Macs will not boot when the printer is on!

Question

Macs will not boot when the printer is on!

This one's a stumper. I just figured out the reason my iMac (2010) will not boot up, is because the printer is on! The printer is a Canon Pixma MP130 attached by USB, and when I boot up, it just stays on the grey screen - no apple logo. What makes it even weirder is this:

a) I've used this printer with this iMac for years (under Mountain Lion), without issue. I never turn it off, and do not recall ever seeing this problem. Now I've got Snow Leopard on it, but that changes nothing. b) is the reason why:

b) I first noticed this problem when the printer was attached to my Macbook Pro (Mavericks installed). So it is not even dependent on the OS, or the Mac or type of Mac itself.

Nor the cable, as I changed USB cables. If I remove the USB cable, of course the Macs will boot without issue. If I leave the cable attached and the power OFF, they will not have a problem there either. If I leave the cable attached and the power on.... freeze on grey screen!

What's going on here?

iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Mar 29, 2015 11:37 AM

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Answer 1

SeaPapp

Level 7

26,486 points

Mar 29, 2015 12:20 PM in response to Charlie Poole

Have never heard of that either. It's possible the printer is drawing too much power. Try connecting the printer to a powered hub and test it that way.

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Answer 2

Mar 29, 2015 12:37 PM in response to SeaPapp

The plot thickens.... I took out my 2011 iMac, with Mountain Lion installed. It booted up without issue, whether the Canon printer was on or off. This is despite the fact that the printer came out before Mountain Lion, and does not even have a proper driver for it!

If I had to guess... the problem may be due to hardware specific to 2010 models of iMac and Macbook; that are causing a boot fail when the printer is attached by USB cable and turned on. This presumes the Mac reads does some sort of handshake at bootup when a USB peripheral is connected and turned on. Maybe it thinks its an external hard drive, who knows.... 😕

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