PowerPC :: IBook Won't Boot Past Gray Screen
Dec 30, 2010
I'm trying to resurrect an iBook (translucent white case, 14.1 LCD) that was long neglected, so not sure on its past service history. The following do NOT work: - won't boot up past the gray screen with Apple logo and spinning gear icon (just hangs) - same problem if I try to boot from install DVD ("c" or using "option" then selecting DVD) - same problem with safe boot with "shift" - reset PRAM It will connect via firewire target disk mode to another computer, and I used that to completely wipe the disk and do a clean install of 10.5. When I tried booting into single-user mode (cmd-s), it fills about 2/3 of the screen with normal-looking messages, but then hangs after this (no keyboard response): Got boot device = IOService... [various other stuff] BSD root: disk0s6, major 14, minor 5 I'm out of ideas. Any suggestions? The machine is old enough that it's probably not worth the diagnostic fee of the local Apple shop. Since I can't get it to boot, I can't even run TechTools.
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Feb 6, 2008
At the tech dept we have this G4 that refuses to boot past the grey screen with the rotating wheel. The logic board has been replaced, we've removed all sticks of RAM save 1x512, we've tried a known working optical drive, replaced ribbon cables (optical cable was frayed on one end) No dice. Option booting works, but once we select the DVD we can't boot from an install PPC CD either, it just gets stuck at the grey screen. We also have a tech HD inside that the computer does not boot from either.
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May 1, 2009
I recently required a Power Mac G4, and it was working fine, albeit a bit slow but I just assume that was because there's too many files on it, but that's another story. I shut it down before I left work, when I came back in the morning it was just the grey screen with the apple. I reset it, still no response. I reset the PRAM, nothing. I tried to boot in Single user mode, nothing. I tried to boot in verbose mode, nothing. I force ejected the CD and put in an OSX disk one from my laptop, asked it to force read by restarting and pressing "C" and still nothing. I am not sure if a cable inside has been jarred lose.
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Jul 17, 2010
I was given a PowerBook G4 15" today. I need to fix it, but I can't find out what exactly is wrong. I've used MROOGLE and I can't find any problem quite like what I'm experiencing. In my case, the laptop will turn on, make the chime, and stay stuck on a white/grey screen. No apple, no spinning gear, no nothing. Just a blank white/grey screen. However, when I insert the Leopard DVD and hold down "C" the apple appears as well as the little spinning gear. That goes on for a few minutes. BUT, after those few minutes are up the small gear still spins, but the Apple logo is replaced with a prohibitory sign (like what you would see on a non-smoking or no parking sign) and it sticks there and sometime says that I need to re-start my computer. The same happens with the Tiger disk. Also, when I place the Leopard or Tiger disk in the SuperDrive and hold down "option" so that I can boot OS X from the DVD, I click the little continue arrow and nothing happens. I've reset everything there is to be reset, and I've opened up the computer and re-seated everything that could possibly be re-seated. RAM, HDD, all connector cables, etc. There isn't any visible physical damage inside of the computer either.
The most recent thing I've tried was to boot off of a PPC-specific Ubuntu disk. It does some stuff and lets me run the kernel, but after that the computer gets stuck on a black screen and does nothing at all. I'd really appreciate it if you all could offer some advice as to what may be wrong. All suggestions and ideas are welcome too.
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Jun 11, 2007
I have an iBook G4 1.07 GHz 30 gb 256 RAM with Panther. It was working fine until my HD got close to being full. Now I can't get it to boot past the Apple screen. It will either freeze there, or move on to the blue screen and freeze before the progress bar enters. I want to re-install Panther but I can't get any CD to boot during startup by holding "C", including the Panther OS CD, the Hardware Test CD, or the Tech Tool CD. I am able to boot to single user mode, where I type fsck -fy, and I recieve no errors with the hardware. I had this issue beore and my HD had to be replaced by Apple.
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May 13, 2009
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!!
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May 30, 2012
I have a mirror door g4 power pc that had been having some issues with not turning on, and after testing the power supply, it failed miserably. We placed a refurbished power supply in it from a company in New York and the computer was working wonderfully. I went on a cruise last week and went to turn the computer on for the first time in a week and a few days. The CPU turns on, the unit chimes, the fan turns on and the computer starts to boot up, but it won't boot past the gray apple logo screen. Actually, the first few attempts to boot it resulted in a blue screen with gaint apple logo and spinner; it wouldn't advance further. After several restarts and resets, I got it to come up into the normal gray screen. On several attempts it wouldn't boot further than this. On two occasions now though, it has moved past the gray screen to normal operation (it takes about an hour for it to get to that point though) but with some kind of errors. I get the side bar, but the gray panel on to with "file" ect is gone and my HD icon never comes up. The icons on the sidebar do not respond when clicked. The computer will not boot from the OS X disc.
