Grey screen issue

Hi
I was having grey screen, flashing folder (an icon inside) once I startup my macbook pro. Already tried safeboot, mem test, AHT test, external mac to access internal HDD. Nothing works. Have any idea?
Thanks much

Not too difficult. Take the Snow Leopard installation disk, slide it in the optical drive slot, start the MBP with the C key pressed down. Choose your preferred language and continue until you see a menu bar on top of the display.
On the menu bar, click on UTILITIES.
From the drop down menu, select DISK UTILITY.
Open Disk Utility>Erase and make certain the format Mac OS Extended (Journaled) is selected.
Click on the ERASE button.
Exit Disk Utility and follow the directions to complete the installation.
Ciao.

Similar Messages

"Grey Screen" issue attached to Third Party RAM?

Ran into an issue with my iMac. A few weeks back, when I started up my Mac, I got the "grey screen" brick wall, where the machine, for some reason, isn't seeing the operating system. Sometimes the flashing folder question mark, sometimes just grey. After a hard-reboot, things were okay.
But got progressively worse over the last three weeks. One reboot, went up to between 5 and 6 reboots just to get the CPU to see the hard disk. Stripped the machine, reinstalled the OS, did okay for only a day, and then back to the usual grey screen madness. Ran Disk Utility to repair my hard drive, sometimes I cant start-up without this process.
Did everything possible from the online troubleshooting pages on this issue... and finally pulled out my "third party" 1G RAM card... just as a final hoorah before packing it into the box for the Mac Store visit...
And now she starts up like a dream.
SO... would anybody know why in the heck a third-pary RAM card would affect my computer's ability to see the start-disk OS? Why, after pulling it out, would things be just fine? Should I just replace the RAM, or is it something else?
Strange, eh? --- Hit me with any thoughts you guys have. Thanks!

Welcome to the Forum.
If your 3rd party ram, or indeed any party ram was faulty then you might experience strange issues like this. Contact the people you got it from and see what they have to say - think of it as a faulty item and they should just offer to replace it for you.

GREY SCREEN ISSUE HELP

help! i keep getting a grey screen saying my mac needs to be restarted its happend for the first time today and done it at least 5 times this is my business pc and is backed up but its only 18 months old i need help!

It's ok, you likely just have a incompatible at boot third party kernel extension file.
Reboot holding the Shift key down, and go around and update all your third party software, especially something you suspect or know may install something at boot time.
Big culprits are any always on anti-virus or the MacKeeper junkware, just uninstall these totally, it's really not needed, ClamXav is good enough to clean files off of Windows and not run all the time causing problems.
But because of 10.7.4 update could be any number of other things, VMFusion, Parallels or some other specialized software.
If that doesn't work, then simply #8 Reinstall Just OS X, it's rather painless too, that will do the trick and kick out everything in OS X, then all you have to do is reinstall a few pieces of software no longer working when they issue a update that works with 10.7.4
Simple enough, but here's the link to my User Tip with awhole bunch of fixes.
Step by Step to fix your Mac

Stuck at grey screen issue: with an Afghanistan twist

First time post, so please go easy. I apologize for loading so much into the first post, but I believe it's better to give you all the information about my situation so I don't waste your time having to ask me questions about it, that I could have already provided.
Background: I bought my 17" MBP from a friend in late 2007 after he convinced me how superb it was in comparison to a PC. Since then I've been on a mission to convert everyone I can, as I personally view Windows as a self sustaining virus and will never use one for personal use again.
I'm in the Army, and my MBP has survived three long deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, and has not once ever had any kind of problems...until now. I'm currently in Afghanistan with my MBP and do not have any of my systems disks. A week ago, the CD drive stopped reading disks of any kind and ejects them after attempting to read them. Additionally, I can now hear the right side fan sounding like a lawn mower.
Today, my biggest nightmare came to fruition. I restarted my MBP after making some folder organizational changes, and it now refuses to start. It sticks at the grey screen with apple logo and spinning wheel. The wheel does spin. (I say that since in other threads I've noticed most people say their wheel does not spin).
I've already read countless blogs and discussion boards, and have tried many recommended solutions. I have particularly enjoyed Kappy's help to others. But I feel as if I'm in an near Apollo 13 situation, in that I do not have my installation CD and it wouldn't help anyway with my CD drive not responding and having nothing else to use to get my MBP to start up.
I've tried the single user startup using command "s" and attempted some solutions suggested by Kappy with the following results:
/sbin/fsck -fy
This ends by telling me "The volume MAC HD appears to be OK"
AWESOME
So then I tried this:
:/ root# /sbin/mount -uw /
:/ root# cd /Library/Preferences
:Preferences rm com.apple.loginwindow.plist
and could not go any further because it responded with: "No such file or directory"
When I tried using command "V" it kept repeating the following:
chad-squires-macbook-pro-32 com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.mDNSResponder[31]): posix_spawnp("/usr/sbin/mDNSResponder', ...): No such file or directory
So at this point, I have no idea what to do. I have internet access through a friends MBP (thought it's about as fast as dial up), but that's the extent of my problem and availability of resources to fix.
Please tell me that there is something I can do to get my baby working again, and most importantly get some irreplaceable family photos off and other documents back.

