Getting a "key" prompt when booting up in single user mode!!

I bought my used macbook pro about a week ago without the original cd's and manuals. I installed the boot camp package but rebooted without creating the drivers disk to do this later. When my macbook boots up now it passes the apple icon with the twirling round arrow, then it stays at the Mac OS X box forever. How do I fix this without the tiger CD.
I have tried booting up in single user mode and it takes me to a "key" prompt. Anything i type does not come up. I read the troubleshooting and it sayd that it should through me to a # sign instead so i can perform a "fsck --y" funtion.
Please help restore my Macbook!!
CM

I waited 15min at the key prompt when booting in single user mode and it unlocked the command prompt.
I guess it's some sort of security feature for the root.

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IMac 7,1 boot only in single user mode

Hi all
I've a colleague with the following problem... his iMac 20'' (iMac7,1) is able to boot ONLY in safe/single user mode (with shift key pressed during boot).
If he tries to boot normally, after the usual Apple logo screen he gets a blank (light grey) screen. No finder, no login screen.
We've tried this procedures:
- SMB reset
- PRAM cleared
- OS Reinstall (we've tried from Lion to Mavericks... actually there's 10.7.5 installed)... note that ALL installation procedure has completed successfully.
- tested the 1 RAM module installed (seems to be OK)
- tested the HD (no problems found)
Despite all these attempts, this iMac is booting well only if we press SHIFT during startup. All programs run well, wifi is working and online update too. If we reboot leaving it to restart normally (no key pressed) it shows Apple Logo for 1 minutes, then (after a black reset of the screen) seems to crash/stuck into an empty grey screen.
Is possible to identify which driver/kext is causing this problem? It can be an hardware problem? How we can fix it?
Thank you!

