Gray screen while booting

Hi Im Having trouble with my mac pro while booting
When i shutdown my mac en restart it the next day it takes several minutes for the mac to show the apple logo.
when i disconnect the powercable it starts up directley. i tryed a nvram/pram reset, safe boot, verbose boot and
a smc reset but no luck. the only this i see with verbose boot is a black screen with one cursor stripe. and than
after a few minutes the mac starts up. how can i resolve this problem ???????

Reinstall Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks without erasing drive
Boot to the Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Repair
When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported then click on the Repair Permissions button. When the process is completed, then quit DU and return to the main menu. Select Restart from the Apple menu.
Reinstall Mountain Lion or Mavericks
OS X Mavericks- Reinstall OS X
OS X Mountain Lion- Reinstall OS X
OS X Lion- Reinstall Mac OS X
Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet
if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.

Similar Messages

Forzen gray screen at boot

I'm using an iMac that was new in Dec '12. 27-inch I think it's still the current model.
Lately I've been getting long if not terminal hang-ups at boot on the plain gray screen.
The only system maintenance I have with this Mac is to confirm and correct my preferences on the main drive, through Disk Utility. I know there is much more to clean up in the system.
What program should I be using to do this with?
I used to use Onyx, but that is now only a pay program now. If I must use a pay program I want to get the best value for the program.
So my question is two questions.....
1. Are there free programs that will clean up the caches and whatever else needs attending to?
2. What is the best pay program for maintaing a Mac?
Thanks

Take each of these steps that you haven't already tried. Stop when the problem is resolved.
Step 1
The first step in dealing with a boot failure is to secure your data. If you want to preserve the contents of the startup drive, and you don't already have at least one current backup, you must try to back up now, before you do anything else. It may or may not be possible. If you don't care about the data that has changed since your last backup, you can skip this step.
There are several ways to back up a Mac that is unable to boot. You need an external hard drive to hold the backup data.a. Boot into Recovery by holding down the key combination command-R at the startup chime, or from a local Time Machine backup volume (option key at startup.) Release the keys when you see a gray screen with a spinning dial. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, launch Disk Utility and follow the instructions in this support article, under “Instructions for backing up to an external hard disk via Disk Utility.”
b. If you have access to a working Mac, and both it and the non-working Mac have FireWire or Thunderbolt ports, boot the non-working Mac in target disk mode by holding down the key combination command-T at the startup chime. Connect the two Macs with a FireWire or Thunderbolt cable. The internal drive of the machine running in target mode will mount as an external drive on the other machine. Copy the data to another drive. This technique won't work with USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, or Bluetooth.
c. If the internal drive of the non-working Mac is user-replaceable, remove it and mount it in an external enclosure or drive dock. Use another Mac to copy the data.
Step 2
Press and hold the power button until the power shuts off. Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed to boot, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards. Use a different keyboard and/or mouse, if those devices are wired. If you can boot now, one of the devices you disconnected, or a combination of them, is causing the problem. Finding out which one is a process of elimination.
If you've booted from an external storage device, make sure that your internal boot volume is selected in the Startup Disk pane of System Preferences.
Step 3
Boot in safe mode. Note: If FileVault is enabled, or if a firmware password is set, or if the boot volume is a software RAID, you can’t do this. Post for further instructions.
Safe mode is much slower to boot and run than normal, and some things won’t work at all, including wireless networking on certain Macs.
The login screen appears even if you usually log in automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.
When you boot in safe mode, it's normal to see a dark gray progress bar on a light gray background. If the progress bar gets stuck for more than a few minutes, or if the system shuts down automatically while the progress bar is displayed, your boot volume is damaged and the drive is probably malfunctioning. In that case, go to step 5.
If you can boot and log in now, empty the Trash, and then open the Finder Info window on your boot volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name.) Check that you have at least 9 GB of available space, as shown in the window. If you don't, copy as many files as necessary to another volume (not another folder on the same volume) and delete the originals. Deletion isn't complete until you empty the Trash again. Do this until the available space is more than 9 GB. Then reboot as usual (i.e., not in safe mode.)
If the boot process hangs again, the problem is likely caused by a third-party system modification that you installed. Post for further instructions.
Step 4
Sometimes a boot failure can be resolved by resetting the NVRAM.
Step 5
Launch Disk Utility in Recovery mode (see step 1.) Select your startup volume, then run Repair Disk. If any problems are found, repeat until clear. If Disk Utility reports that the volume can't be repaired, the drive has malfunctioned and should be replaced. You might choose to tolerate one such malfunction in the life of the drive. In that case, erase the volume and restore from a backup. If the same thing ever happens again, replace the drive immediately.
This is one of the rare situations in which you should also run Repair Permissions, ignoring the false warnings it may produce. Look for the line "Permissions repair complete" at the end of the output. Then reboot as usual.
Step 6
Boot into Recovery again. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, follow the prompts to reinstall the OS. If your Mac was upgraded from an older version of OS X, you’ll need the Apple ID and password you used to upgrade.
Note: You need an always-on Ethernet or Wi-Fi connection to the Internet to use Recovery. It won’t work with USB or PPPoE modems, or with proxy servers, or with networks that require a certificate for authentication.
Step 7
Repeat step 6, but this time erase the boot volume in Disk Utility before installing. The system should automatically reboot into the Setup Assistant. Follow the prompts to transfer your data from a backup.
Step 8
A dead logic-board battery in a Mac Pro can cause a gray screen at boot. Typically the boot failure will be preceded by loss of the startup disk and system clock settings. See the user manual for replacement instructions.
Step 9
If you get this far, you're probably dealing with a hardware fault. Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store to have the machine tested.