Oh boy, you've gotten some all-over-the-board responses.
Let's start here.
Someone mentioned above that it sounds like the NVIDIA issue. Rest assured, unless you have no video, graphics artifacting (lines, distortion, etc.), or kernel panics (messages that tell you you have to power off/restart), you don't have the NVIDIA issue. People love to toss that out when you have a model that may be affected, your symptoms don't sound anything like this.
You're not necessarily SOL without your install discs per se, but if it does look like you need to reinstall, there's not much that can be done without...well...some kind of installer. You can install from a USB drive but you'd need a working machine and an operating system disc of some kind to clone it.
That said:
:/ root# /sbin/mount -uw /
:/ root# cd /Library/Preferences
:Preferences rm com.apple.loginwindow.plist
Unless I'm reading this wrong, you've got a typo.
Should be:
/sbin/mount -uw /
cd /Library/Preferences
rm com.apple.loginwindow.plist
I saw the line
:Preferences rm com.apple.loginwindow.plist
Was expecting you to have root# in front, that makes me think you typed 'preferences rm', you don't need to type 'preferences' first.
Also: is your account set to automatically log you in (take you to the desktop) or does it have you type your username/password first? That might be important.
Have you tried a safe boot?
Safe boot: this can be helpful if the issue is with your account, a font cache, or a third party kernel extension/driver. Boot this way by holding Shift when you hear the chime, let go when you see the spinning gear. If all goes well, this should take you to the login window. If you can't boot in safe mode or if it does the exact same thing, again, let us know.
The results you saw in verbose mode make me think it's hanging because something got moved. mDNSresponder is important and you can't start without it.
There are other preference files that we can troubleshoot, I find verbose mode to be the most helpful in diagnosing the spinning wheel that goes on forever, a lot of times it's a corrupt driver and there's not much that can be done except reinstall.
Lastly: you mentioned you restarted after organizational changes and that's when the problem started...what did you move? Anything in the System folder or Library folder(s)?
You mentioned you have a friend with a MBP. Any chance either of you has a firewire cable? Does he have his discs? You can use another computer's superdrive in target disk mode hooked up to your computer, that's always one way to reinstall if your own superdrive doesn't work.

Grey screen issue with 10.5 & 10.5.1 - bad experience with Leopard

Here's a quick overview of my bad experience with installing Leopard:
*1st attempt:* Upgraded Tiger 10.4.10, was greeted with the blue screen. This was an APE issue.
*2nd attempt:* Archive and installed above install. This is where the continuing issue first occurred. The issue being on the first or second reboot after a 'successful' installation, I get the grey screen and spinning gear loop. In verbose mode I see this recurring loop:
Mez com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.nDNSResponder |xxx|) : posix_spawnp("usr/sbin/mDNSResponder", ...): No such file or directory
xxx = incremental value, it adds 1 each time the error cycles, which happens roughly ever 10 seconds).
Additionally, Disk Utility reports this error: Error: The underlying task reported failure on exit.
*3rd attempt:* Erase and install. Same issue as 2nd attempt occured.
*4th, 5th, 6th attempts:* Bought a brand new hard drive to replace the old one. This was an idea that was raised on another one of my threads. People thought I could have bad sectors. Tried upgrading and archive install from 10.4, no. Erase and install, no. Same issue as before.
*7th attempt:* Tried swapping out the RAM from a friends MBP (who has successfully upgraded to Leopard). No, same failure as before.
*8th attempt:* Tried using his Leopard disk. NO!
*9th attempt:* My last attempt so far... Erase and install, then applied the 10.5.1 update. It all went well, but it always has, until the point where I reboot. It successfully rebooted once, but to be sure all was fine (before using the migration assistant) I rebooted again... Oh what a surprise, it doesn't work anymore. Same enraging loop.
*Any new ideas people, I have faith that there is some genius out there who can provide me with a solution. I will love you forever if you can help me.*
*Quick question:* Do other people see the dialogue box that appears before the computer restarts...
"Updating Boot Caches - The Boot caches are being updated, the system will shutdown when this task is complete" (It's sort of along those lines. I don't have enough time to write down exactly what it says)??
Oh well, back to my newest backup (10.4.11).
*Fingers crossed for 10.5.2 :D*