1. This procedure is a diagnostic test. It changes nothing, for better or worse, and therefore will not, in itself, solve the problem. But with the aid of the test results, the solution may take a few minutes, instead of hours or days.
Don't be put off by the complexity of these instructions. The process is much less complicated than the description. You do harder tasks with the computer all the time.
2. If you don't already have a current backup, back up all data before doing anything else. The backup is necessary on general principle, not because of anything in the test procedure. Backup is always a must, and when you're having any kind of trouble with the computer, you may be at higher than usual risk of losing data, whether you follow these instructions or not.
There are ways to back up a computer that isn't fully functional. Ask if you need guidance.
3. Below are instructions to run a UNIX shell script, a type of program. As I wrote above, it changes nothing. It doesn't send or receive any data on the network. All it does is to generate a human-readable report on the state of the computer. That report goes nowhere unless you choose to share it. If you prefer, you can act on it yourself without disclosing the contents to me or anyone else.
You should be wondering whether you can believe me, and whether it's safe to run a program at the behest of a stranger. In general, no, it's not safe and I don't encourage it.
In this case, however, there are a couple of ways for you to decide whether the program is safe without having to trust me. First, you can read it. Unlike an application that you download and click to run, it's transparent, so anyone with the necessary skill can verify what it does.
You may not be able to understand the script yourself. But variations of the script have been posted on this website thousands of times over a period of years. The site is hosted by Apple, which does not allow it to be used to distribute harmful software. Any one of the millions of registered users could have read the script and raised the alarm if it was harmful. Then I would not be here now and you would not be reading this message.
Nevertheless, if you can't satisfy yourself that these instructions are safe, don't follow them. Ask for other options.
4. Here's a summary of what you need to do, if you choose to proceed:
☞ Copy a line of text in this window to the Clipboard.
☞ Paste into the window of another application.
☞ Wait for the test to run. It usually takes a few minutes.
☞ Paste the results, which will have been copied automatically, back into a reply on this page.
The sequence is: copy, paste, wait, paste again. You don't need to copy a second time. Details follow.
5. You may have started the computer in "safe" mode. Preferably, these steps should be taken in “normal” mode, under the conditions in which the problem is reproduced. If the system is now in safe mode and works well enough in normal mode to run the test, restart as usual. If you can only test in safe mode, do that.
6. If you have more than one user, and the one affected by the problem is not an administrator, then please run the test twice: once while logged in as the affected user, and once as an administrator. The results may be different. The user that is created automatically on a new computer when you start it for the first time is an administrator. If you can't log in as an administrator, test as the affected user. Most personal Macs have only one user, and in that case this section doesn’t apply. Don't log in as root.
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PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/libexec;clear;cd;p=(Software Hardware Memory Diagnostics Power FireWire Thunderbolt USB Fonts SerialATA 4 1000 25 5120 KiB/s 1024 85 \\b%% 20480 1 MB/s 25000 ports ' com.clark.