.411, and it froze up so I did a hard restart: hold the power button for 10 seconds till it shuts off. When I turned it on the next time it would not boot up. Gray screen withe the spinning wheel of bars like it is thinking, searching, and longing to start up. Booted from the install cd to access the hd, but it acts like it wants to install the os fresh.
I apologize for the long message but I want to be as detailed as possible. My MacBook (purchased early 2006, white 13", upgraded to Leopard about a year ago with no problems until now) will not boot past the grey screen and spinning wheel. Here' are the list of 6 steps I've followed so far and still is not working. Oh, and I do not have any peripherals attached to my MacBook:
1. Reboot in Safe Mode: tried pressing down the Shift key before the powering up sound AND after the sound. Could not get into Safe Mode. Did this several times, holding the Shift key for as much as a minute or two. Nothing but grey screen and spinning wheel.
2. Reset NVRAM/PRAM: CMD+R+P+Option: Computer restarted but still goes into Grey Screen, spinning wheel and stays there forever.
3. CMD +S: I read this online. Gave me a black screen with a lot of information, but I don't know how to read the computer jargon, let alone know what to do with said info. 4. Disk Utility Repair Disk : Inserted my Leopard install disk. Went to Utility Disk. Performed a Repair Disk and I did get two error messages, something related to id 70000452 should be id 70000450 ( I'm sorry to say I cannot remember the exact error messages). But it showed as repaired. When I did a 2nd Repair Disk, I got the message that the volume appears to be OK. Turned off and on again, nothing but grey screen and wheel.......
My early Intel iMac (2006) won't shut down - gray spinning wheel and blue screen for more than 2 hours now. Can I safely turn it off with the power button? (I'm a little paranoid after a bad experience doing that with my MacBook Pro).what I should I do then?
So all of the sudden my mbp will not boot past the spinning wheel/apple screen. I have not let it try for longer than 15 minutes but I don't see the point. I tried to boot in safe mode(hold down shift) but the bar only went to about 1/3 and stopped/disappeared...so I don't know what to do. This shouldn't be happening after a couple months of light use.
Just for extra info:
I am able to boot into windows 7 via boot camp. Cannot boot from cd or go into safe mode.
The colorful spinning wheel has been stuck on the screen for 2 days now. I can move the cursor around but the wheel never goes away.....I don't know what to do
I have a IMac that suddenly can't move past the grey screen, apple logos, and spinning wheel. I have used the OS system disk to repair the Macintosh HD, the app stated that the repair of the volume was successful, but in trying to use the HD to restart, I am still stuck with the spinning wheel. What should I do next, or what am I doing wrong?Â
I have an iMac G5 stuck on the gray screen with spinning gear. I woke up to it being stuck on a blue screen, then force quit and now it's stuck on gray with spinning gear.
Everything was fine until this morning when i came into work, started up my Macbook as usual from sleep mode. was able to use OS X for a little while, had to leave to go onsite so i locked my screen (i use sizzle keys and made Command + L to lock my screen to the log on prompt). as soon as the cube spins to the logon screen, BOOM, all i see is the solid light blue screen just sit there. i walk away and 5 minutes later, it's still on there, can't recover or go back to my desktop, so i force shut down (hit the power button, and attempt to reboot the OS X. then thats when it all gets bad. Everytime i boot into OS X it just sits there with the blue screen and flickers back and forth with the gray gear wheel spinning and so forth.
Ok, so next check, i go to boot into my Boot Camp partition into Vista. no problems, was able to boot in my boot camp partition without any problems (im typing this in boot camp at this moment.)
So far i've been able to boot into my Boot Camp and the OS X Restore Disc without any problems.
I booted into the OS X boot disc, and ran Disk Utility, ran the perrmissions check and the disk check and both fixed problems aparently on my OS X partition. went to boot back into OS X, blue screen.
So now i do the PRAM and NVRAM reset doing Command+Option+P+R and again booted into OS X. blue screen.
Booted into Safe Mode (Safe Boot) took awhile, but again. stuck at blue screen and if i press any keys or move the mouse, the grey gear spins for like 10 seconds and just goes back to the blue screen. and the process goes over and over again.