New MBP 13 inch w/ Retina dude- gray screen on boot up

I bought a new laptop and 2 weeks in I booted up to a frozen gray screen. It would happen anytime after a shutdown or restart. Weirdly, I could get to the desktop after being frozen on the gray screen and boot up after holding option, command and power. But I would have to do this everytime I got to the gray screen. Spoke with apple people on the phone. They had me reset my smc and pram. These strategies did not work. I did alittle bit of research quickly while on the phone and found safe booting it could fix this problem. Tried it and it worked.
I'm just wondering if I should be concerned of a hardware problem? Maybe theres other maverick users who have experienced the same issue. I just want to make sure. It's been fine since though.

These are symptoms of a GPU problem. Your best option is an appointment at an Apple store genius bar for a FREE definitive evaluation.
Ciao.

S930 stuck at Lenovo screen while boot up.

My S930 stuck at lenovo screen while boot up.
I tried to leave the phone while waiting for it to boot until the battery drain out.
Then charged till full , try to boot again and it still stuck at the same lenovo screen..
What to do? How to reset / factory default ?
Please help. TQ

Issue :- G500 Lenovo laptop screen gets stuck at lenovo screen and does not allow to do any thing alternatively need to power off laptop.
I am also having this same problem occasionally. In that case if my screen stuck at lenovo screen then I turn off my laptop, After while when I turn it on then problem go off. But today same method did not help me, finally I removed my batter for a while then plugged it again which again resolved the issue.
I purchased my G500 lenovo laptop 4 or 5 months ago , it had been working fine for first 3 months but after it I encountered with this probelm.
I updated my bios with latest available version but that also not helped me
My concern is that why this problem is occuring occasionally. Request you to share valuable steps and guide us to get rid off from this problem.
Thanks and Regards
Ashok Dewan

Does anyone know what a gray screen on boot up means?

I have a Mac Pro with 10.6.x (snow leopard) and I am getting a gray screen on boot up. Any ideas on how to fix this? It wont boot from the dvd either.

"A Mac that will not boot from an appropriate Installer/Utilities DVD has a Hardware problem."
Is the Power light flashing? that may mean a RAM problem.
Sometimes the "snag keys" at Startup are not seen due to the keyboard connected via a Hub in a display. The keyboard needs to be connected to a USB directly on the chassis, no intervening Hub.
Use the Alt/Option key for best resuilts when in a jam -- it needs nothing from any drives to make a picture on the display, its code is all in ROM.

Gray screen while using mac book pro

While using my mac book pro the screen suddenly turnef gray. I tried restarting my computer, but the screen remained gray. I don't know what to do please help!!!