THANK YOU!!! At least preliminarily...
I've spent the last three hours researching and troubleshooting my greyscreen dilemma, and your post is the only one that seemed to work so far.
I installed Leopard 10.5 onto my G4 Dual 1.25 Mirror, successfully restarted after the install, then had glitchy problems including being unable to run Software Update or even run the Leopard Update after downloading it from the apple website. So I restarted the computer (after removing the Install DVD and shutting the drive door) and found myself stuck at the grey screen with the spinning ball.
Nothing worked. I couldn't do anything to get it to boot.
After researching, I booted into single user mode and ran mount -o rw,remount / # (from this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5796214&#5796214) and when I exited and it began to boot I saw it get stuck at mDNSResponder line prompt, repeating the line prompt every 5 seconds or so and never getting anywhere.
Then I found your post and changed permissions as you mentioned, exited and it booted up successfully. I then immediately ran Software Update and installed the Leopard 10.5.1 update and now all is well again.
Insane for this to be required. I barely know what single user means and would have sent this computer in to Apple if I hadn't found your solution.
Hopefully the next person who searches on this problem will find this and save themselves a horror story too. Thanks again.
Jeff

Blank Grey Screen Issue

Hi,
I tried to upgrade to Yosemite last night and I think there's something wrong.
At the last step process gets to a grey screen with Apple Logo with a filling bar below it. As soon as the bar hits quarter way everything disappears and I'm left with a blank grey screen...
I don't have much on this iMac few folders and pictures.
Anyone experiencing the same issue? Any advice?

I just tried to install 10.10.1 and ran into the same problem, however, in my case, I found that the login form disappeared (invisible). If you're able to move the mouse pointer, try moving it around the middle of the screen where the username and password text fields are supposed to be. If you see two places where mouse pointer turn into a keyboard prompt, type your user name in the upper one and your password in the lower one and hit the return key. You should be able to complete the installation.

Can't fix Grey Screen issue

Hello,
My Mac Book seems to have a grey screen/OSX problem. The computer boots up fine, but after a few minutes the screen will go grey and I will get a warning stating there is a problem with OSX and I need to shut down. After shutting down and rebooting the computer will work fine for a couple of minutes and then the same thing happens again.
I took it to a local Mac reseller and they said it was the hard drive and since it is under warranty they replaced it for me. However the problem continues. It sounds like an OSx problem, but I would have thought they would have re-installed the operating system when they replaced the hard drive.
Any thoughts? If the hard drive has been replaced and the operating system has been reinstalled, what else could it be?

Sounds like you are having kernel panics. Here are a couple of resources to start with:
http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1392
Good luck!

More on the G5 Won't boot, no chime, no grey screen issue....

OK, so in the last thread, I had taken it to the apple store, where the g5 (DP 2.5) dutifully started up on their firewire drive, whereupon they declared it a faulty hard drive.
I pressed them pretty hard, but it made sense at the time, and certainly never failed while they were there.
So now I have it back home, a new WD SATA drive installed, and guess what?? same thing... boots, no chime, no power LED, just fans.
I have set/reset the SMU, I have removed everything including the batter (which checks good at 3.7 volts BTW)
Here's the weird part - it seems like once per day (always the first time) I do get one good try out of it. By this I mean, it will chime and at least get to the grey screen, and i can eject a CD. However, up till now I have not been prepared with the right thing to give it. Once that opportunity has passed, its back to the old black screen with no chimes for at least 24 hours.
I don't detect any overheating or that sort of problem - anyone ever seen this - where you can only get one good boot out of it for a day?
Thanks,
adam

Hi gB -
Yes I tried without the cover, to no avail. Ended up taking it back to the apple store today where they now are able to see the problem (with a different monitor).
Their gut instinct is logic board, but I am asking them to do a complete test on it (whatever that means) just to make sure it isn't a flaky leg on the power supply, or a bad cable somewhere. I don't have alot of hope, but I will give it a chance.
If it ends up being procs, board, or both, I will probably sell it for parts and put the money into a new one with warranty etc!
Glad yours is up and running.
Adam

TS2570 I think I may be having a similar "grey screen" issue?

