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MacBook Pro 13" - Grey Screen at startup

Hello everyone,

I have an older MacBook Pro 13" mid 2012. Upon startup I'm getting the common "grey sceen of death." If I hold Command-R at startup, it takes me to a spinning globe, asks me to choose my wifi network, then says "starting internet recovery."


It then takes me to the OS X Utilities menu 1) Restore Time Machine 2) Reinstall OS X 3) Get Help Online 4) Disk Utilities


I'm wondering how to proceed?

  • I do use an external HD to backup the computer via Time Machine. My last full backup was a few months back, but I don't have any new files on the computer, as I mostly use iCloud or other clouds. I'm not worried about losing files, as I haven't saved any to the actual internal HD since the last backup, even though it was last March 2023.
  • I did install Catalina OS on Tuesday, as it was a suggested update. Not positive what OS I was already using (I know, this is a basic thing to know. Sorry.)
  • After installing Catalina I realized Word wouldn't work any longer. Thus, I wanted to uninstall Catalina. I plugged in my external XD to do a Time Machine backup, just to be safe. While it was connected, the computer went into the continual reboot situation. I shut it down. Upon restart, I was getting the grey screen
  • I hadn't had any issues prior to the Catalina OS install
  • A few years back I did install a new SATA HD, as my internal HD crashed and was damaged.


I'm wondering how best to proceed. Thank you in advance!

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Jan 20, 2024 9:09 AM

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Jan 20, 2024 10:18 AM in response to nayr497

Are you getting any progress bar or Apple logo? Or is it just an empty screen? If a progress bar, how far does the progress bar get?


Have you tried booting without the TM drive connected? Have you also tried disconnecting all other external devices as well?


Have you tried booting into Safe Mode?


If none of this helps, then while in recovery mode run Disk Utility First Aid on the hidden Container. Within Disk Utility you may need to click "View" and select "Show All Devices" before the hidden Container appears on the left pane of Disk Utility. Even if First Aid says everything is "Ok", click "Show Details" and scroll back through the report to see if any unfixed errors are listed. If there are unfixed errors, then run First Aid again to see if they are repaired. Make sure you are booted to the Catalina installer while in recovery mode.


Do you by any chance have a USB to SATA Adapter, SATA drive dock, or external drive enclosure handy? Or a spare external USB drive that can be erased?


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Jan 28, 2024 12:29 PM in response to nayr497

Catalina is not the issue unless it is incompatible with some of your third part software. Catalina should run just fine on a 2012 laptop. The main compatibility issue with Catalina is that it no longer supports 32 bit apps. As for compatibility with Word, there is a very good chance you won't be able to use that old version of Word anymore even if you can restore it from a backup. If Word requires you to reactivate your license after restoring from the backup, then it won't work since Microsoft turned off the old activation servers many years ago.


Besides, you need to figure out where the actual problem is. Since you are able to boot a macOS installer, it would suggest to me an issue with the internal SSD or the internal SATA Cable, but of course it could be something else entirely since the macOS installer only contains a very small portion of built-in macOS system drivers & software. Plus if you want to try to fix the internal boot drive, Catalina is necessary to run a First Aid scan & it makes it easier to recover data if that is necessary. This external boot drive is mainly to be used for testing & troubleshooting purposes. Trying to access data on the internal drive requires at least macOS 10.13 to be able to read the APFS file system, but it can be difficult to find the data using an older OS....a Catalina boot drive makes it much easier to attempt to access the data.


This is why I was suggesting to remove the internal SSD and attempt to boot the SSD externally. It can answer several questions at once and is quick & simple to do....all you need for that test is a USB to SATA Adapter such as the one I linked previously, or a SATA drive dock, or an external drive enclosure.


If you do not care about rescuing any data and only want to attempt to boot to the internal SSD, then you can of course decide to erase the internal SSD & install whatever older version of macOS you want on it. If the internal SSD or the internal SATA Cable is the problem, then the installation of macOS to the internal drive will most likely fail.


