My MacBook Air turns off while booting

Question

Level 1

2 points

My MacBook Air turns off while booting

Last night I installed a heavy software on my Mac but still had 11GB free on hard drive. However while working it just crashed and stopped working. Then I turned it off and on again, but everytime it in booting when the Apple logo appears it was keep loading, even for 20 mins. So I treid to load recovery and tried all opriones. But each one does not work for different reasons.

First one is recovery from back up, as I dont have any backup so I cant use it.

Installing new OS also does not work as I does not let me to choose a drive. Keep saying Macintosh HD is locked.

Also for Disk Uitility, when I choose the Macintosh HD, it gives error while verifying the Disk and also ends up with error when repairing.

And now whenever i turn it on, it just turns of when the apple logo appears.

I have not tried safe mode yet, as I dont know how to do it.

Any idea? :/

Is there anyway to copy my files before I format the drive or any way?

MacBook Air, iOS 6.0.1

Posted on Sep 13, 2013 10:12 AM

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Answer 1

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Sep 13, 2013 10:22 AM in response to Danial.S

Safe Mode:

Start while holding the Shift Key.

Starting in Safe Mode, just loads the absolutely necessary from the OS to run, no user things.

It is enough to start in safe mode and shutdown, it "resets" everything, and often solves issues just by doing it and then restart.

Your problem is probably that all disk space is used up. 11GB is low when you also need buffers caches for apps that run. If this "heavy app" is also in the startup list, then it will be very difficult to eliminate it.

What is this "heavy app"?

Post the result, and give all details of your MBA, model, year, disksize and HDD or SSD, OS version....

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Answer 2

Danial.S Author

Level 1

2 points

Sep 13, 2013 11:38 AM in response to Lexiepex

Thanks for your help. It seems like safe mode does not work on my Macbook. Nothing happens when I hold down the shift key and turn it on. It just turns on naturally and turns of after the apple logo apears.

However my MBA is 13", 120gb HDD. and OS version is 10.8 i think, actually the latest one. I bought it 7 months ago.

Do you have any suggestio to fix it ?

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Answer 3

Danial.S Author

Level 1

2 points

Sep 13, 2013 1:39 PM in response to Danial.S

Additionally, I installed the OS on a memoy stick to load from USB.

pressing C key for loading from USB did not work for me and ends up with a white page for couple of minutes and then shut down.

:/

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Answer 4

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Sep 14, 2013 1:44 AM in response to Danial.S

The MBA bought new? Then you have warrantee.

You should be able to start while holding the Alt(option) key for the Boot menu: HDD, RecoveryDisk.

And start while holding the Shift key for the Safe mode.

Do the SMC reset:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

Do it twice or even three times.

When you can then boot into the safe mode, do that, then shutdown and do the PRAM reset:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

When the system then still misbehaves, go the Apple, make an appointment and have them look at it.

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Answer 5

Danial.S Author

Level 1

2 points

Sep 14, 2013 10:09 AM in response to Lexiepex

Thanks for your post. Actually for some reasons safe mode never appears for me. I tried the rest but did not work. I have already booked an appointment to check it at Apple. However, in Disk Utility, when choosing the location of the new image, I can browse in my disk and could see all my files. So I think thats a clue that the HDD is fine and my files are still alive. But do not know if there is any way to copy them.

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