But I'm not sure. my Mac appears to boot as normal up to the log in screen. I select either account and enter the correct password and then nothing! The only thing I have is the default wallpaper and the pointer. The pointer moves about the screen like I'd expect it to. There are no error messages or spinning pinwheels just the default wallpaper. As for my attempts to solve the problem I haven't tried anything but holding the power button and shutting it Mac down. Any ideas on how to resolve the issue?

******update******
I tried to reboot in safe mode (shift, command, v) and got the same results. I got to the log in screen and after I entered my password nothing!

Grey screen issue when starting it up

i safe booted first and it gave a diskos2 i/o error. i shut it down and resetted the NVRAM/PRAM, after that i started it up from the OS disc and started to install the OS, it gave an installation error, i then tried to do a clean install by erasing the HD but the HD does not show up in disc utilty at all, now im unsure in what to do

Hello, I am also experiencing this problem, particularly on mail startup, but it can happen any time. Thanks Mulder, I have tried your suggested sequence, and I thought it was helping, but the problem has recurred. If by chance you think this is a different problem than awaiti describes, please let me know, I do not want to intrude on the thread.
To summarize, over the past week or so, Mail (for me) has become unstable to the point of not being usable. No software updates had been applied on my Macbook for several weeks, until today (10.5.5), but I notice no difference in behavior after applying the 10.5.5 update. Mail starts then begins dragging the system down, finally ending up with the spinning beachball wait cursor. I have Mail's activity window "on", as well as Activity Monitor, to see if anything unusual is going on. Activity Monitor, when and if it gets any operating time, shows Mail "not responding". It gets so bad that other applications begin to show "not responding" and even Force Quit (cmd-opt-esc) takes forever to respond.
Some things to note:
1. If I do not start Mail, the system runs fine, applications respond normally.
2. When Mail goes in the weeds, other applications also go unresponsive, so I can only assume that Mail is consuming so much resources other cannot execute. (This include Activity Monitor... when Mail runs crazy, I cannot even see what other system processes are taking up CPU time.)
3. If and when I actually get Mail to Force Quit, Activity Monitor shows that the "spindump" process continues taking over 10% CPU time for up to a minute after Mail terminates.
4. I can successfully use the MobileMe webmail with no problems, so the email and folders on the server must be okay. But I prefer the Mail client.
Hope this information helps someone with insight suggest a course of action.
Thanks!

Grey screen fix ??

I'm trying to fix the Grey screen issue on my Mac book pro. I have started it up using command"R". I tried reinstalling Mac OSX but there is not enough space required. There is only 49.4 mb available.
I then went into disk utility and started verifying disks. The volume Macintosh HD was found corrupt and needs to be repaired. My pictures I have stored are the most important thing I do not want to lose. By doing this repair disk will I risk losing these? Our ifs there a way that I can plug an external drive in now and save anything before it's potentially lost?

I Am sorry for the typos. Typing this on an iPad, the auto save will not let me go back and edit.

Air randomly getting Grey Screen of Death...

I have a 2011 Macbook Air which I adore more than life itself. (Well, not exactly, but I am really enjoying my first Air).
Anyway,I am starting to have problems and I'm not sure how to troubleshoot.
Seemingly randomly, the Air with either restart, or freeze to a blank grey screen (with not Apple logo) preceeded by the chime.
Holding down the power button will restart the computer, but it ends up at the same grey screen.
If I reset the PRAM (control-option-power), the computer will restart successfully and continue to work okay...until it doesn't.
Any suggestions as to how to troubleshoot, or do I need to visit a Genius?

Some more followup. For whatever reason, the grey-screen issue has stopped. But I am now noticing the following odd behavor.
Randomly, the keyboard will completely stop functioning. (This is true for both the built-in keyboard and the Apple keyboard I also use when at work).
The only way to solve the problem is to reset the PRAM.
It's sounding like there's some logic board issue or something.
Any ideas?

My mac hung up while installing an update. It took hours and still did not complete the update. I restarted my mac. Upon turning it back on, a wheel has been spinning on a grey screen. I tried to reinstall OS X from utilities, but encounter an error. Why?