It is possible to check the health of the internal drive by creating & using a bootable Linux USB stick. I did not suggest this earlier because I thought installing macOS to an external drive would be easier for you since you are familiar with macOS and it would prove a better test to confirm the laptop is working fine other than having issues with the internal boot drive. Here are the instructions I wrote several years ago for another user:

Creating & using a bootable Knoppix Linux USB stick to check health of a drive on a Mac -- HWTech - Apple Community



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Jan 28, 2024 1:53 PM in response to nayr497

A bootable USB installer is exactly what it sounds like. A USB drive....usually a USB stick that has been setup up with the macOS installer on it. You actually provided a link to the instructions to create a bootable macOS USB installers in one of your previous posts. However, a bootable macOS USB installer can only be created on another compatible Mac since your Mac is currently not booting normally. For you, you would need access to another Mac generally from 2007 to mid-2020 which would allow you to create a bootable macOS 10.11, 10.13, or 10.15 USB installer (depends on the exact Mac). If you don't have access to another Mac from 2007 to mid-2020, then a USB installer is irrelevant and can be ignored.


Internet Recovery Mode (Command + Option + R) is just fine as long as you have a good Internet connection....seems like you were already able to boot into Internet Recovery Mode IIRC. You can access Internet Recovery Mode by holding down Command + Option + R immediately after hearing the startup chime. You may be prompted to connect to your WiFi network if you are not using an Ethernet Cable for the network connection.


Both Internet Recovery Mode and a USB installer will do the same thing although a bootable macOS USB installer can be a bit faster & more reliable, but both can do the job.


For reference you can review this Apple article which explains how to boot into Internet Recovery Mode (there are three options, use the one I mentioned for best results). And follow my instructions for using Disk Utility for properly erasing the external drive you will be using.....Apple's instructions for erasing a drive in this article may not always work especially for an external drive, plus it depends on which version of macOS installer you end up booting when booting into Internet Recovery Mode. Some Macs may only boot to the online installer which originally shipped with the Mac from the factory...in that case you will need to review my instructions in a previous post on how to properly prepare the external destination drive using Disk Utility. Scroll down to the section "If you are using any other Mac" as that is the section which applies to your older Intel Mac:

How to reinstall macOS - Apple Support


You can tell which version of macOS you are booting by looking at the utilities screen once booted into recovery mode. One of the options is "Install macOS xxxxx", where the "xxxxx" tells you the version of the installer (aka the version of macOS which will be installed).


Sorry this is so complicated, but Apple has made lots of changes over the years and some Macs will behave differently regardless of the special keys used to boot the Mac. And the instructions in Apple's recent articles are focusing mainly on the more recent versions of macOS forgetting that many people may be using older computers & installers.


As long as you can boot to a macOS installer and you only erase the external drive and only select the external drive as a destination, you can experiment as you wish or need to. Removing the internal SSD would ensure that you don't accidentally erase the internal SSD by taking out all risk in experimenting with installing macOS to an external drive.


Good Luck.

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Jan 23, 2024 4:53 AM in response to HWTech

Grey screen if I just start up.


If I start up and hold Command R I get the spinning globe.


It asks me to choose a network. Select mine, put in my password (all wifi, not plugged in. Computer has nothing plugged in beyond the power cord)



Starting internet recovery, this may take awhile, spinning globe.


It then takes me to the OS X Utilities screen with the four options

  • restore TM
  • Reinstall OS X
  • Get Help Online
  • Disk Utilities
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Jan 20, 2024 10:45 AM in response to HWTech

I have an Intel Mac, holding Shift during startup doedn't do anything, just the grey screen.


I think what you want me to try next is working from the OS X Utilities menu, which I get to when I hold Command R during startup. Correct?

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Jan 20, 2024 11:08 AM in response to HWTech

When I run the Disk Utility it shows two things in the left pane - 960 GB Crucial and Mac OS X Base System.


I can run or do anything with First Aid when I cleck the 960 GB Crucial. Verify Disk and Repair Disk are greyed out and not clickable.


When I click on Mac OS X Base System I can click Verify Disk and it runs and then gives me a message in green. "The Mac OS X Base System appears to be OK."

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Jan 20, 2024 6:39 PM in response to nayr497

nayr497 wrote:

Hmm, the TM drive? Not sure what that is, sorry! But yes, I'm try to start up without anything connected, aside from the power cable.

Time Machine drive.


I can run or do anything with First Aid when I cleck the 960 GB Crucial. Verify Disk and Repair Disk are greyed out and not clickable.

What is the make & model of the Crucial SSD?


