Booting problems

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Booting problems

Hey all.

I'm having some problems with my 20" iMac. It's the 24.Ghz C2D Aluminium model.

My problem is, whenever I try to start the computer it will either stay on the grey screen and refuse to start into the OSX system and will just idle on the apple logo and the spinning gear thing, about an hour or 2 ago I had a grey screen with the folder and a question mark in it, but after booting it into safe mode, that problem vanished.

However, It does let me boot into safe mode, whilst in safe mode the only thing I cannot do is hear audio.

The only notable change that has been done to the computer is I had 4GB of RAM installed from Crucial about a month and a half ago.

I'm running Snow Leopard 10.6.8 and the only additional software thats been installed is Anti Virus (Not the malware haha, I'm using Sophos) and all of my photography Apps, such as lightroom and Photomatix Pro.

Another note I would like to mention, is that I downloaded a trial of Final Cut Pro X from the App store and it doesn't load up. It show the loading screen and then it just forces the Mac to crash.

Please advise me on this as soon as possible!

Thanks, Alex.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Nov 1, 2011 9:11 PM

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Answer 1

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X423424X

Level 6

14,265 points

Nov 1, 2011 9:47 PM in response to starfaceeee

1. Boot from your installer dvd and verify/repair your boot drive.

2. Run Apple Hardware Test to check that memory you installed.

3. Get rid of that AV software.

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Answer 2

starfaceeee Author

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Nov 1, 2011 10:01 PM in response to X423424X

Thank you for your response, may I ask why though? I understand the hard ware test, but am unsure of the reasoning behind the AV and the disc verifying?

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Answer 3

X423424X

Level 6

14,265 points

Nov 1, 2011 10:07 PM in response to starfaceeee

Disk errors can lead to boot problems.

AV software, IMO, is unnecessary, and sometimes overly intrusive. And in this case one variable that is unnecessary. Other wild card variables are any startup software that your lightroom and Photomatix Pro stuff added. But I didn't suggest getting rid of that...yet. Obviously with a safe boot, if any of this stuff added startup code, it isn't being executed. So if you don't do a safe boot it is. It the boot hangs up you can see why they become possible suspects.

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