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Mac Pro 4,1 Boot disk set to a broken Windows 10 based external disk. Keyboard NOT WORKING AT ALL Please help me

My question is the same as this guys basically https://discussions.apple.com/thread/251334143?login=true


So I was trying to use a bootcamp drive I made on my imac 2013 on my Mac Pro 4,1 (2009). I wasn't getting the boot selector when holding alt so instead I held command + r and changed my start up disk to the external HDD connected via USB.


The boot was unsuccessful and is stuck on a flashing underscore in the top left corner.

Additionally my KEYBOARD DOES NOT WORK AT ALL. I've TRIED THREE DIFFERENT KEYBOARDS. I'VE TRIED DOING ALL THE KNOWN TO ME COMMANDS RIGHT AFTER + BEFORE + DURING "the chime"... it always just has the chime>white screen *no apple logo* > then it goes into windows STRAIGHT into the flashing underscore.


The keyboard commands I've tried:

shift

command + r

alt

Command + R + P + Alt


Other things I've tried:

taking out the BIOS battery on the motherboard for more than 20 seconds after draining all power from the computer

Pressing the reset button next to the BIOS battery

spamming keys on startup and beyond


The start up external HDD does work on my imac 2013 still.


Please someone help me.

Mac Pro

Posted on Nov 9, 2020 7:46 PM

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Question marked as Best answer

A USB should also work. It needs to have a bootable installer for macOS supported by your Mac.

Posted on Nov 10, 2020 11:55 AM

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21 replies

Nov 10, 2020 5:35 PM in response to Loner T

Okay so my friend gave me his old OS CD and I held down C as it said to do when bootign and its WORKING. It went into os setup mode and I now have access to terminal and disk utilty and such. I do't have a time machine back up (though idid make one, I delted it when I reformated a drive out of anxiouness of tryingto find soultions so I don't have a valid system back up I can use. Unless someone is willing to send me a back up (anyone plase? if so email me ming.domenic@gmail.com).


So basicaly what can I do from here to get this thing working. keep in mind I do still have the orignial disk so I guess what I will do is boot the orignal disk on my normal imac that is working and make a time machine back up to that and then from there I'll try to back it up or osmething idk.

Nov 11, 2020 3:23 PM in response to Loner T

Thank you, So I realized that I didn't properly make the bootable usb at first. I simply dragged and dropped the dmg to the flash drive which wasn't good enough lol. After following a few youtube tutorials I was able to make a proper one for El Capitan (that's the OS I Was running on the hard drive) and what happened was it said it was installing and then suddenly my login popped up.


So yeah that's the fix, although putting in an installer disk of any os beyond snow leopard and hold c may work casue at least terminal will then be accessible and you can use a command line to switch your start up disk by force. But also idk ifthat woudl work, but the reason I couldn't do with with snow leopard is becasue i didn't have x coe and snow leopard is missing a LOT of commands that's you'd have to install using home brew, but you cna't get home brew till you get tiger something and you cna't get tiger something till you get xcode lmaooo and you cna't install xcode unles you have access to your cpu.


However I did run into a new error. I'm talking about it here:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/252026602

Mac Pro 4,1 Boot disk set to a broken Windows 10 based external disk. Keyboard NOT WORKING AT ALL Please help me

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