Macbook Pro Mid 2007 17 Inch - Mavericks hangs after starting.

I have an MBP 3,1 (mid-late 2007) 15-inch. I had three goes at installing Mavericks, but no luck.

The first install was a clean wipe, done by FW Target Disk Mode. I made the receiving MBP the mounted Target hard drive and installed from my Mac mini. Some people say this is wrong, although it is also possible that it's not wrong anymore. (Certainly the Mavericks installer did think that it was installing onto a Mac mini - e.g. thje 'setting up' animation near the end of the install process drew the shape of a mac mini, but whether it customised any installations I could not say.)

Anyway, it booted OK and I logged in OK, but when I turned off wifi and connected Ethernet instead, it froze. Force reboots only resulted in more freezes - usually before login was possible, i.e. during the Apple-logo boot stage, or at the login screen.

I then connected an external drive and started up with the options key pressed. I was going to boot externally, but then I saw that there was a 10.9 recovery partition available, so I tried from there. That install took a long time (including a lot of slow downloading of Mavericks components, so I probably wasted my time). I can't recall, but I don't think the boot of that install even got to login. I think it too froze at Apple-logo stage.

My third attempt was to boot from an external Snow Leopard drive, wipe the internal HD, then install Mavericks. (And yes, this time the animation at the end of the install process drew an MBP, not a mini.) This got me back to login OK, but again the MBP froze as soon as I switched to Ethernet.

One other thing: about the MBP running hot, which is on another thread here. Certainly I thought mine was running hot once I put Mavericks on. (If I recall correctly from years back, Leopard was hot but Snow Leopard was much better. I have never put Lion or Mountain Lion on this old MBP 3,1.) In fact, the MBP did also do a random shutdown (you know that sudden 'power off' problem - it was associated in some models with overheating). (Also, ethnernet and logic board issues tended to affect Macs of this vintage.)

I would have liked to run Mavericks on this Mac, but I think I was dreaming. (Actually, Apple was dreaming really.) I've decided not to risk a fourth attempt, because even though I might ultimately be able to sort out the Ethernet bug, the experience reminded me too much of the battles I had before Snow Leopard.

And by the way, my old MBP is in fact a desktop machine these days. Years ago, after logic board replacements and whatnot, my (beautiful, matt) screen developed a dodginess in its connection, so that if you move it (or press it at the edges), half the screen goes fuzzy. It needs to stay gently still. This was a common manufacturing weakness of these machines, I think. Luckily, it is quite stable if left alone, so it does good service as a desktop Mac. (For years I had it connected to a TV, but now I am reviving it as more useful than that, for the kids.)

ALWAYS do a full backup - e.g. with SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner before mucking around with this stuff! I don't mind returning to Snow Leopard for this vintage Mac. (Besides, iTunes 10.7 is still way better than that disgusting mess called iTunes 11.)

Progress update: I decided to give Mountain Lion a try instead. I ran the 10.5.2 installer on a clean external USB hard drive. All went well. I logged in, ran software update, downloaded lots of stuff, and it rebooted as 10.5.8. I configured all the basics in the wizard (e.g. iCloud), and then pressed for the final restart before login.

No luck. It started to boot, ran quite hot, and went into spontaneous shutdown. I let the MBP cool, and tried twice more to boot from the external drive. Interestingly, I had named the partition in question "mountain lion boot", but on startup (with option key held down) it appeared as 'EFI boot'. (I googled this and decided it was probably no big deal - perhaps just part of unifinished business given my random shutdown.)

Anyway, both attempts at booting from 'EFI boot' caused shutdowns, which do seem heat-related, I think.

So: clearly Snow Leopard is much better for these old chips like the Santa Rosa Core 2 Duo in my MBP. I considered the case closed for this particular machine. It's staying as Snow Leopard - which really is a **** good operating system anyway. Besides, I can quit now - no need to bother with the migration stage that I would have faced after my clean installs of 10.9 / 10.8.

One last problem though: I can't get the minecraft installer to run on 10.6.8, even though I have the latest Java possible for it.

I'm running a 2007 Macbook Pro 3,1. I've experienced identical issues with 10.8.5 and with 10.9. The issue seems to be related to the use of the ethernet interface. Installing 10.9 over ethernet or plugging in the ethernet cable following a clean install causes the system to freeze and hose the OS. Formating the OSX partition and a clean install over wi-fi without ever plugging in the ethernet cable has worked fine. My system has been running stable with sleep functionality on wi-fi only for a few days now.

I was wondering if some of you replaced your drive with an SSD. I believe that's where my problem is.

