Shannon Mcglathery

Q: Mac Pro Only Boots in Safe Mode - GeForce 7300 issue?

I'm having major issues with my MacPro. Last week I was working when the screen froze. I had to force restart with the power button. Since then it has only booted in Safe Mode.

I've tried booting from MacOS 10.6.3 CD and latest Diskwarrior CD and it get part way through startup then hangs on blank screens. Oddly the cursor works okay at that point.

I suspect the problem might be a bad NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT card. I've seen that issue in a couple other posts

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1541589
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=13011155&#13011155
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=13031408&#13031408

Any help greatly appreciated!

MacPro1,1 Dual-Core Intel Xeon 2.66 GHz, Mac OS X (10.5.8), 3 GB 667MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM, NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT, Cinema HD

Posted on Mar 30, 2011 10:19 PM

Close

Q: Mac Pro Only Boots in Safe Mode - GeForce 7300 issue?

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

first Previous Page 7 of 7
  • by The hatter,

    The hatter The hatter Mar 19, 2013 8:49 AM in response to Matty2deep
    Level 9 (60,935 points)
    Mar 19, 2013 8:49 AM in response to Matty2deep

    Everything but the motherboard can be upgraded.

     

    Easy: disk drives of all sizes, SSD, etc

    RAM $120 for 16GB, $300+ for more than that.

    Video graphic card as you just  did

    PCIe controllers to add USB3 and SATA 6G are popular

    processor: the upgrade from 2.66 (2x2-core) to a 2 x 4-core 53xx is more common and darn cheap today and can double the cpu processing power if needed.

     

    Having a good UPS 1500VA can help protect and lessen or extend the life of the computer and PSU, I feel. A must too for protecting modems and routers.

     

    Paid $1000 for 23" display, today you can put  in larger displays, for less, just not the newest Apple display that uses its new (proprietary) Thunderbolt interface.

  • by Matty2deep,

    Matty2deep Matty2deep Mar 19, 2013 9:06 AM in response to The hatter
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 19, 2013 9:06 AM in response to The hatter

    Sorry Hatter, I am a bit confused by your response. I am in the wrong thread? I think I had asked that before and asked wether I should move somewhere else. I ended up here googling "my maxc only starts in safe mode, came accross this thread and it turns out after a lot of back and forth, that the problem was with the Geforce 7300./ That's the thread I am in, no?

    To explain:

    The instructions that came with the new card told me that I could add the card anywhere BUT slot 4. I didn't pick slot one because when I removed the old card the little plastic attachment on the computer, that seemd to hold the old one in place broke off.

    The card is recogized and the computer works. If it's a matter of having the card run at a better speed, I will certainly try to use slot one, but if it's no difference and I can't alloocate more speed anyways, I would prefer not to open the darn computer again and mess anything up. If I can change the speed, please let me know.

    If you have one more advice, I would love to get it.

  • by The hatter,

    The hatter The hatter Mar 19, 2013 9:13 AM in response to Matty2deep
    Level 9 (60,935 points)
    Mar 19, 2013 9:13 AM in response to Matty2deep

    There is no "wrong thread" but only if you start a thread, can you also award points or make replies as "Helpful" or "Solved"

     

    The OP for this thread: Shannon Mcglathery

     

    The details. The plastic clip is 'extra' and not  essential to "holding in place"

     

    And while anywhere but top (double wide won't fit physically) the #1 slot IS where primary graphic cards go.

     

    No you cannot get full bandwidth but you can if you CANNOT get the card to function in #1 then assign 8x to another (that is usually #4 slot though).

     

    You aren't messing. It is one of the best designed with ease of access. Unplug and head in there, even if you need a flashlight as I often do.

  • by Matty2deep,

    Matty2deep Matty2deep Mar 20, 2013 7:25 AM in response to The hatter
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 20, 2013 7:25 AM in response to The hatter

    Can I still start a new thread, copy over our conversation, etc in order for you to get the points? You helped tremendously, so I don't want that to go to waste

  • by The hatter,

    The hatter The hatter Mar 20, 2013 8:20 AM in response to Matty2deep
    Level 9 (60,935 points)
    Mar 20, 2013 8:20 AM in response to Matty2deep

    It won't go to waste. Hopefully.

     

    So no, leave as is. A moderator could have pulled it off and done all that that is what they are there for in part.

