Every time I boot, nether in OSX or windows I get a screen the same as the boot screen just with a buffering wheel. Please Help.

Hello,

I'm currently in mac recovery. I have a 21.5'' iMac (I think late 2011). I'm running OSX mountain lion and I think its kept up to date. Every time I boot, nether in OSX or windows I get a screen the same as the boot screen just with a buffering wheel (not the beachball one). This seems to go on for ever (at least 3 hours) ant will not boot. Booting in safe mode does not work and results in the same problem. As I said earlier I can get tom recovery mode. Thanks Oliver.

I have on/for my machine:

• Mac OSX mountain lion
• Windows 7 Pro 64bit
• 4GB of ram
• OSX 10 FULL backups (External 2TB drive)
• 500GB HDD

Please ask if you would like more Information.