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Level 2

385 points

Unable to start Mac past spinning wheel

I am unable to start an iMac past the grey screen Apple logo and spinning wheel. It will sit there indefinitely until a power cycle.

What are my options?

Dual 2GHz PowerMac G5 (plus 15" G4 PowerBook), Mac OS X (10.5.2), 2.5 GB DDR SDRAM, 2x160GB SATA, 23" Cinema HD Display

Posted on Mar 25, 2008 2:31 AM

17 replies

Mar 27, 2008 3:06 PM in response to MacPopp

I actually had the same issue this morning (at work, im a PC tech) and I went ahead and ran the following:
alt/option and ran first aid- no issues found
single user- ran fsck -y -f- no issues found
Ran ASD and AHT diagnostic- no issues found.
But yet after powering it up same issue- stuck at the spinning wheel.

I went ahead and removed the top cover to inspect the system- no issues. Replaced the hdd w/ one our test drive, powered up and it worked fine. At this point I believe the issue is more on the SW related than HW.

Now off to configuring a new HDD for the customer.

Redsmartie Author

Level 2

385 points

Mar 28, 2008 1:46 AM in response to Technogeek74

I pretty much came to the same conclusion. All the subsequent HW tests I performed checked out ok.

Even when I started it up in target disk mode it performed without issue so it was something OS side. It would just be nice to know what to see if any preventative measures could be taken.

I would like to give a big nod in the direction of Archive and Install which I haven't previously used. I thought that my option was going to be an install (or archive and install) and then show it the Time Machine disk which I didn't have at the time so couldn't select that option from initial installation. The archive and install was seamless. I'm really impressed how it restored users and applications.

Unable to start Mac past spinning wheel