Info:
PowerMac, Mac OS X (10.4.8)
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Nov 24, 2010
So bare with me I want to be thorough so hopefully someone can help me out. My MBP (08) will not boot past the grey screen. The wheel just spins infinitely. I've read about it trying to figure it out.
1) I tried to boot from the install disc, when I do there are weird diagonal lines and the thing is unreadable.
2) I hooked it to my Mac Pro in target disc mode. I was able to get some of the information off, but it would eventually freeze up and freeze the finder on the Pro. It wouldn't verify the disc in disc utility. It would freeze if I tried to repair the disc.
3) It won't boot in safe mode or single user mode (CMD + S)
4) I tried removing the ram and switching it and using only one stick of ram (to make sure it wasn't a ram problem).
5) I tried to boot without the battery
Needless to say I am a bit frustrated. My applecare is long gone and there is no apple certified repair place anywhere near here. I've also noticed the thing is very hot. If nothing else I'd like to have an idea of what I should be expecting from the repair place.
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Nov 23, 2007
I started this topic on the Garage Band forum because I was having trouble with Garage Band '08 when my computer crashed and will not restart afterwards. Garage Band was crashing 2 out of every 3 attempts at recording, and I would have to use Force Quit to escape and start over. Then, while I was in the middle of a very complex project involving Garage Band, iTunes, Finale (music notation program), and Microsoft Word, the computer froze up and I hit restart, thinking that would solve the problem. Big mistake - the computer has not been able to restart since then. I have a late 2005 G5 power mac with 1 GB of memory, 230 GB hard drive (or something like that) and no additional gizmos installed, running OS X 10.4.4. I had upgraded to iLife '08 a month or so ago and have had problems since with unusual crashes and freezes, especially involving Garage Band '08.
When I boot, I get to the gray opening screen with the gray apple logo and the spinning gear (is it really called an "intergalactic frisbee?"), and no further. The fans come on (and begin to ramp up to a huge noise after two minutes or so), the white LED light comes on steadily. I've disconnected all peripherals except my keyboard and mouse (Kensington USB keyboard and Logitech Mouse, both of which seem to work OK still). I can use the keyboard to open the CD/DVD player, and I can start the computer with both the Apple Installer disk and with Disk Warrior 4.0. I've repaired everything I can find with both programs, verified everything available, used Disk Warrior to examine corrupted files, and removed all the .plist files that it said were broken and could not be fixed. The only thing I can't find is that it says I am missing a "tmp" folder in my HD/private/ folder, which I can't seem to locate on the directory on Disk Warrior. Both programs say that all my hardware is fine, and that everything else is OK too. Puzzling. I removed the battery and tested it (it was OK), replaced it, and reset the PMU button on the motherboard even though I know all you have to do is unplug the back for a few minutes or so.............
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Jan 8, 2011
My iMac won't get past grey screen, I've tried holding down c. I've tried holding cmd+s. I've reset my PRAM etc, I've put back in RAM it came with, and when I turn it on I just get grey screen, apple logo and the spinning thing! Updated it to new snow leopard OSX 10.6.6 and it has a DVD in the drive and I can't even get that out! What can I do?
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Jul 23, 2010
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.......
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Jan 8, 2011
My macbook pro won't boot past the grey screen, I've tried reseting PRam, running fsck from single user etc to no avail. All signs would point towards a hard disk failure, but the curious thing is that it sometimes mounts in disk utility when booting from the install CD, so theres a little life left in it yet! I have fairly recent backups of most of my files, but there are a couple I've been working on in the past few days that won't be backed up. So my question is this - is it possible to copy files from my mac HD onto a external drive through the terminal/disk utility while booting from the CD.
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May 29, 2012
This morning, I would turn it on and it'd go to the grey screen with the Apple logo for a few seconds and then go to the icon that is a circle with a line through it. After reading online, I was able to boot it up in Safe Mode. I went to Startup Disk in Preferences. I chose the MAC OS X, xxxx and then clicked the lock to prevent further changes and then clicked restart. Now when I turn on the macbook, it goes to the grey screen with the Apple logo for at least two-three minutes and then just shuts off. Won't boot into Safe Mode now. I already tried the Command-Option-P-R keys trick like five times.
Info:
MacBook Pro
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Dec 29, 2008
My iBook G4 will not boot even from DVD.Boot with option does not show the hard drive, but shows the Tiger dvd.Memory access error shows at open boot.How can I get this thing to boot?
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Sep 30, 2007
I have an iBook G3 Clamshell 466MHz with 192mb RAM and 10GB HD. I recently updated the OS from 9.2.2 to Panther on a single partition. The upgrade went flawlessly.Then I purchased a 512mb RAM module from a 3rd Party Vendor and after fitting it discovered the iBook no longer boots past the flashing folder/?.
