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Will not start after update

My computer prompted an update two days ago. I postponed it the first time. It came back yesterday morning. I let it run through. It seemed to "cook" all morning long and when I went to look at the screen I got the following?


Installing on OSX


About 22 Minutes Remaining


That was that way from around 10am to 11pm (13 hours) yesterday. That's a long 22 minutes.


I turned it off overnight and it is showing the same 22 minutes this morning.


What now?

iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2)

Posted on Mar 25, 2015 5:05 AM

Reply
13 replies

Mar 25, 2015 5:59 AM in response to bokenrosie

If you turned it off with the button because the menu option to shutdown didn't work -- you put it to sleep/wake -- in general it seems now to power off apple devices you have to hold the power button down until you know it shuts off -- or look at energy saver settings to see if you can un-select option to use power button as sleep/wake.


Two other posts on problems with an update -- so contact apple support

Mar 25, 2015 11:26 AM in response to rkaufmann87

I should have mentioned that I've done a recovery three or 4 times. It seems to work as it should. It comes up shows disk utility, recovery option, and a few other choices. I choose recovery, it only gives me one disk that is not locked out of three. I choose to recover to OSX, it makes me login into Itunes and then downloads an hours worth of installation files. Once done it automatically reboots the machine and then gets stuck on 22 minutes left. When it initially restarts you can hear the disk writing normally (ie not sounding like a bad disk) but after a bit you stop hearing disk activity and it never moves past the 22 minutes left. I left it for 11 hours yesterday.


This morning I booted to live linux CD and ran SMART test with their tool. Disk says okay other than temperature warning which I read others reporting. Disk Utility in Recovery mode makes no mntion of the temperature issue and does clear the disk for recovery operation.


When I power off with switch I hold for 10 seconds to make sure I am not going to sleep mode.


Thanks,

Mar 27, 2015 5:58 AM in response to blind visionary

I agree. There is wisdom in the group and when there are this many people having problems it would seem worth a closer look.


That said I can either be "right" and have a rather heavy paperweight on my desk while I wait for them to address this or go to plan B.


I've ordered a replacement drive. Everything I've read says stay with same manufacturer so despite how much I detest Seagate I bought one. I bought the hybrid after reviewing the one and only iMac comment about it and I'll cross my fingers.


I am not cloning. I will replace the drive and start from scratch. Hopefully I can find a way to get Microsoft Office 2011 moved over from the old disks as I don't have the install disk or license number in my ziplock full of "important stuff for iMac".


Hopefully the disk and suction cups arrive today!

Mar 27, 2015 6:22 AM in response to bokenrosie

On the update - it may be that the software cache needs to be emptied before you can try to download the update again.


Had an update get stuck like yours - that it just sat at 100% download for hours apparently it was a sleep issue or a line hiccup -- in order to finally get it (apple no help) used by intego washing machine to clear the apple update cache (it shows where it is and it is) In Hard drive/users/your username/library/caches/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate.


Yosemite may be in the same place.

Mar 28, 2015 2:07 PM in response to blind visionary

blind visionary wrote:


how can I try this if I can't get the computer to boot?


If your system is starting up - but not finishing the install - it may be trying to connect to the internet and can't so - try disconnecting your internet connection in order to get an error.


Years ago - had the problem after installing one of the early OSX's that Apple reset allow internet connection as required -- -- along with deciding no one wanted to hear a modem dial -- so my install was a bit stuck until I realized the system was trying to dial out before I had a chance to reset some preferences and setup - and it just kept looping - so I disconnected the modem - finish my setup once the error message came up & then register the software.


After that - when I did other release updates made sure the system could not connect to the internet on its own by unplugging it. -- And yes one of the few times apple did what users wanted was adding back ability to hear the modem dial etc -- nice when using paperless fax to a fax machine.

Mar 30, 2015 6:44 AM in response to notcloudy

Something is hokey here.


I tried using original disks to recover but everything is grey in menus when it comes up and then says OSX cant' be installed to this computer.


So I tried dd on a linux disk to clone the original disk to new replacement disk. That resulted in error confirming that the original HD was bad.


So does grey menus confirm that original disks are bad? Confused because this is the only Mac ever had so it's tough to have wrong OSX disks.


Where do I go from here?

Apr 3, 2015 4:50 AM in response to bokenrosie

There IS a happy end of this story. It seems the iMac is not actually married to any one particular drive. I've read that they like the same brand of drive and I cannot confirm or deny this as I played it safe and put in a Seagate depite my personal experience SHOUTING at me to never again buy a Seagate.


I called up Apple Support and they were immensely helpful. The second tech told me about a Macworld article that walks you through the steps of creating a recovery disk using a working Mac.


There are 15 steps to the process but if you do them you get a working USB drive that you can boot to, use disk utility on to prep the new drive, and ultimately find the joy you are looking for. I don't know if this link will come over but if you google "macworld bootable yosemite" it should be the top hit.


Good Luck!

Will not start after update

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