Question (?) Mark, Blinking Folder, or Gray Screen at Startup
These are related but not identical issues. Their causes are outlined in Intel-based Mac- Startup sequence and error codes, symbols. Solutions may be found in:
A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac
Mac OS X- Gray screen appears during startup
In most cases the problems may be caused by one or more of these:
a. Problem with the computer's PRAM - See Resetting your Mac's PRAM and NVRAM.
b. Boot drive's directory has been corrupted - Repair with Disk Utility.
c. Critical system files are damaged or deleted - Reinstall OS X.
d. The disk drive is physically non-functional - Replace the hard drive.
Note that the information I have provided is what Apple recommends, If other users suggest different solutions than found here, then be sure what they recommend does not impact on your warranty, if any, or ability to get continuing Apple service.
Please don't start removing drives or changing cables unless you know what you are doing and have exhausted other non-invasive alternatives outlined here. If you perform any work yourself that is unapproved by Apple, then you will void any warranty you may have and lose all further Apple Support.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
The main difference if you are using Lion or Mountain Lion is that you must first boot from the Recovery HD. Simply boot from the Recovery HD to perform the above.
Reinstall Snow Leopard Without Erasing The drive
1. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
2. Reinstall Snow Leopard
If the drive is OK then quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed with reinstalling OS X. Note that the Snow Leopard installer will not erase your drive or disturb your files. After installing a fresh copy of OS X the installer will move your Home folder, third-party applications, support items, and network preferences into the newly installed system.
Download and install Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1.
Reinstalling Lion/Mountain Lion Without Erasing The Drive
Boot to the Recovery HD: Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions: Upon startup select Disk Utility from the main menu. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions as follows.
When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu.
Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion: Select Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion and click on the Continue button.
Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.

Gray screen after boot and blue screen with stripes

Hi, I have a MacBook Pro Mid 2011 with Mavericks (came with Snow Leopard).
History:
One day i was working and things were too slow. I tried to restart but it was taking too long to close all the programs. So I forced shut down by holding the power button. When I turned it on again, my problems begin.
Problem:
The Apple logo and the spinning wheel appear. After a while, both disappear and it freezes at gray screen. Some solutions I tried make the screen goes blue with black vertical stripes. In both cases, I have to force shut down.
Solutions I tried:
- Reset NVRAM
     It does reset, but nothing change
- Log in my Windows partition. I can't log
- Hold option key and choose recovery. Blue screen
- Recovery system by restart and press Command-R. Blue Screen.
- Safe boot by pressing Shift. Blue Screen
- Verbose by pressing Command-V. Restart and gray screen again.
- Single-user mode by pressing Command-S
     Tried to reapair hard drive:
          /sbin/fsck –fy
     Returns the message "** The volume Macintosh HD appears to be OK.". I restart and nothing change.
     Tried to change startup permissions:
          mount -uw /
          chown root /
          chmod 1775 /
          exit
     Restart and nothing change.
- Boot from a bootable USB flash drive
     Holding option key, I choose my flash drive with Ubuntu installed. It gives me 3 options: Use Ubuntu without installing, Install Ubuntu, Repair Disk      Errors (something like that). The 3 options go to the blue screen
     Flash drive with Mavericks. Blue screen.
-Boot from my Snow Leopard CD. Gray screen, restarting, gray screen.
I don't what else I can do. Is it a hardware problem? At first I thought it was some corrupted file. But is it a GPU or logic board problem? What else can I try?

I found this to work at least to get in and backup some files. It is VERY important to put these commands in EXACTLY as seen here, including spaces.
Boot into Single-User mode (Command-S while booting up)
Execute the following commands:
/sbin/fsck -fy /
/sbin/mount -uw /
mkdir /Disabled_System_Library_Extensions
cd /Disabled_System_Library_Extensions
mv /System/Library/Extensions/ATI* .
mv /System/Library/Extensions/AMD* .
touch /System/Library/Extensions
exit
I guess these two graphics extensions go bad quite often on Macbook Pro 15-inch. They are part of the logic board. The only problem I had was I still couldn't get into my computer any other way, and the graphics for Safari were messed up. Firefox was okay. Good Luck!
Here's the original thread:
http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/120507/boot-hangs-on-grey-screen-even-w hen-booting-from-usb-drive-with-fresh-os-x-inst