I removed the new ram and replaced the 128mb module but haven't been able to boot past this flashing folder/? icon. I've zapped the PRAM, reset Open Firmware, disconnected the Keyboard then booted, reset the PMU (need to do this each boot or I see black screen only) and tried to boot from the Panther Disc #1 holding the 'C' key. I also tried TDM with my Intel Mac Core 2 Duo but couldn't boot past the flashing folder/? icon.
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Jun 24, 2009
I've searched this problem on google for the past hour or so and have had no luck whatsoever. I have an Ibook G4 14" and I think it's like 1.2 CPU. A while back the Ibook stopped working and left me with a grey screen and finder icon with flash quiestion mark. I searched the net for a solution for that and what came back was that I had a dead harddrive. Okay fair enough, I've just replaced the drive with the working one from my Mac Mini, i repeat the WORKING drive, I know it works. So I start up the Ibook and hear the chimes, the screen flashes black white black and then stays on white. I have reset the PRAM and eject disk works but no other key commands, I cannot boot from installer 10.4 cd (a new one I bought, not the bundled one), I can't go into target mode as I have no firewire and leaving it alone for a while doesn't help.
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Oct 4, 2009
I am trying to reformat an iBook for a friend. Everything was running, but, there was no chime on boot. I logged into the machine, and was checking files and folders when it locked up. It actyally locked up while trying to run Microsoft Word. It now boots to a grey screen the the little "spinning" thing, and then, instead of going to the login screen, it just turns blue. It will NOT boot into Safe Mode, it will NOT boot to the iBook Install CD, I just get the same blue screen using both methods. I used Command-Option-P-R without success. I booted to Open Firmware and typed reset-nvram without success. I don't know what else to try. I am copying her files right now by booting into Target Disk mode, but, once I get that done, I still won't be able to boot the install disc to get the system wiped and reinstalled. What else can I do to correct this?
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Sep 25, 2008
My ibookG4 won't boot past the blue screen. I have run fsck several times in single user because it won't boot in safe mode. Every time it comes back **** FILE SYSTEM WAS MODIFIED **** and never that the volume is ok. This blue screen problem occurred after trying to hook up a wireless router and changing settings in airport. If anyone knows how I can fix this.
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May 5, 2007
after my six year old daughter dropped it(on hardwood floor).
I tried this:
<command> <opt> <p> <r> Letting it chime 4 times. But, no luck - it just sits there witht the gray screen/dark gray apple logo and that thing twirling around like it's thinking.
check that I've left it on and it has now worked its way to the blue screen. Cursor shows up and the twirling thing is gone(as are the little clicking noises inside like it's actually trying to do someting).
Now you're really going to let me have it. I don't have any of my original disks.
Guess I should take it to the Apple store and see what they say(no applecare).
I was running Tiger(latest version) and the ibook G4 is a 1.33 with 768mb of ram if that matters.
Luckily all my photo's and music are on my powerbook and mac mini.
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May 14, 2007
I signed up here to ask a life or death question for my iBook G3 While transferring through an airport last week on one of those moveable walkways, I got clipped off by another passenger who was running through the terminal to catch his flight. Unfortunately, he somehow managed to send my briefcase- with the iBook- sailing ten feet accross the terminal, landing onto the floor with a sickening thud. Although the iBook was fortunately in a protective notebook cover, and there were no cracks to be seen when I retreived it, my attempts to fire up the iBook have failed. That is, when turning the machine on, everything seems to lead me on that its going to run normally- the OS9 to OS10.3 transfer clicks in, I get the grey apple symbol on the grey background with the running circle below- and then nothing. The grey screen goes on, and on, and on. I tried it again this morning and it stayed like this for an hour. Worse, I cannot simply turn the machine off without hitting the reset button, and all attempts to reinstall the programs or do a hardware test lead to nothing. If I had more time, I'd probably search high and low through the forums to see if there was anything I could do to bring the iBook back to life. Unfortunately, I have to leave in two days again, and wanted to bring the laptop with me. is there some way that I can get this dear old beast running again, or is it curtains for my beloved iBook?
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Jul 17, 2007
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?
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Dec 30, 2008
A friend of mine brought over his 14" iBook G4, 1.33GHz, 60GB HDD and 1.25 GB RAM. The problem with it is that upon start-up, the grey screen with the apple/turning gear comes up, then after a few moments a blue screen will appear, though no box showing the start-up process. I've run a few basic diagnostics on this, including the lovely disk utility (which did nothing), I've run fsck, zapped the PRAM, etc, no success as of yet. At one point, I received a screen with alternating folders, one showing the smiley mac face, the other folder with a flashing "?". I cannot replicate this for the life of me. I have attempted to acquire files via TDM, though am not able to see the hard drive despite using 2 different laptops. Possibly the firewire cable itself is spent, though it's brand new! Here is where I become increasingly frustrated: I ask my friend for the boot disks as the ones for my own 12" iBook don't work (for whatever reason). He tells me that he loaded Leopard this summer (currently running 10.5.2, no updates loaded since), then proceeds to bring over boot discs for a MacBook...:headdesk: To begin with, it seemed like the HDD was fried, however, after running disk utility (and not hearing any negative sounds), it does appear that the HDD is fine. I'm thinking a kernel panic, though not sure how to resolve these.
