My Mac OS PC keeps prompting me to restart. I unplugged all and restarted about 20x and stays frozen on the Restart prompt.

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LLWHHI Author

Level 1

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My Mac OS PC keeps prompting me to restart. I unplugged all and restarted about 20x and stays frozen on the Restart prompt.

Not sure of the model.

Mac Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.1)

Posted on Sep 12, 2013 4:48 PM

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Answer 1

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Sep 12, 2013 6:44 PM in response to LLWHHI

Hi, have you blown the dust out lately?

Does it boot to the Restore Partition using CMD+r keys?

Could be RAM, or other failure, see if it safe boots?

One way to test is to Safe Boot from the HD, (holding Shift key down at bootup), run Disk Utility in Applications>Utilities, then highlight your drive, click on Repair Permissions, Test for problem in Safe Mode...

PS. Safe boot may stay on the gray radian for a long time, let it go, it's trying to repair the Hard Drive

Reboot, test again.

If it only does it in Regular Boot, then it could be some hardware problem like Video card, (Quartz is turned off in Safe Mode), or Airport, or some USB or Firewire device, or 3rd party add-on, Check System Preferences>Accounts (Users & Groups in later OSX versions)>Login Items window to see if it or something relevant is listed. Or an errant process eating up RAM.

Check the System Preferences>Other Row, for 3rd party Pref Panes.

Also look in these if they exist, some are invisible...

/private/var/run/StartupItems

/Library/StartupItems

/System/Library/StartupItems

/System/Library/LaunchDaemons

/Library/LaunchDaemons

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Answer 2

LLWHHI Author

Level 1

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Sep 12, 2013 8:35 PM in response to BDAqua

Thanks for the suggestions. I did vacuum the unit yesterday. I will try those other keys. The Option key brought up the drive picture...that didn't work. I inserted the Snow Leopard disk and it asked if I wanted to install. I tried, but the computer didn't. I'll try your suggestions later. I appreciate it!

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Answer 3

BDAqua

Level 10

250,259 points

Sep 12, 2013 8:43 PM in response to LLWHHI

Yikes, sounds like seriou Drive problems...

"Try Disk Utility

1. Insert the Mac OS X Install disc, then restart the computer while holding the C key.

2. When your computer finishes starting up from the disc, choose Disk Utility from the Installer menu at top of the screen. (In Mac OS X 10.4 or later, you must select your language first.)

*Important: Do not click Continue in the first screen of the Installer. If you do, you must restart from the disc again to access Disk Utility.*

3. Click the First Aid tab.

4. Select your Mac OS X volume.

5. Click Repair Disk, (not Repair Permissions). Disk Utility checks and repairs the disk."

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106214

See if the Disk is issuing any S.M.A.R.T errors in Disk Utility...

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH7029

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