(later on this afternoon) I even ran FSCK to check the volume for problems. "it appears to be OK"
The good thing atleast in this situation is that i can access my OS X partition in Vista (via MacDrive) without any problems, so if having to reload my previous Time Machine backup (which stupid me forgot to back up my system over 60 days ago ) or having to just Archive my OS X and reinstall it, that will have to be my final choice. But i don't REALLY want to have to do this all over again if at all possiable.
i need some help regarding my iMac. I was busy installing combo update 10.5.8 on my iMac when the power in the entire house went down due to the snow. When I started my iMac back up it got stuck on the apple logo with the spinning wheel below it. I can leave it there for as long as i like nothing happens. I had the idea to reboot using the CD's i got with the iMac but there is already a disc in the discloader so i can't put the reboot CD's in. anybody know how i can get my iMac to work again? There aren't any files on the computer that i neccesarely need but if i would be able to save my photo's etc. it would be great.
My MacBook pro freezes at start up at the gray screen with spinning gear. I did a firmware update yesterday and this happened upon restart. MacBook pro purchased new early 2011 lion
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.
My daughter's old I Mac won't start. It is not backed up. We want to get some things off of it if we can. When we turn it on, we get the Apple logo with spinning wheel for awhile, then a question mark briefly and then a sky blue blank screen. Is there any hope of getting this to work? This computer is out of warranty. Does it seem that if we reinstall the Operating System we might find old data? Â
my mom's Macbook Pro can't start up. it gets stuck at the grey screen w/ the Apple logo and spinning pinwheel every time. nothing else is plugged into the laptop aside from the power cord. Â
here's what i tried already, but to no avail:
 - Reset SMC
 - Reset PRAM
 - Hold shift while starting up... nothing happens. So can't start in safe mode
 - Used install disk to run Disk Utility diagnostic: Ran into a bunch of Disk Permission errors and fixed those. Nothing wrong on the Disk itself.
 - Held Command-S while starting up and typed "fsck -fy". Got "File system was modified" at first. Ran it again and got clean bill of health there
 - Held "d" while booting, ran the hardware test and it checked out fine.Â
after all of the above, tried waiting for it to restart for 15 minutes and still same spinning wheel. Â
this all started when a Skype update couldn't install, so i got rid of the current Skype. then tried downloading the new Skype. after it supposedly downloaded fully and it was automatically processing in the download pop up window (e.g. something about "writing", "image", etc.), it got stuck and froze the computer for at least 5 minutes. at that point, i help the power button until it turned out. then this started..
PS: not sure if this has anything to do w/ the problem, but after this happened, i tried to use Disk Utilities to make an image onto an external hard drive and it gave me an "operation timed out" error.Â
PPS:Â she has the following specs -
Hitachi Hard drive; partition Map Scheme: GUID Partition Table
After having inserted a dvd borrowed from the library which my Imac had a really tough time reading, I turned off my Imac as usual. Since then when I turn my mac on the fan starts roaring and i don't get beyond the first white screen with the sort of clocked wheel just going round and round. I don't have a clue to what to do.
Mac won't boot, starts with white apple screen and spinning wheel. Also has grey loading bar which disappears after loaded then stays at white apple screen.
One day my computer just switched off for no reason. And when u tried to switch it back on it wouldn't pass the apple logo. It just stays on the apple logo with the spinning wheel under.I have tried fsck -fy it say my computer is ok .but then recently there is a losing bar that appeared under the spinning wheel. I have tried putting in the mac osx cd in and nothing happened but the cd won't come out anymore so now every time I switch the laptop it tries to start the cd.
I did a software update and now MacBook pro is stuck on grey screen with spinning wheel. Turned off and on, still the wheel is spinning. Tried holding down shift key on a start up and yet still returned to grey screen with spinning wheel.
I started up my 24" iMac today and it just got stuck on the grey screen before the apple logo appears. I reset the PRAM and I tried using the OSX disc and holding down C. I got to the disk utility and it freezes. I am stuck using my bottom of the line laptop untill I can work around this.
'Ive had a MacBookPro for about a year and a half - with zero problems to report. But, yesterday, I decided to do a software update for OSX. While waiting on it, I relaized I was running late for an appointment, got impatient and did a forced shutdown (stupid move, I now know). Anyway, upon restarting it, I get the usual start-up chime, then the grey screen with the apple logo and the spinning wheel - and then it stays there. I tried putting the operating syten disc in and did a start-up - same results. Ditto for safe start. I also tried to reset the NVRAM, got the second chime, then back to the same. Is there anything you folks can suggest? Is there a way to override this and get back to normal? I hope I'm merely having hiccups related to the operating system. Or could this be a sign of the dreaded logic board failure that I fear?
