MBP Won't Boot - No Safe Mode

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Level 1

7 points

MBP Won't Boot - No Safe Mode

Hey everyone, I have a late 2011 MBP, 15" with i7 processor. Factory 750GB HDD. OS 10.9.?

When I try to boot, it goes to the gray login screen as usual. When I login, I would get the "trouble" screen (gray) with the spinning wheel and the progress bar across the bottom indicating that there was a problem and it was checking things. This runs for about 10 minutes, the progress bar moves all the way to completion, disappears like it's going to boot, then all goes black and it's dead.

So I tried to boot to safe mode by holding shift down after "the sound". However, I wasn't getting "the sound" at all, and it would never go to safe mode.

So then I reset the NVRAM / PRAM per the recommended steps. Now I get "the sound" but still no safe mode.

So then I tried to boot into single user mode, which took a few tries, but then it went there. I ran "/sbin/fsck -fy" at the command prompt and was told a few times that there were incorrect numbers of records and eventually that the disk could not be repaired after 3 attempts.

My backup setup is like this.... I have two 3TB drives that each have a bootable clone of the main HDD via SuperDuper on one partitiion (750GB) and the remaining space is a time machine drive. (I swap them out once a week or so with one being kept offsite.)

I then plugged my backup drive in and tried to boot to the clone (called "bootable 1") via the startup manager. And I got the same exact boot sequence and black screen death as noted in the second paragraph above.

So basically I can't boot to anything at this point. I'm pretty good with my 20+ years of Windows experience, but I'm pretty new to Macs. What on Earth do I do now?

Thanks!

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Apr 8, 2014 9:15 PM

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Answer 1

Melophage

Level 5

7,213 points

Apr 9, 2014 10:20 AM in response to fatnecks

fatnecks,

are you able to boot into Recovery mode by holding down a Command key and the R key at startup?

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Answer 2

fatnecks Author

Level 1

7 points

Apr 9, 2014 10:30 AM in response to Melophage

I didn't actually get that far last night. Eventually, I booted into the "startup manager" by using OPTION during boot. At that point, I could click on my disk and choose "verify disk" and "repair disk". Both options said everything was fine, but then it still didn't boot.

So I gave up and went to bed.

Within the startup manager, I do recall seeing what looked like a recovery partition, and one of my options was to "Reinstall OS X", so I would assume that would use it.... But I haven't done that yet. At work now.

Thanks!

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Answer 3

Apr 9, 2014 11:04 AM in response to fatnecks

I had a similar issue after I dropped my 13" MacBook down the stairs. It messed up my hard drive, logic board, and graphics card. Apple was unaware of any other issue besides the hard drive so when I got it back, it was still messed up but the new hard drive seemed to fix the issue. See if you can boot into recovery mode by holding in Command and R as soon as you turn it on. Verify your disk and if anything is in red text, repair the disk. If the system can't repair the issues, then I'm afraid your hard drive has a malfunction or failure. If I was you and needed a new hard drive, I would get an SSD from corsair. They have the best ones of all the companies. If you need something with a lot of storage, crucial memory is pretty good. For my machine, I can get up to 1TB of SSD storage for $530. If you can't boot into recovery mode, perform a hardware test. Click the link for the steps on how to perform a hardware test: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1509://

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Answer 4

fatnecks Author

Level 1

7 points

Apr 9, 2014 6:55 PM in response to Look-at-menow

So I booted into recovery mode and got to the "OS X Utilitiies" screen. Go to disk utility find that my drive is not mounted. BTW, it's an encrypted drive. When I click on it and click verify, now it tells me that the disk needs repaired. When I try to repair it, I get told that "Live File System repair is not supported".

When I try to mount it, it tells me that I should run first aid on it before trying to mount again.

So it appears that my drive has file system trouble and/or mechanical failure. It seems that disk warrior is very popular around here, but I'm a little frustrated by the cost. I can replace the drive for cheaper than the software and hopefully restore my files from my Time Machine partition.

Should I assume that the physical drive must be replaced? Or could Disk Warrior repair the disk and have it still be functional?

Thanks!

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Answer 5

Apr 10, 2014 8:40 AM in response to fatnecks

It must be a hard drive failure. You'd be better off getting a new one.

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Answer 6

fatnecks Author

Level 1

7 points

Apr 10, 2014 2:58 PM in response to Look-at-menow

I got my backup drive #2 today and booted into the "OS X Utilities" screen and went into the disk utility. From within the disk utility, I can unlock drive #2 (it's encrypted like the others), and verify it, and it checks all OK. So all seems to be well with this drive.

However, when I exit the utility and select drive #2 as my boot disk, it tries but then I get the flashing folder icon with the question mark on it. No prompts, no status bar, no nothing. I let it sit like that for at least a half-hour or so and got nothing.

I suspect that the file integrity on drive #2 is fine. And I should theoretically be able to image from backup drive #2 onto a new internal drive. But....

1. How can I do that if I can't boot to drive #2?

2. Why can't I boot to drive #2?

Other advice?

Thanks!

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Answer 7

Melophage

Level 5

7,213 points

Apr 10, 2014 7:09 PM in response to fatnecks

fatnecks,

are you trying to boot from drive #2 when it’s internal, or when it’s external? If you’re able to boot from it externally, but you’re not able to boot from it internally, then perhaps your internal SATA cable needs to be replaced rather than your internal drive.

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Answer 8

fatnecks Author

Level 1

7 points

Apr 10, 2014 8:06 PM in response to Melophage

I'm actually trying to boot #2 externally. Inadvertently, I've also tried that drive with two different PSU's and USB cables. Mystified.....

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Answer 9

Melophage

Level 5

7,213 points

Apr 10, 2014 8:51 PM in response to fatnecks

fatnecks,

do you have a spare external drive that you could format as a bootable Mavericks drive via Recovery mode on the internal drive? So far, it sounds as though your internal drive and both of your bootable clones are unusable, so one possibility is that if it’s due to a software problem, both of the bootable clones currently have the same software problem as your internal drive — so it would be useful to determine if you can get a working bootable drive or not.

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