\* \*dropbox \*genieo\* \*GoogleDr\* \*k.AutoCAD\* \*k.Maya\* vidinst\* ' DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES\ DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH -86 "` route -n get default|awk '/e:/{print $2}' `" 25 N\\/A down up 102400 25600 recvfrom sendto CFBundleIdentifier 25 25 25 1000 MB ' com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0 com.adobe.CS4ServiceManager com.adobe.CS5ServiceManager com.adobe.fpsaud com.adobe.SwitchBoard com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent com.apple.installer.osmessagetracing com.apple.SafariNotificationAgent com.apple.usbmuxd com.apple.xprotectupdater com.google.keystone.agent com.google.keystone.daemon com.microsoft.office.licensing.helper com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool com.oracle.java.JavaUpdateHelper ' ' 879294308 3627668074 1083382502 1274181950 1855907737 464843899 1233118628 2636415542 842973933 4019080058 3301885676 891055588 998894468 695903914 1443423563 ' 51 5120 files );N5=${#p[@]};p[N5]=` networksetup -listnetworkserviceorder|awk ' NR>1 { sub(/^$[0-9]+$ /,"");n=$0;getline;} $NF=="'${p[26]}')" { sub(/.$/,"",$NF);print n;exit;} ' `;f=('\n%s: %s\n' '\n%s\n\n%s\n' '\nRAM details\n%s\n' %s\ %s '%s\n-\t%s\n' );S0() { echo ' { q=$NF+0;$NF="";u=$(NF-1);$(NF-1)="";gsub(/^ +| +$/,"");if(q>='${p[$1]}') printf("%s (UID %s) is using %s '${p[$2]}'",$0,u,q);} ';};s=(' s/[0-9A-Za-z._]+@[0-9A-Za-z.]+\.[0-9A-Za-z]{2,4}/EMAIL/g;/faceb/s/(at\.)[^.]+/\1NAME/g;/\/Shared/!s/(\/Users\/)[^ /]+/\1USER/g;s/[-0-9A-Fa-f]{22,}/UUID/g;' ' s/^ +//;/de: S|[nst]:/p;' ' {sub(/^ +/,"")};/er:/;/y:/&&$2<'${p[10]} ' 1s/://;3,6d;/[my].+:/d;s/^ {4}//;H;${ g;s/\n$//;/s: [^EO]|x([^08]|02[^F]|8[^0])/p;} ' ' 5h;6{ H;g;/P/!p;} ' ' ($1~/^Cy/&&$3>'${p[11]}')||($1~/^Cond/&&$2!~/^N/) ' ' /:$/{ N;/:.+:/d;s/ *://;b0'$'\n'' };/^ *(V.+ [0N]|Man).+ /{ s/ 0x.... //;s/[()]//g;s/(.+: )(.+)/ (\2)/;H;};$b0'$'\n'' d;:0'$'\n'' 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"int($6/1024)" out";} END { if(a) print "CPU: "a;if(b) print "I/O: "b;if(c) print "Net: "c" (KiB/s)";if(d) print "Net errors: "d" packets/s";} ' ' /r\[0\] /&&$NF!~/^1(0|72\.(1[6-9]|2[0-9]|3[0-1])|92\.168)\./ { print $NF;exit;} ' ' !/^T/ { printf "(static)";exit;} ' '/apsd|BKAg|OpenD/!s/:.+//p' ' (/k:/&&$3!~/(255\.){3}0/ )||(/v6:/&&$2!~/A/ ) ' ' $1~"lR"&&$2<='${p[25]}';$1~"li"&&$3!~"wpa2";' ' BEGIN { FS=":";p="uniq -c|sed -E '"'s/ +\$[0-9]+\$\$.+\$/\\\2 x\\\1/;s/x1$//'"'";} { n=split($3,a,".");sub(/_2[01].+/,"",$3);print $2" "$3" "a[n]$1|p;b=b$1;} END { close(p);if(b) print("\n\t* Code injection");} ' ' NR!=4{next} {$NF/=10240} '"`S0 27 14`" ' END { if($3~/[0-9]/)print$3;} ' ' BEGIN { L='${p[36]}';} !/^[[:space:]]*(#.*)?$/ { l++;if(l<=L) f=f"\n "$0;} END { F=FILENAME;if(!F) exit;if(!f) f="\n [N/A]";"cksum "F|getline C;split(C, A);C="checksum "A[1];"file -b "F|getline T;if(T!~/^(AS.+ (En.+ )?text(, with v.+)?$|(Bo|PO).+ sh.+ text ex|XM)/) F=F" ("T", "C")";else F=F" ("C")";printf("\nContents of %s\n%s\n",F,f);if(l>L) printf("\n ...and %s more line(s)\n",l-L);} ' ' s/^ ?n...://p;s/^ ?p...:/-'$'\t''/p;' 's/0/Off/p' ' END{print NR} ' ' /id: N|te: Y/{i++} END{print i} ' ' / / { print "'"${p[28]}"'";exit;};1;' '/ en/!s/\.//p' ' NR!=13{next};{sub(/[+-M]$/,"",$NF)};'"`S0 39 40`" ' $10~/\(L/&&$9!~"localhost" { sub(/.+:/,"",$9);print $1": "$9;} ' '/^ +r/s/.+"(.+)".+/\1/p' 's/(.+\.wdgt)\/(Contents\/)?Info\.plist$/\1/p' 's/^.+\/(.+)\.wdgt$/\1/p' ' /l: /{ /DVD/d;s/.+: //;b0'$'\n'' };/s: /{ /V/d;s/^ */- /;H;};$b0'$'\n'' d;:0'$'\n'' x;/APPLE [^:]+$/d;p;' ' /^find: /d;p;' "`S0 44 45`" ' BEGIN{FS="= "} /Path/{print $2} ' ' /^ *$/d;s/^ */ /;' ' /:/d;/\./p;' '/\.appex\/Contents\/Info\.plist$/p' );c1=(system_profiler pmset\ -g nvram fdesetup find syslog df vm_stat sar ps sudo\ crontab sudo\ iotop top pkgutil 'PlistBuddy 2>&1 -c "Print' whoami cksum kextstat launchctl sudo\ launchctl crontab 'sudo defaults read' stat lsbom mdfind ' for i in ${p[24]};do ${c1[18]} ${c2[27]} $i;done;' defaults\ read scutil sudo\ dtrace sudo\ profiles sed\ -En awk /S*/*/P*/*/*/C*/*/airport networksetup mdutil sudo\ lsof test osascript\ -e );c2=(com.apple.loginwindow\ LoginHook '" /L*/P*/loginw*' "'tell app \"System Events\" to get properties of login items'|tr , \\\n" 'L*/Ca*/com.ap*.Saf*/E*/* -d 1 -name In*t -exec '"${c1[14]}"' :CFBundleDisplayName" {} \;|sort|uniq' '~ $TMPDIR.. $ -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 $' '.??* -path .Trash -prune -o -type d -name *.app -print -prune' :${p[35]}\" :Label\" '{/,}L*/{Con,Pref}* -type f ! -size 0 -name *.plist -exec plutil -s {} \;' "-f'%N: %l' Desktop L*/Keyc*" therm sysload boot-args status " -F '\$Time \$Message' -k Sender kernel -k Message Req 'bad |Beac|caug|corru|dead[^bl]|FAIL|fail|GPU |hfs: Ru|inval|jnl:|last value [1-9]|n Cause: -|NVDA$|pagin|proc: t|Roamed|rror|ssert|Thrott|tim(ed? ?