  • by AppleHarvest,

    AppleHarvest AppleHarvest Jan 23, 2014 3:28 PM in response to Shannon Mcglathery
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Desktops
    Jan 23, 2014 3:28 PM in response to Shannon Mcglathery

    In my case, this Mac Pro (early 2008) running OS 10.5 and also 10.6 will restart fine, but a cold boot always requires holding option key when the tone sounds. I believe it once agreed to cold boot using the shift key, but now only woks with the option key. Others with this same observation?

  • by Grant Bennet-Alder,

    Grant Bennet-Alder Grant Bennet-Alder Jan 23, 2014 5:57 PM in response to AppleHarvest
    Level 9 (60,926 points)
    Desktops
    Jan 23, 2014 5:57 PM in response to AppleHarvest

    The Mac will try to boot from the device specified in:

     

    System Preferences > Startup Disk

     

    Option-Boot allows you to boot from a different boot Volume temporarily, but it makes no semi-permanent change.

     

    Shift-Boot does not change what device to boot from, but invokes Safe mode, which loads minimal extensions after running a Disk Utility (Repair Disk).

  • by AppleHarvest,

    AppleHarvest AppleHarvest Jan 23, 2014 8:00 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Desktops
    Jan 23, 2014 8:00 PM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

    Thanks, Grant. At this point, I'm in the midst of an upgrade to Mavericks; thought I'd get all this housekeeping out of the way before I actually put the Mac to work.

     

    I'll be interested to see if this next OS upgrade solves the problem, or if it may be the aforementioned hardware issue - e.g. replacing Geforce 7300 that does the trick.

     

    I have noted "Disk Utility (Repair Disk)" as another strategy.

     

    Thank you again,

     

    David

  • by AppleHarvest,

    AppleHarvest AppleHarvest Jan 24, 2014 6:02 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Desktops
    Jan 24, 2014 6:02 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

    G'day,

     

    Installing Mavericks has taken care of the problem here, "Mac Pro Only Boots in Safe Mode."

     

    Thanks again for the generous coaching.

     

    David

  • by Dan Hasegawa,

    Dan Hasegawa Dan Hasegawa Mar 25, 2014 11:44 PM in response to Shannon Mcglathery
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 25, 2014 11:44 PM in response to Shannon Mcglathery

    Sorry to bring this back out of the blue but I am having many of the same problems as others here on my 2010 Mac Pro. I've read most people here having problems with there 7300 card, however, i am running a 4870 radeon 512mb. Computer starts up fine in safe mode but when i start up in regular mode the system freezes (cannot even move cursor.) Does this still seem to be something that will be remedied by a new graphics card? Thanks in advance for any help!

  • by Grant Bennet-Alder,

    Grant Bennet-Alder Grant Bennet-Alder Mar 26, 2014 9:35 AM in response to Dan Hasegawa
    Level 9 (60,926 points)
    Desktops
    Mar 26, 2014 9:35 AM in response to Dan Hasegawa

    Here is the detailed story:

     

    Safe Mode deliberately loads only the absolutely essential Apple-only extensions.

     

    Some of those NOT loaded are the ones for running the display card in "automatic" mode, so the display card in Safe mode continues to use the built-in primitive driver.

     

    If your system is heavily modified with "anti-Virus", Finder extenders, haxies, and numerous other add-ons, these are also not loaded -- so the Safe mode test will not be definitive in that case.

  • by Dan Hasegawa,

    Dan Hasegawa Dan Hasegawa Mar 26, 2014 9:40 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 26, 2014 9:40 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

    My computer is a 5,1 2010 dual CPU 2.66 system. 8 gb of ram. I swapped out July video card with. Working 5770 and now the screen gets stuck on the apple logo screen. I can move the mouse now but unfortunately the graphics card isn't what my main problem was:(

  • by Grant Bennet-Alder,

    Grant Bennet-Alder Grant Bennet-Alder Mar 26, 2014 9:48 AM in response to Dan Hasegawa
    Level 9 (60,926 points)
    Desktops
    Mar 26, 2014 9:48 AM in response to Dan Hasegawa

    Even a PC-only 5770, if working, should show screens starting with the login screen (or desktop if you auto-login).

     

    If you are confident your File system is good (and preferably have good backups as well) a Re-Install (in place, without erase) of Mac OS X is designed to replace only those Mac OS X and standard Applications with those from the Installer.

     

    It is not intended to remove added Third-party Appications or any of your files. (But if you have a Disk Error while re-installing, you could lose all your stuff, so backups are vastly preferable.)

first Previous Page 7 of 7