Gray screen while installing snow leopard on macbook unibody (2009 )

Hi , I have a unibody macbook (2009), i recently erased my HD after making a backup to renew my mac OS , so i started by installing OS 10.5 (delivered with my mac) , then i made all possible updates , and tried to install Snow leopard from a DVD i purchased a year ago seperately . but when in try installing the OS 10.6 , i get stuck into the famous "gray screen" ( and sometimes a blue one ), i tried nearly all answers around this issue proposed by apple but no one appears to work and i still get the gray screen ( just while i try to install the snow leopard , and if not , the system boots properly into OS 10.5.8 ) .
i have to mention that i recently upgraded my RAM from 2 Go to 8 Go .
So any suggestions here?
Thank you.

Try booting into "verbose mode". That will cause a series of messages to appear on the screen during the boot process. When that stalls (presuming it does so), write down the last few messages and post them as a reply.
You might also try running the diagnostics that came with that Mac. Depending on the model, you can boot with the "system restore disc" in the machine with the "D" key held down to run those. Run the diagnostics several times.

Can't get past gray screen after Boot Camp Assistant

So last night I decided it was time to start experimenting with Boot Camp and Windows XP Pro. I fired up Boot Camp Assistant and allocated a 32gb partition of my HD for the XP install. When prompted, I put in the XP Pro CD and restarted. It booted into the XP install utility, but when asking about which partition to use, instead of the 32gb partition, all I saw was a 131gb partition. Thinking that it was my OS X partition, I decided to cancel out of the install and do some more investigating. When it restarted, all I got was a blank gray screen, no spinning gear, no logos, nothing. When rebooting while holding down a mouse button, I was able to eject the Windows XP cd. Here's what I've tried so far:
CDs: Leopard, Original OS X Disk 1, Windows XP, None
Keys: none
Result: Gray screen
Keys: option
Result: Gray screen with mouse pointer that initially is moveable, but then freezes
Keys: c
Result: Gray screen
Keys: d
Result: Gray Screen
Keys: shift
Result: Gray Screen
Keys: command + r + p
Result: Gray Screen
Holding power button
Result: Long tone while starting up, then gray screen.
What can I do?? I'm thinking that Boot Camp fried my HD partition data, but I can't seem to access any of the boot disks or any sort of disk utilities

I did. I took it into the Apple store and they replaced my hard drive. It was under warranty, so it wasn't a problem. I got them to give me my old hard drive back, which I hooked up to an external SATA enclosure. My mac recognized it, but said it wasn't initialized. I downloaded Data Rescue II and it recovered all of my software. I'm now using it as a Time Machine disk.
After further research, I found out the my main problem was that I used Windows XP SP1. You NEED to use SP2, otherwise, this problem will occur. I figured I could just upgrade later, but nope, you need a native SP2 disk.
If your Mac isn't under warranty, try this post:
http://phail.net/2008/04/10/bootcamp-windows-xp-sp1-epic-phail/
and his solution:
http://phail.net/2008/04/13/bootcampsp1-white-screen-of-death-a-solution/
In short, you need another Leopard computer. I bet if you print out the instructions and take them to the Apple store with you, the Genius Bar will help you, they've always been super helpful/nice with me.
Good luck!!

IMac stuck at gray screen when booting

Hi - My 2011 iMac with 10.8.2 is stuck on the gray screen when rebooting. I was in Windows 7 bootcamp, and restarted to OS X. I see the screen below, and once the progress bar reaches 100%, the computer shuts off. Every time I reboot, the same problem. I've disconnected everything, except for the standard bluetooth wireless keyboard. I've tried some various boot options, such as holding down Shift while rebooting, as well as command+R, but neither had any impact, it is the same problem over and over. Any tips on what to try next?