|ing )o|WARN' -k Message Rne 'Goog|ksadm|SMC:|suhel| VALI|ver-r|xpma' -o -k Sender fseventsd -k Message Req 'SL' " '-du -n DEV -n EDEV 1 10' 'acrx -o comm,ruid,%cpu' '-t1 10 1' '-f -pfc /var/db/r*/com.apple.*.{BS,Bas,Es,J,OSXU,Rem,up}*.bom' '{/,}L*/Lo*/Diag* -type f -regex .\*[cght] ! -name .?\* ! -name \*ag \( -exec grep -lq "^Thread c" {} \; -exec printf \* \; -o -true $ -execdir stat -f:%Sc:%N -t%F {} \;|sort -t: -k2 |tail -n'${p[38]} '/S*/*/Ca*/*xpc* >&- ||echo No' '-L /{S*/,}L*/StartupItems -type f -exec file {} +' '-L /S*/L*/{C*/Sec*A,Ex}* {/,}L*/{A*d,Ca*/*/Ex,Co{mpon,reM},Ex,In{p,ter},iTu*/*P,Keyb,Mail/B,Pr*P,Qu*T,Scripti,Sec,Servi,Spo,Widg}* -path \\*s/Resources -prune -o -type f -name Info.plist' '/usr/lib -type f -name *.dylib' `awk "${s[31]}"<<<${p[23]}` "/e*/{auto,{cron,fs}tab,hosts,{[lp],sy}*.conf,mach_i*/*,pam.d/*,ssh{,d}_config,*.local} {,/usr/local}/etc/periodic/*/* /L*/P*{,/*}/com.a*.{Bo,sec*.ap}*t {/S*/,/,}L*/Lau*/*t .launchd.conf" list getenv /Library/Preferences/com.apple.alf\ globalstate --proxy '-n get default' -I --dns -getdnsservers\ "${p[N5]}" -getinfo\ "${p[N5]}" -P -m\ / '' -n1 '-R -l1 -n1 -o prt -stats command,uid,prt' '--regexp --only-files --files com.apple.pkg.*|sort|uniq' -kl -l -s\ / '-R -l1 -n1 -o mem -stats command,uid,mem' '+c0 -i4TCP:0-1023' com.apple.dashboard\ layer-gadgets '-d /L*/Mana*/$USER&&echo On' '-app Safari WebKitDNSPrefetchingEnabled' "+c0 -l|awk '{print(\$1,\$3)}'|sort|uniq -c|sort -n|tail -1|awk '{print(\$2,\$3,\$1)}'" 'L*/P*/com.ap*.p*.ext*.*.*t -exec '"${c1[14]}"' :displayOrder" {} \;' );N1=${#c2[@]};for j in {0..9};do c2[N1+j]=SP${p[j]}DataType;done;N2=${#c2[@]};for j in 0 1;do c2[N2+j]="-n ' syscall::'${p[33+j]}':return { @out[execname,uid]=sum(arg0) } tick-10sec { trunc(@out,1);exit(0);} '";done;l=(Restricted\ files Hidden\ apps 'Elapsed time (s)' POST Battery Safari\ extensions Bad\ plists 'High file counts' User Heat System\ load boot\ args FileVault Diagnostic\ reports Log 'Free space (MiB)' 'Swap (MiB)' Activity 'CPU per process' Login\ hook 'I/O per process' Mach\ ports kexts Daemons Agents XPC\ cache Startup\ items Admin\ access Root\ access Bundles dylibs Apps Font\ issues Inserted\ dylibs Firewall Proxies DNS TCP/IP Wi-Fi Profiles Root\ crontab User\ crontab 'Global login items' 'User login items' Spotlight Memory Listeners Widgets Parental\ Controls Prefetching SATA Descriptors appexes );N3=${#l[@]};for i in 0 1 2;do l[N3+i]=${p[5+i]};done;N4=${#l[@]};for j in 0 1;do l[N4+j]="Current ${p[29+j]}stream data";done;A0() { id -G|grep -qw 80;v[1]=$?;((v[1]==0))&&sudo true;v[2]=$?;v[3]=`date +%s`;clear >&-;date '+Start time: %T %D%n';};for i in 0 1;do eval ' A'$((1+i))'() { v=` eval "${c1[$1]} ${c2[$2]}"|'${c1[30+i]}' "${s[$3]}" `;[[ "$v" ]];};A'$((3+i))'() { v=` while read i;do [[ "$i" ]]&&eval "${c1[$1]} ${c2[$2]}" \"$i\"|'${c1[30+i]}' "${s[$3]}";done<<<"${v[$4]}" `;[[ "$v" ]];};A'$((5+i))'() { v=` while read i;do '${c1[30+i]}' "${s[$1]}" "$i";done<<<"${v[$2]}" `;[[ "$v" ]];};';done;A7(){ v=$((`date +%s`-v[3]));};B2(){ v[$1]="$v";};for i in 0 1;do eval ' B'$i'() { v=;((v['$((i+1))']==0))||{ v=No;false;};};B'$((3+i))'() { v[$2]=`'${c1[30+i]}' "${s[$3]}"<<<"${v[$1]}"`;} ';done;B5(){ v[$1]="${v[$1]}"$'\n'"${v[$2]}";};B6() { v=` paste -d: <(printf "${v[$1]}") <(printf "${v[$2]}")|awk -F: ' {printf("'"${f[$3]}"'",$1,$2)} ' `;};B7(){ v=`grep -Fv "${v[$1]}"<<<"$v"`;};C0() { [[ "$v" ]]&&sed -E "$s"<<<"$v";};C1() { [[ "$v" ]]&&printf "${f[$1]}" "${l[$2]}" "$v"|sed -E "$s";};C2() { v=`echo $v`;[[ "$v" != 0 ]]&&C1 0 $1;};C3() { v=`sed -E "${s[63]}"<<<"$v"`&&C1 1 $1;};for i in 1 2;do for j in 0 2 3;do eval D$i$j'(){ A'$i' $1 $2 $3; C'$j' $4;};';done;done;{ A0;D20 0 $((N1+1)) 2;D10 0 $N1 1;B0;C2 27;B0&&! B1&&C2 28;D12 15 37 25 8;A1 0 $((N1+2)) 3;C0;D13 0 $((N1+3)) 4 3;D23 0 $((N1+4)) 5 4;D13 0 $((N1+9)) 59 50;for i in 0 1 2;do D13 0 $((N1+5+i)) 6 $((N3+i));done;D13 1 10 7 9;D13 1 11 8 10;D22 2 12 9 11;D12 3 13 10 12;D23 4 19 44 13;D23 5 14 12 14;D22 6 36 13 15;D22 7 37 14 16;D23 8 15 38 17;D22 9 16 16 18;B1&&{ D22 35 49 61 51;D22 11 17 17 20;for i in 0 1;do D22 28 $((N2+i)) 45 $((N4+i));done;};D22 12 44 54 45;D22 12 39 15 21;A1 13 40 18;B2 4;B3 4 0 19;A3 14 6 32 0;B4 0 5 11;A1 17 41 20;B7 5;C3 22;B4 4 6 21;A3 14 7 32 6;B4 0 7 11;B3 4 0 22;A3 14 6 32 0;B4 0 8 11;B5 7 8;B1&&{ A2 19 26 23;B7 7;C3 23;};A2 18 26 23;B7 7;C3 24;D13 4 21 24 26;B4 4 12 26;B3 4 13 27;A1 4 22 29;B7 12;B2 14;A4 14 6 52 14;B2 15;B6 14 15 4;B3 0 0 30;C3 29;A1 4 23 27;B7 13;C3 30;B3 4 0 65;A3 14 6 32 0;B4 0 16 11;A1 4 50 64;B7 16;C3 52;D13 24 24 32 31;D13 25 37 32 33;A2 23 18 28;B2 16;A2 16 25 33;B7 16;B3 0 0 34;B2 21;A6 47 21&&C0;B1&&{ D13 21 0 32 19;D13 10 42 32 40;D22 29 35 46 39;};D23 14 1 62 42;D12 34 43 53 44;D12 22 20 32 25;D22 0 $((N1+8)) 51 32;D13 4 8 41 6;D12 26 28 35 34;D13 27 29 36 35;A2 27 32 39&&{ B2 19;A2 33 33 40;B2 20;B6 19 20 3;};C2 36;D23 33 34 42 37;B1&&D23 35 45 55 46;D23 32 31 43 38;D12 36 47 32 48;D13 20 42 32 41;D13 37 2 48 43;D13 4 5 32 1;D13 4 3 60 5;D12 26 48 49 49;B3 4 22 57;A1 26 46 56;B7 22;B3 0 0 58;C3 47;D22 4 4 50 0;D23 22 9 37 7;A7;C2 2;} 2>/dev/null|pbcopy;exit 2>&-
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.
8. Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
Click anywhere in the Terminal window and paste by pressing command-V. The text you pasted should vanish immediately. If it doesn't, press the return key.
9. If you see an error message in the Terminal window such as "Syntax error" or "Event not found," enter
exec bash
and press return. Then paste the script again.
10. If you're logged in as an administrator, you'll be prompted for your login password. Nothing will be displayed when you type it. You will not see the usual dots in place of typed characters. Make sure caps lock is off. Type carefully and then press return. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you make three failed attempts to enter the password, the test will run anyway, but it will produce less information. In most cases, the difference is not important. If you don't know the password, or if you prefer not to enter it, press the key combination control-C or just press return three times at the password prompt. Again, the script will still run.
If you're not logged in as an administrator, you won't be prompted for a password. The test will still run. It just won't do anything that requires administrator privileges.
11. The test may take a few minutes to run, depending on how many files you have and the speed of the computer. A computer that's abnormally slow may take longer to run the test. While it's running, there will be nothing in the Terminal window and no indication of progress. Wait for the line
[Process completed]
to appear. If you don't see it within half an hour or so, the test probably won't complete in a reasonable time. In that case, close the Terminal window and report what happened. No harm will be done.
12. When the test is complete, quit Terminal. The results will have been copied to the Clipboard automatically. They are not shown in the Terminal window. Please don't copy anything from there. All you have to do is start a reply to this comment and then paste by pressing command-V again.
At the top of the results, there will be a line that begins with the words "Start time." If you don't see that, but instead see a mass of gibberish, you didn't wait for the "Process completed" message to appear in the Terminal window. Please wait for it and try again.
If any private information, such as your name or email address, appears in the results, anonymize it before posting. Usually that won't be necessary.
13. When you post the results, you might see an error message on the web page: "You have included content in your post that is not permitted," or "You are not authorized to post." That's a bug in the forum software. Please post the test results on Pastebin, then post a link here to the page you created.
14. This is a public forum, and others may give you advice based on the results of the test. They speak only for themselves, and I don't necessarily agree with them.
Copyright © 2014 by Linc Davis. As the sole author of this work, I reserve all rights to it except as provided in the Use Agreement for the Apple Support Communities website ("ASC"). Readers of ASC may copy it for their own personal use. Neither the whole nor any part may be redistributed.

