Q: MacBook Pro will not load OS X
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Jul 14, 2015 8:29 AMby Drew Reece,What machine created each of these installations? Is it similar spec to the MacBook Pro?
OS X can install machine specific drivers & kernel extensions, sometimes the OS will not work from one model to another.
You can try safe mode to attempt to clear out the kernel caches but it may not help. The caches are rebuilt on the next boot, so you need to try a safe mode boot & then retry another normal boot.
Try safe mode if your Mac doesn't finish starting up - Apple Support
It is odd that the original disks don't boot, it's possible hardware is failing, maybe try a hardware test…
Using Apple Hardware Test - Apple Support
If you can't get any further I would take it to an Apple store for a diagnosis, they may be able to detect more than AHT can pick up. They can also check for any repair/ replacement programs for that model (listed at https://www.apple.com/support/exchange_repair/ until they expire).
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Jul 14, 2015 3:09 PMby High-Res Solutions,Thanks, Drew, for your response.
The Internal HD's installation of 10.7.5 was created by the machine in question. The External USB HD's installation of 10.8.5 was created by a different MacBook Pro from the same year.
Tried booting with safe mode, but no luck.
Apple Hardware Test came back with error "4MEM/62/40000000 : 0x8624c418". Google search suggested this might be a memory error. Removed and reseated memory sticks, same error. Removed top DIMM completely, then no error. However, normal boot or safe mode still not working from any boot source. Swapped out memory sticks completely for different ones tested working in another machine, and again no AHT error, but also no boot.
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Jul 14, 2015 4:05 PMby Drew Reece,I think a trip to an Apple store is order if you can do so.
The fact that known good RAM fails & the OS was made on that Mac points towards another hardware issue to me. AHT can fail to report some errors or over report others, so run extended & short modes on a loop, hit command + L to enable that in the test screen.
It sounds like a GPU error since it freezes around the time I think the advanced graphics starts to load. I'm not sure if there are any arguments you can set to switch GPU modes via NVRAM…
This has a little info on some arguments…
http://superuser.com/questions/255176/is-there-a-list-of-available-boot-args-for -darwin-os-x
Or there is the manual…
https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/ man8/nvram.8.html
Zap the PRAM to reset the NVRAM arguments
How to Reset NVRAM on your Mac - Apple Support
Take a look at this thread, I think it is discussing how to disable the drivers (I didn't read much of it sorry it's too long )…
2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card
I think the com.apple.boot.plist can also be used to change how booting works, just be sure to keep copies of the originals…
You can also compare the verbose output between the same models if you want to get even more detail, but I don't know where to go from there.
Mac OS X: How to start up in single-user or verbose mode - Apple Support
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Aug 21, 2015 1:04 PMby cabermud,Try going to Apple. I think you too may be getting the issue with the AMD GPU on this model:
https://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro-videoissues/
I know this is an older post and you may have done this already.