If you want to preserve the data on the internal drive(s), you must try to back up now, before you do anything else. It may or may not be possible. If you don't care about the data, you can skip this step.
There are several ways to back up a Mac that is unable to fully boot. You need an external hard drive to hold the backup data.
1. Boot into Recovery (command-R at startup) or from a local Time Machine backup volume (option key at startup.) Launch Disk Utility and follow the instructions in the support article linked below, under “Instructions for backing up to an external hard disk via Disk Utility.”
How to back up and restore your files
2. If you have access to a working Mac, and both it and the non-working Mac have FireWire or Thunderbolt ports, boot the non-working Mac in target disk mode by holding down the key combination command-T at the startup chime. Connect the two Macs with a FireWire or Thunderbolt cable. The internal drive of the machine running in target mode will mount as an external drive on the other machine. Copy the data to another drive. This technique won't work with USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, or Bluetooth.
How to use and troubleshoot FireWire target disk mode
3. If the internal drive of the non-working Mac is user-replaceable, remove it and mount it in an external enclosure or drive dock. Use another Mac to copy the data.

Dual 1Ghz PowerMac G4 gray screen after booting

Greetings
Please can someone give me some more ideas to try, my G4 dual 1Gz system boots in to the operating system fine but after a while I get the gray screen crash, can be quick can be a while. I've reinstalled the operating system after formatting the HHD, I've done the disk utility repairs, I've swapped out the video card and the ram and its still doing it.
Any further ideas would be appreciated.
Rgds
James

Sounds like it's going out.
I would try running the extended version of your Apple Hardware Test.
It's not perfect but may flag something.
DALE

Powerbook G4 Gray Screen on boot up after trying to install an update

I was trying to update my computer but when I was doing the install and shut down all my programs to complete the install it said it could not find the application from which it was trying to update. I closed the update and when I tried to get on the internet and the laptop froze. I turned off the laptop and when I turned it back on all I have is a gray screen. I have done a PMU reset as well as a RAM reset. Both of these have not solved the problem. I know it is probably software related. Would you reccommend booting from the OS X disc??? Please help!!

I believe your problem is software related not hardware. Try to do archieve install and install update by downloading 10.4.7 PPC combo from apple site and then do the rest of the update from software update.
I think this problem caused of the bug in the 10.4.7 the first released by apple has problem with software update app (I've seen few of our customer has to do archive install to solve their boot related problem after software update to 10.4.7). Apple already released the update and also they fix the bug so I believe it is already safe to do archive install and update your software to 10.4.7 from software update but just want to be safe do from combo update download.
Hope this help
Flippo

Gray screen on boot

My mac doesn't go further than the gray screen with the apple logo at the beginning.
When I do a safe boot there is this message that doesn't stop appearring:
FCP-01 com.apple.lunchd(1) (com.apple.mDNSresponder(57).getpawn("_mdnsresponder") failed.
What can I do?
What command via terminal can I do to solve the problem?
I think it's a autorization of account issue at start-up.
Help me out please.
Guillaume

Have you been using Time Machine?

2007 iMac Gray Screen After Boot - Can't do anything

Hello,
I have a 2007 iMac. When I turn it on, I hear the boot chime and see the light gray screen, and then it goes to a darker gray screen. It won't get past the dark gray screen, and the screen doesn't show any icons or anything. It's just a solid dark gray. I've tried resetting the NVRAM/PRAM, starting in safe mode, etc., and nothing seems to be making a difference.
Does anyone have any idea what might be causing this, and how I can fix it?
Thanks in advanced!

I've tried all of those things. I don't believe the peripherals are causing the problem. I forgot to mention that I have it connected to a TV via VGA adapter. The iMac's monitor doesn't work.

Mackbook pro stucks on a gray window while booting

I have a macbook pro 15", that was working without problems, and when i turned on yesterday, the computer stucks on a white-gray screen, and doesn't make anything else. What could be damaged? May I be able to recover disk info? Thanks.

see this
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2570
see this
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718
Use Safe Mode, reboot holding shift key down, as soon as your in, copy your user file folder to a external drive and disconnect before doing anything else.
If you can't command r boot into the recovery partition...see if you can c boot off the 10.6. installer disk and using Disk Utility to repair the drive.
If you don't see the drive, it's likely dead.

Gray screen while booting

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