I had similar problems with my 2007 MacBook Pro 3.1 For me it started with the latest combo update for Mountain Lion. So I decided to wait for Mavericks to come out, and had about the same symptoms: mouse pointer freeze at start up, or after log in.

I tried just about everything like formatting the disk and doing clean installs, resetting nvram but no good.

I took the Mac to my local Apple store, and they checked it out, and told me it was vintage, so I was on my own.

My biggest concern was the Crucial V4 256MB SSD I installed. At the Apple store the tech guy tried to do a network install, but it wouldn't just install. The Mac passed all the hardware tests, except RAM wich I also upgraded a while ago up to 4 GB.

So today I tried a clean install on the now external disk the Mac had before the SSD, and it just went fine.

I downloaded and saved the Mavericks install on a flash drive. But the Santa Rosa MacBook Pro does not boot from usb pendrives. So I partitioned the 160 GB external drive to have the bootable recovery and install partition for Mavericks.

I did have a freeze after plugging Ethernet and doing a check for updates. What bugged me though was the fact that on most of the unsuccessful installs I tried on the SSD, sometimes the login window would show all the users that should have been gone. If the disk is erased and a new system is installed, there should be no familiar user accounts.

My impression is that the disk information is retained despite being cleared and having a fresh install.

Since Mavericks did seem to install correctly on an external hard drive, I did a clean install again on another external drive, and with Disk Utilities I completely erased the internal Crucial SSD. After the clean install this time I didn't plug the Ethernet cable, and just connected through WiFi. I tried Mavericks a little with no freezes, so then I used SuperDuper to copy Mavericks from the external disk to the SSD. So far the Mac is working fine. I haven't plugged in Ethernet yet, to try one thing at a time. By using SuperDuper and not Mavericks installer on the SSD, I did not create the rescue partition, and I have a hunch that's what's messing things up. Right now I'm downloading my apps from the App Store. I can say, the Mac is behaving as it has with Mountain Lion, and my next test will be to plug Ethernet tomorrow.

I'll keep you posted.

I am also running a crucial M4 SSD with the ethernet freezing. I found that using the disk utlity and erasing/formating the drive and then performing a clean install of 10.9 (without using the ethernet) allows me to load and run 10.9 with no problems. I have the rescue partition along with a bootcamp windows 7 64 bit install (which works fine with the ethernet). The recovery install does not seem to erase/format the drive, it just installs overtop.

Hi rajsayshai,

By installing via USB flash do you mean a pendrive?

I'm asking because the MacBook Pro 3.1 with the 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo, also known as Santa Rosa, did not support bootable pen drives, wich would be nice to have. The ways to install software is either with an external USB or FireWire drive or the internal Super Drive (CD or DVD), and perhaps by Ethernet with the most recent systems.

However Mavericks seems to be a no no.

I tried to burn a dual layer bootable DVD, but it doesn't work. I read somewhere that Mavericks seems to have phased out, or made more difficult that opion. I found Lion DiskMaker 2, now DiskMaker X that makes a bootable pen drive, external drive, and DVD up to Mountain Lion. DiskMaker X is for Mavericks backward but without DVD support.

I got slashed with the bootable DVD option, so I recurred to a couple of hard disks: the original internal 160 GB from my MacBook Pro, and the original Mac Mini 160 GB I also replaced.

So I made a partition, the smallest was 11GB I think, where I installed with DiskMaker X the Mavericks install.

With that, I have a bootable external USB install disk that made it possible to install Mavericks .

I bought the V4 version from Crucial since I would never get more than the theoretical 1.5 Gb/sec.

Trying the 10.8.5 combo update, and 10.6 Mavericks, I had the feeling that somehow the SSD would not clear or flush memory, or would retain some part of it.

As I said earlier, if a disk is formatted or erased, no previous information should pop up.

My Mac would freeze at startup with the daisy clockwise I'm busy animation thing going. Or I would get to the gray screen and the mouse pointer that would freeze just by looking at it. Or I would get the login screen with the few accounts I had previously and sometimes authenticate and freeze, or get to the Finder desktop and freeze.

If I tried the Command (Apple)-S safety boot, the progress bar would go halfway and then freeze.

If I tried the Command (Apple)-V verbose log, I could get up to a "swapping memory" statement, the gray screen and the freeze.

The first tryouts were updates, so it was OK to me to see the familiar login accounts. But, as I said, if I have a clean install, everything is gone and I should not see my previous accounts, nor the previous desktop picture I had.

