Macbook Pro 2009 has gray screen, safe mode won't work

LisaLoParo,

no, you’re not doing anything wrong in trying to boot into Safe mode.

I can think of three possible alternatives to Safe mode to try:

• If you have an external disk, you could boot from the grey Mac OS X Install DVD which came in the box with your MacBook Pro, and try copying files from your internal disk to the external disk;
• If you have a bootable external disk, you could boot from it using Startup Manager, and try copying files from your internal disk to the external disk;
• If you have access to a FireWire 800 cable and a second Mac with a FireWire 800 port, you could try booting your MacBook Pro into Target Disk mode so that it can be used as an external disk from the second Mac, and try copying files from your MacBook Pro to the second Mac.

You’d only need to try one of these three alternatives; if you try one of them and it doesn’t work, then you’d get the same result by trying either of the other two. Good luck.

LisaLoParo,

no, it’s the other way around. Your Mac, booted into Target Disk mode, would be the target computer; the second Mac would be the host computer. (In this terminology, the “target” is actually the internal disk of the the computer to be booted into Target Disk mode.)

LisaLoParo,

your only chance now is to hire a data recovery service; but note that they’re typically quite expensive. After your appointment tomorrow, you might want to purchase an external hard drive for use as a Time Machine backup destination, so that in case of future disk problems, restoration from a backup would be a simple remedy.