How do change boot disk from single user mode?

My G5 hangs when booting at the blue screen while "Loading printing services...". Attempting to boot into safe mode only hangs at the grey gear screen. It will, however, successfully boot into single user mode. I've run fsck but no change in bootability. I have another disk in the machine that has Tiger on it. How do I change the boot disk from the single user prompt?

You can hold c and boot off the installer disk and select disk utility repair disk/permissions
or you can hold option to boot off Mac OS X on another drive, like a clone and run Data Rescue to recvoer your files.
It does sound bad, you can try going through these
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106464
But I think you'll need a fresh install, hopefully you have been backing up/cloning to a external drive.
http://homepage.mac.com/hogfish/Personal11.html

Help needed: Lion boots only in single user mode after a kasperksy unsuccefull installation

Hello everyboby,
I used to be a Sun Solaris sysadmin with root privileges, but I can't fix the Macbook of my girlfriend...
WHAT I WISHED:
I wished I could restore the boot INI/config files of a MacBook (the old one, made of white plastic, not the pro, made of "steel"), so that Lion started at boot, like it used to do, before a "fatal" kasperky installation.
WHAT HAPPENS:
the macbook plays the chord, shows the Apple logo, seems to load the OS (Lion) and then switches to graphic mode, BUT the desktop (is "desktop" the name of the screen of the operating system, once it's fully started, like on a PC?) doesn't appear, only a grey screen, then nothing happens.
I guess that probably Lion is fully running under the grey screen, but without the screen/video been correctly setup, I cannot interact with the notebook.
I CAN boot in single user mode, mount the file system in writing mode and read and write the disk.
WHAT HAPPENED:
my girlfriend upgraded to Lion from Snow Leopard and used the notebook for a while (one month?), then she decided to upgrade kaspersky, but the installation failed somehow and now the notebook is stuck.
WHAT I TRIED TO DO:
- I read this: http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystem Startup/Chapters/CustomLogin.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/10000172i-SW10-BAJCGEGG
- and that: http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/ man5/launchd.conf.5.html#//apple_ref/doc/man/5/launchd.conf
- and removed from the disk all the folders and files dealing with startup items AND kaspersky, but nothing changed: at boot the grey screen appears and Lion's interface is not loaded (or if it is, it's not shown).
- then I looked for some logs, found the kernel's one and found something that looks like an error message dealing with video inizialization... So, it really seems something is not working at video level.
WHAT I AM ASKING YOU:
some help, please... : is there anybody that can give me some specific advice on how the boot is done on a macbook with Lion? Are there some INI files I can copy into the macbook, so that it starts in grphic mode?
whatever...
thank you in advance!
Dario

Linc Davis wrote:
I used to be a Sun Solaris sysadmin...
Then you backed up
I didn't: it's my girlfriend's notebook and she not using a timemachine external disk. She did all by herself

Suddenly, Macbook doesn't boot up in single user mode or verbose mode

Hello, I use the single-user boot up quite often to check permissions and do a fsck after my mac crashes.
I do this by pressing Apple(Command)-S at startup or cmd-V for the verbose mode. I do this all the time.
But now my Mac won't take it anymore. It just refuses to accept any key combo. Any ideas why this is happening?
thanks.

Hi Jose, actually you don't have to boot to single user and repair permission all the time. Just perform that after you update your software and or hardware.
Can you start up normally and then use your keyboard as usual, or is the keyboard refuse to do so?
Try to reset your PRAM and or PMU to refresh your hardware behavior.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=2238
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303319
Good Luck.

Boot mac mini server into single-user mode?

I've got a mac mini server (one of the ones with no optical drive) and I'm trying to boot it into single-user mode. I hit the power button and hold down the command (apple, splat) key and the 'S' key simultaneously ---- until it boots up to a login prompt rather than a black screen with white text and a unix command prompt...
Is there some magic different on this particular machine to get to single-user?

Hi, I wonder if anyone helped you out. I'm new here so here goes. I just bought a mac mini, but not the server. I had finished my new install and then I rebooted and got a black screen, since i have a wireless Apple keyboard, I cannot log into the computer by using commands, like Command-S. And Yes, you are using the right command, that hasn't changed.
Your problem may be the same as mine, are you using a wireless keyboard, because if you are, it seems that the Bluetooth doesn't have time to install its software while we are trying to log into the system. Thus, as we reboot, we are holding down they keys but that won't help us because the Bluetooth software doesn't have time to do its thing, in the background.
That is a huge problem because I don't have any other keyboard, but if you have access to a keyboard, get one and plug it into the back of your Mac mini and then you should be all set.
Does this make sense? Let me know if this helps. I have no idea what to do because now I have a brand new computer with a serious screen with the you must reboot your system in many languages, and when one gets this it is not a good sign.

Can't boot in to multi user mode

After a reboot, Arch went blank before launching gdm - it wouldn't respond to C-A-Backspace or anything. So I booted in to single user mode, and changed the runlevel to 3 and rebooted. When I try to log in from the CLI, the computer hangs, and never prompts for a password. Does anyone know what might cause this, and how it can be fixed? Until then it fixed, I'm stuck with my damn iBook running YDL
Thanks!

