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grey screen with lock icon

Macbook not booting properly, install disk nothing, press option on start up goes directly to grey screen with lock and login bar, tried all passwords and ...Nothing
cannot safe boot. cannot reset PRAM. regular boot startup displays apple icon and spinning wheel.. Have no idea what may have caused issue (not the last one to use it) In other words HELP!

MACBOOK, Mac OS X (10.6.6)

Posted on Feb 17, 2011 9:51 AM

Top-ranking reply

aduffbrew

Level 1

87 points

Posted on Aug 22, 2012 12:05 AM

If it looks like this, Kappy is right and your firmware is locked. You need to use the password used when configuring this feature in Open Firmware.

To force remove password protection, change the amount of RAM by adding or removing DIMMs then reset the PRAM three times.

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19 replies

Kappy

Level 10

361,907 points

Feb 17, 2011 12:02 PM in response to brandon handford

OK. Try resetting the PRAM and resetting the SMC. Try again with install DVD. Be sure to wait several minutes as the installer is slow to load from optical media.

Feb 17, 2011 11:51 AM in response to Kappy

Chime muted, restarted using I stall DVD, wheel continues to spin.

Feb 17, 2011 2:09 PM in response to Kappy

Thank you Kappy, i apologize for sounding short... i appreciate your time and insight. I will try these again and keep my fingers crossed.... ill keep you up to date...

kgresssm

Level 1

4 points

Aug 21, 2012 5:57 PM in response to brandon handford

Brandon..... Please tell me you found an easy fix for this?????

I have the exact same issue.

Grey screen with big lock. Only there when i try to reinstall Lion...

Keith Morgan

kgressm@me.com

grey screen with lock icon