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Jul 11, 2009
I have recently come across an extremely cheap ibook (free) which i was able to keep if I got it too work. Well I've been successfully fairly by using it for a few weeks, then it just died. Not sure how it did but it did. The problems seem to be with the flashing (Finder/?) folder on a gray screen back ground. I've already run through the [URL] tutorials of what's wrong and have successfully done a PRAM and a PMU reset with no result. One of the times that I restarted the iBook and after the flashing folder got two new separate folders. One with an arrow turning clockwise on the left, and another folder with an arrow pointing right on the right. Both in blue folders as the flashing folders. Now I believe the problem is that the iBook is unable to find and utilize the Startup Disk. Forums I have read state to put in the reinstall disc, which I don't see how that will work on account of the CD tray not responding to anything I've yet put in there. Not trying with disc until i know that is the only possible solution. Don't want to loose my disc. Maybe some of you have come across this situation and know of a sure fire way to fix it. If not, Ill have to just send it in to some site.
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Aug 31, 2010
I have an old PowerBook G4 that my son uses for simple stuff. One day the screen went dark gray (not powered off) and it won't boot. When I try to boot from a Tiger disk, I get what appears to be a kernel panic. I don't get any strange startup beeps
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Nov 1, 2006
So I've got a powerbook G4, thats 8 days past its warranty. Conveniently, it now won't turn on. It won't wont boot from CD. If I turn it on, I get a gray screen that usually just turns my computer back off, if thats not the case I get a screen that shows the finder icon and a question mark and then turns off.
All it will do is boot into open firmware mode. Currently the install disc is inside of it and I've tried booting the cd using "cd:, bxi" and "dir hd", and it can't open both. Does anyone know how to wipe the HD, and start the installer using firmware? Otherwise, I think I'll have to take out the harddrive and plug it into an external case and then wipe it.
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Aug 2, 2010
first i'd like to give you a few pieces of information on what was going on before I restarted my mac. 1. My mac is a 13'' late 2008 mb with 2gb of ram (running leopard). 2. I JUST had my hard drive replaced due to a failure. 3. Before i restarted my computer i was having several "system extenstion" errors and when i tried to repair i recieved the message 'Underlying task reported failure on exit.' At the time, i was also trying to install Adobe CS5 Master Collection trial and i couldn't get past a password screen. This also prompted me to restart. Once the computer began to restart, it began updating boot caches. This was taking a very long time so i walked away from the mb. When i came back i realized the battery had died and when i plugged it back in and tried to get it to boot, it would get to the gray screen with the apple and the spinning logo underneath. But then it simply reboots.
I've tried restarting the pram. I've tried rebooting in single user mode (cmd + S) and got to the point where i could rebuild the tree (fsck_hfs -r /dev/disk0s2) and that did it's thing for about ten minutes and it didn't fix the problem. I don't have my install disk but apple is sending me a new one and will be here by friday.
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May 12, 2010
I have a few month old iMac 27" i7 quad core for music use and did an update this morning which consisted of an itunes update and update to the screen firmware and two other things I can't remember. Do the usual install and restart business and am now met with the following error:
------------------------------------------------------
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x558271): "Unable to find device driver for this platform: "ACPI".
"@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-1504.3.12......................
Debugger called: <panic>
Backtrace (CPU 0) , Frame: Return Address (4 potential args on stack)
7 lines of numbers and letters (please let me know if you need these)
BSD process name correspoding to current thread: Unknown
Mac OS Version:
Not yet set
Kernal Version:
Darwin Kernel Version 10.3.0...............
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May 21, 2012
what should I try? I did try restting the eprom by removing he battery and hoding the power button for 30 seconds.
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May 21, 2012
Tried everything, the shift key at startup, the c key at start up, with the disk installed, disk is brand new no scratches. Gray Screen still on, no movement of the optical drive or HD apparent Is my HD screwed ?
Info:MacBook Pro (17-inch Early 2011), Mac OS X (10.6.8)
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Dec 2, 2014
How to get my computer to turn on? I used it on Friday and had a normal shut down but when I went to turn it on yesterday, it gets the the gray screen with the apple and the loading bar and loads half way and then just stops and sits there until it eventually shuts itself off. I have tried turning it off and then back on and holding the D key but nothing happened.
Info:
MacBook Pro, iOS 8
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