You could lave the machine off for a while, start it, let it freeze, shutdown, wait some more, then post here everything with a relavent timestamp from the logs. Assuming you can shutdown without messing up your filesystem that is - if you have to press the power button to turn off I wouldn't do too much of that.
Also, what did you do before the reboot? any upgrades?
Jack
PS: now going home, won't be back till tomorrow

MacBook won't boot in Single User Mode

My MacBook will neither boot up in Single User Mode nor in Safe Mode. Nor will it perform a PRAM zap. The key-combinations I use during boot-up are OK, because they work well on my iMac. Does anyone know why this is? And of course: how it can be solved?
MacBook: white, late 2007, 13", 10.6.2
iMac: early 2008, 20", 10.6.2
key-combo's used: command-S / shift / command-option-P-R

Called MacHouse, they supposed it could be Firmware-related. Since all software on the MacBook was up-to-date, a Firmware-update could not help me out. They advised me to remove the Mac's memory and reboot, thus forcing the Firmware to get a fresh grip on the installed hardware, including keyboards and the like. I don't understand the technical details of this, but it worked.
Removing both memory-cards made the MacBook make panicky beeping sounds, but removing one of them, rebooting, then reinstalling it and reboot again did the trick. It will now boot in Single User Mode, Safe Mode and Apple Hardware Test.

Why Do I Get An UAC Prompt When I Start Task Manager From The Desktop?

Windows 8 Pro X64
In Windows 7 Ultimate x64 if I start Task Manager by right clicking on the taskbar and selecting it it starts without any UAC prompt running in my security context. It is only if I click on show processes from all users that I get an UAC
prompt for an administrator password.
In Windows 8 Pro x64 I get the UAC prompt when I start Task Manager by right clicking on the taskbar in the Desktop environment. Why?
http://www.saberman.com

I think I see why we were having a disconnect earlier when discussing this. I had some time so I did some more testing and found the following.
Fresh Windows 8 install with a normal user account (non-admin) has NO UAC PROMPT for taskmgr, regedit, etc. It just opens under the current user context, same as Windows 7 did.
Upgraded Windows 8 from Windows 7 install gives a UAC prompt for taskmgr, etc. under the same situation. I made sure they were in the same OU with the same policies and the same UAC level. No prompts! That's the part that never made sense
to me. If you can run an app and then use your non-admin credentials at the UAC prompt and it still runs, why did it prompt in the first place? Makes no sense. And it turns out that it doesn't look like this is default behavior but something
messed up on the 7-to-8 computers I'm dealing with.
So am I missing some setting or something for Windows 7 to 8 upgrade or is this a bug?
I just started seeing that behavior on a computer that has a fresh installation of windows 8. For a few weeks after installation, it worked as expected. Then it started prompting for user credentials when running task manager as a non-admin user.
If I enter the credentials of the user who started it (the non-admin user I'm logged on as) it opens and works as expected.

Network / external access when booted in single-user mode from install CD?

So I have this iBook with a semi-functional hard drive: can't boot from it (either normal or single-user), can't use it in Firewire Target Disk mode, can't fix it with Disk Utility, an overnight run with Disk Warrior seemed to be hung, etc, BUT if I boot in single-user mode from the install CD I can then mount it readonly and see at least many of the files on it.
So now I want to slurp the important ones of those files off of it over the network (or in any other clever way anyone can suggest). I'm not a huge Unix or Darwin expert, so an exact set of commands would be appreciated. *8) A friend suggested to me that I might be able to 'init' it at a 'runlevel' that included the networking stack, but I dunno what that means. *8) Does the CD in fact include a full networking stack? Or anything else that I might be able to use to slurp some data from the hard disk before it gives up entirely?
Tx very...
Message was edited by: David Chess; annoying typo

David
I think Ronda was hoping you had the Tiger Instal DVD, which has a copy of Terminal on it.
You said earlier that trying to boot into Target Disk Mode didn't work. Would it help you if you could? If so, I can show you how to do it from Single User Mode. I've done it, and it works, although admittedly I did boot into SU mode from my HD, not my Instal Disc (I have tried that, it also works, I just haven't done both together).
If you can make use of this, post back and tell me what you get from which nvram when you are booted in SU mode from your CD. It's possible that command won't be available on the CD—so we need to check first. If it says "which: no such command", try ls -l /usr/sbin/nvram instead.