I didn't think about an Ethernet connection glitch 'till this post. However there is some connection to the fact that the Apple Store tech guy would use an Ethernet connection to check the Mac, and that it would not install Mavericks, nor 10.8.5. Now it makes sense. What I don't know yet is if this Ethernet "bug" can mess what it seems the SSD.

So right now I have a clean installed Mavericks with no recovery partition on it, and I did not plug in the Ethernet cable yet. And it's working just fine.

I have a way to try something, so I will post next my idea.

Ok. I have the MacBook Pro 3.2 with an internal Crucial V4-256 SSD, and external FireWire SuperDuper(d) disk with my last, good, working configuration (10.8.4), an external 160GB USB drive with a partition for 10.9 Mavericks install and the remaining partition free, and yet another external 160GB USB drive all free. I also have TimeMachine Backups around...

I will SuperDupe the Mavericks working configuration, and will try the Ethernet connection.

I can also try to SuperDupe back 10.8.4 and update it to 10.8.5 without plugging in Ethernet to verify it gets there and if it works as Mavericks is now.

I can also re-install Mavericks to have it build the recovery partition, and therefore find out if there is a problem with that.

So having some spare time, I think I can give it a try and decide whether to stay with 10.8.4 and wait for an eventual update, or just let life take its course and start to set aside this Mac along with the PowerBook G4 that I still roll out like a classic car on nostalgic Sundays.

I will post results as soon as I can to let you know what happened, and what can we do about it.

B.T.W.: At the Apple Store, I was checking out the hottest MacBook Pro, and noticed they use Deep Freeze to get their Macs fresh clean for the next day. It sound like a good side kick along with Time Machine and SuperDuper.

Here's the System Info for the Mac:

Model Name: MacBook Pro

Model Identifier: MacBookPro3,1

Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo

Processor Speed: 2,4 GHz

Number of Processors: 1

Total Number of Cores: 2

L2 Cache: 4 MB

Memory: 4 GB

Bus Speed: 800 MHz

Boot ROM Version: MBP31.0070.B07

SMC Version (system): 1.18f5

Serial Number (system): W8******

Hardware UUID: 00000000-0000-1000-8000-001EC20D*D**

Sudden Motion Sensor:

State: Enabled

Marvell Yukon Gigabit Adapter 88E8055 Singleport Copper SA:

Name: ethernet

Type: Ethernet Controller

Bus: PCI

Vendor ID: 0x11ab

Device ID: 0x436a

Subsystem Vendor ID: 0x11ab

Subsystem ID: 0x00ba

Revision ID: 0x0013

Link Width: x1

BSD name: en0

Kext name: AppleYukon2.kext

Location: /System/Library/Extensions/IONetworkingFamily.kext/Contents/PlugIns/AppleY ukon2.kext

Version: 3.2.3b1

Memory Slots:

ECC: Disabled

BANK 0/DIMM0:

Size: 2 GB

Type: DDR2 SDRAM

Speed: 667 MHz

Status: OK

Manufacturer: 0x7F98000000000000

Part Number: 0x393955353239352D3031312E4130304C4600

Serial Number: 0x51CC9C5C

BANK 1/DIMM1:

Size: 2 GB

Type: DDR2 SDRAM

Speed: 667 MHz

Status: OK

Manufacturer: 0x7F98000000000000

Part Number: 0x393955353239352D3031312E4130304C4600

Serial Number: 0x58CCA83C

Intel ICH8-M AHCI:

Vendor: Intel

Product: ICH8-M AHCI

Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit

Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit

Physical Interconnect: SATA

Description: AHCI Version 1.10 Supported

V4-CT256V4SSD2:

Capacity: 256,06 GB (256.060.514.304 bytes)

Model: V4-CT256V4SSD2

Revision: S5FAMM25

Serial Number: 200033***

Native Command Queuing: Yes

Queue Depth: 32

Removable Media: No

Detachable Drive: No

BSD Name: disk0

Medium Type: Solid State

TRIM Support: Yes

Partition Map Type: GPT (GUID Partition Table)

S.M.A.R.T. status: Verified

Volumes:

EFI:

Capacity: 209,7 MB (209.715.200 bytes)

BSD Name: disk0s1

Content: EFI

MBP17 HD:

Capacity: 255,72 GB (255.716.540.416 bytes)

Available: 200,07 GB (200.065.257.472 bytes)

Writable: Yes

File System: Journaled HFS+

BSD Name: disk0s2

Mount Point: /

Content: Apple_HFS

Volume UUID: 21A4D4B7-7BDC-3491-AC22-E79050D3E***