When I click on Mac OS X Base System I can click Verify Disk and it runs and then gives me a message in green. "The Mac OS X Base System appears to be OK."

This is the macOS installer. Ignore it. You only need to worry about the Crucial SSD and the hidden APFS Container on it. Running First Aid on the hidden Container also runs it on all APFS volumes within that hidden Container.


Just a blank grey screen, no progress bar.

When booting into Recovery Mode, are you booting into local recovery mode or into Internet Recovery Mode? If your laptop is not using an Ethernet cable, are you seeing a spinning globe symbol or being prompted to select WiFi?


Again: Do you by any chance have a USB to SATA Adapter, SATA drive dock, or external drive enclosure handy? Or a spare external USB hard drive or SSD that can be erased? This is important to know so I know what you have to work with to try & troubleshoot here.



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Jan 24, 2024 5:35 AM in response to HWTech

Grey screen

Restart and hold Command R

spinning globe

choose network (I choose mine, put in the password) Wifi, not plugged in to ethernet

starting internet recovery, this might take awhile, spinning globe


This then takes me to the OS X Utilities menu

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Jan 24, 2024 9:17 AM in response to nayr497

Yes, you can use the Dell Seagate HD as an external boot drive....it may be a bit slow, but that doesn't really matter since we just want to test the ability of this laptop to boot a full version of macOS.


Is this Dell HD one that was pulled from a Dell computer? If so then you could try putting your internal Crucial SSD in place of the Dell Seagate HD to try booting (or installing macOS to the Crucial SSD while connected externally). This is a good way to determine whether the Crucial SSD or the internal SATA Cable are the problem.


I would really like to see the SMART health report for this Crucial SSD. We can retrieve the health information from the SSD if we can boot to a full version of macOS (internal or external drive), or from a bootable Knoppix Linux USB stick, or even from a Windows system if you can remove & connect the SSD to it. I can provide instructions for any one of these scenarios.


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Jan 24, 2024 5:40 PM in response to nayr497

Ah, then we can not use it for the Crucial SSD, but you can use it for an external macOS boot drive where you can install macOS to it to test the laptop.


Here is a USB to SATA Adapter you can get & use if you want to remove the Crucial SSD from the laptop to test booting it externally (or to perform a clean install of macOS the Crucial SSD if it still won't boot from the aborted installation). This adapter supports the UASP protocol for optimal USB3 transfers (not very many do):

https://tripplite.eaton.com/usb-3-0-superspeed-sata-iii-adapter-cable-uasp-2-5in-3-5in-sata-black~U33806NSATAB



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Jan 25, 2024 5:05 AM in response to HWTech

Does this mean I'll need to take apart the computer and take the bottom/back off? Would prefer to avoid that, if possible. Are there other fixes that avoid this as the next step?


I do have another External HD that is formatted for Macs, was my wife's, she updated to a new one, it's just my backup to my main EHD. Could I use this one and avoid taking the computer apart? It's not the EHD that I use for my main Time Machine backups.


Thanks!

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Jan 25, 2024 8:34 AM in response to nayr497

You can use any drive for an external macOS boot drive....even the Dell Seagate drive you mentioned. Just make sure you don't need any data on that drive.


Installing macOS to an external drive & booting from it allows us to confirm the laptop will still boot & work with macOS just fine. It also allows us to check the health of the internal SSD. However, it will most likely still leave questions...is the issue with the SSD or the internal SATA Cable, or possibly both?


Removing the internal Crucial SSD and using it externally can be a quicker method to get answers as you may end up needing to do that anyway. But you may still need to install & boot macOS from an external drive such as the Dell Seagate drive if the Crucial SSD has an issue.


Either of these two methods are fine to begin some tests to gather more information about the problem. Unfortunately being able to boot the macOS installer is not sufficient to confirm the laptop will boot macOS since the installer only contains a very small & basic bit of the macOS system. Both methods have their advantages & disadvantages & limitations.


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Jan 25, 2024 11:54 AM in response to HWTech

Okay, so I could start with the Dell/Seagate external HD and run the external macOS boot...


But I'll still need to be prepared to remove the internal Crucial SSD. Just wanted to confirm that I'm reading and understand you correctly?


Thanks again! I should be able to work on this in the next few hours.

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MacBook Pro 13" - Grey Screen at startup

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