Macbook does not boot. stuck at grey screen. have tried single user mode, but text stops at AppleIntelCPUPPowerManagement: initialization complete, without anymore prompts. no

macbook does not boot. stuck at grey screen. have tried single user mode, but text stops at AppleIntelCPUPPowerManagement: initialization complete, without anymore prompts. no hash key appears that will allow me to type in: fsck -fy
have my trials for IB in one week and my history notes are all on my hard drive, that has not been backed up. help please =(

macbook does not boot. stuck at grey screen. have tried single user mode, but text stops at AppleIntelCPUPPowerManagement: initialization complete, without anymore prompts. no hash key appears that will allow me to type in: fsck -fy
have my trials for IB in one week and my history notes are all on my hard drive, that has not been backed up. help please =(

Mac mini i5 mid 2011 always boot in single user mode...how to get out of this?

my mac mini always boot into single user mode
how can i revert back to normal boot screen?
i tried formatting the hard disk and clean install of mac os x 10.9.2 but nothing change..
pls help
mac mini ...core i5 @2.3 ghz mid 2011 model
thanks in advance

Restart the computer with the Option, Command, P, and R keys held down. Release them upon the second startup chime.
(110762)

Usbmultitouch debug report id is invalid when i boot in single user mode

been having a problem for a few months where my track pad will not work at all when i start my mac.
the only things that have worked so far to solve the issue is to restart the laptop, or on occasion to put the laptop to sleep and wake it up several times.
booted in to sigle verbose mode and see the message
AppleUSBMultitouchDebug: ReportID is invalid in AppleUSBMultitouchDriver::_deviceGetReportWithLookup
AppleUSBMultitouchDebug: ReportID is invalid in AppleUSBMultitouchDriver::_deviceGetReportWithLookup
AppleUSBMultitouchDebug: ReportID is invalid in AppleUSBMultitouchDriver::_deviceGetReportWithLookup
AppleUSBMultitouchDebug: ReportID is invalid in AppleUSBMultitouchDriver::_deviceGetReportWithLookup
AppleUSBMultitouchDebug: ReportID is invalid in AppleUSBMultitouchDriver::_deviceGetReportWithLookup
rooting via boot-uuid from /chosen: 7C3431B-A5F6-3122-8A21-83882ABAAC92
BLAH BLAH BLAH...
Looked around and have found no help anywhere so far.

I think it would be worth a try to repair permissions and then boot from the Install disk to run Repair Disk in Disk Utilities. If you still cannot boot into single user mode after that, perhaps obtaining and running Disk Warrior can resolve the problem.
Bob N.
Mac Mini 1.5 GHz; iBook 900 mHz; iPod 20 GB Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Macbook shuts off during start-up - can't get through safe-mode, single user mode (fsck -fy) and target-drive shows no problems when running disk utility repair

Hi everyone,
I'm simply all out of ideas on what to do - my best guess is the problem is not specifically hard-drive related since all the 'normal' fixes just won't work.
What could be the cause of my issue? The only way i've managed to keep the Macbook Pro on for longer than a minute is through target drive, where it seems to work just fine - i can access everything. To sum up everything:
1 - I tried resetting the PRAM
2 - I tried to go in to safe mode, it shut off before i could type the password
3 - I tried fsck -fy command from single user mode, sometimes i can get to actually typing it but mostly it shuts off before
4 - I tried to repair disk via target drive - success, no problems detected (and it didnt fix my issue)
5 - I reinstalled OS Mavericks.
The Macbook Pro previously had some problems with the power-button not working properly (a mac-cunning friend of mine had to open up the mac and start it by swiping to metal pins on a specific (battery/power?) part inside it. The problem kinda went away afterwards but it might be related to this?
This is way off my comfort zone of 'diagnosing' issues, so I'm crossing fingers for some good advice.
Thanks,
Aske
Denmark

I think you're right.
If it's hardware related, is it possible to guess at what it might be? It would be nice to know how much I should expect to pay for a repair before actually getting it fixed.

How do I mount an external Firewire HD when booting into single user mode?

Hi,
How can I mount an external Firewire Harddisk from the Darwin Console, once I have booted into single user mode?
I'm trying to make a backup of all my files and then re-install my iMac G5 since it doesn't start the GUI anymore and I haven't gotten any responses to my question here: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1104762&tstart=0
Thanks,
Torsten

ok, I executed the following commands:
/sbin/fsck -fy
/usr/libexec/registermach_bootstrapservers /etc/mach_init.d
autodiskmount
There were two messages:
UniNEnet: Ethernet address 00:14:51:32:19:b8
and
Aug 29 20:55:29 launchd: server 2e3b in bootstrap 1103 uid 0: "/usr/sbin/lookupd"[16]: exited abnormally: Hangup
I don't know whether this has anything to do with the commands I entered.
And since I don't know what the volume name for the external Firewire HD is, I typed
ls -l /Volumes
but the only volume that is being listed there is my iMac's internal HD.
What should I do next?
Thx!

Getting a "key" prompt when booting up in single user mode!!

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