My mac hung up while installing an update. It took hours and still did not complete the update. I restarted my mac. Upon turning it back on, a wheel has been spinning on a grey screen. I tried to reinstall OS X from utilities, but encounter an error. What do I do?

Hey Manaskala,
First point of call on all grey screen issues is the following:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2570
Given this issue has appeared after a software update, I'd advise you do the following instead though:
1. Get an external hard drive, with enough space to put the entire hard drive of your Mac onto. Make sure you've safely copied any data you have off of it, as the next step will erase it.
2. In the recovery HD of your machine, use Disk Utility to format you EXTERNAL hard drive with the partition table as GUID, and the format as Mac OS Extended (Journaled).
3. Get out of Disk Utility, and click Reinstall Mac OS X.
4. When asked where, choose to install onto your external hard drive.
5. When the download and installation is complete, your Mac will reboot into a clean fresh setup screen. Make your user account an administrator, and make up a name and password; I use 'Test' and 'test'.
6. Your machine is now running from the external hard drive, not the internal hard drive, so don't be alarmed when you don't see your files.
7. Open the finder, you should see 'Macintosh HD' in the sidebar. This is the internal hard drive of your computer.
8. Open Macintosh HD, and copy out the following folders into a new folder on your desktop:
-Users.
-Applications.
-Library. (This only needs to be done if you use 3rd party software that saves things in the /Library, do a quick google and see if it does e.g. Photoshop, Protools).
9. When these have copied (it'll take quiet a while), you can now use Disk Utility to erase your hard drive. Don't erase Macintosh HD but the ENTIRE hard drive on the inside of your Mac, and as Thomas A Reed mentioned, there was likely an existing issue on your HDD so please go to Security Options and choose 'Zero Out' before clicking erase. This will rebuild the partition table which was a possible cause of the failed update.
10. Reboot the machine holding 'Option', go to recovery HD.
11. Choose 'Reinstall Mac OS X', this time onto your INTERNAL hard drive.
12. When this is complete, make another admin user called test and password test, like you did last time.
13. Run Software Update from the  menu of your Mac.
14. In the Finder, you should see your external Hard Drive. open it up, inside that you should see your desktop etc, and on the desktop will be your folder containing Library, Applications and Users.
15. Go to Finder up next to the  and choose File -> New Finder Window.
16. In your second finder window, open up Macintosh HD (through the Go -> Computer menu), and go to your Users folder.
17. Open the Users folder in your first finder window, and copy your user folder (has your name on it) into the second user folder (the one inside Macintosh HD).
18. This might take a while.
19. When complete, go to System Preferences -> Users and Groups and unlock the padlock.
20. Click the '+' sign, and make a new administrator user.
21. Now, the fun bit. Note the name of your user folder you copied, e.g. 'Nathan', containing all of your stuff. Note the difference between your user folder (has your name on it) and the Users folder (contains YOUR user folder, guest folder and shared folder).
22. Make the ACCOUNT NAME of your new adminstrator user the EXACT name of your user folder (normally lower case and without spaces), this is case sensitive folks. Your full name can be whatever you want, usually your full name.
23. Then click create. You should be informed that a home folder with that name in it already exists in the Users folder, would you like to make your new account from that folder? say YES!
24. When this is complete, log out of the Test user, log into your new account we've just made, all your stuff should be there.
25. ???????
26. Profit.
There's a few little bits that may need to be cleaned up afterwards, applications folder from your external hard drive should replace the applications folder on your internal hard drive, if the previously mentioned /Library folder contained important goodies then that should replace the /Library folder on your new Mac.
Hopefully that will help you out, straight after that is done make sure your stuff is there, erase your external hard drive and turn on time machine!

Grey screen after Time Machine restore

Hello, I have conducted a fair search for the problem I'm having but it seems like I'm going in circles. Before you all chose to beat on me for posting yet another grey screen issue please hear me out.
I have an early 2008 imac 8.1. The old HDD (WD3200AAJS) had a S.M.A.R.T fail. After reading many posts about this, I did not hesitate and quickly I replaced the HDD with a new one, the 1TB WD1000FAEX and installed the OS with no problem. Then I proceeded with the Snow Leopard install, again no problems. The imac started up and functioned with no flaws
Since it was a new HDD and none of my data was available, lucky me I have a Time Machine to bring all my data back. I used the Mac OS disk to get me to the installer screen and from there i was able to go to Utilities/Restore System From Back Up. 25 hours later, Grey screen! Did the PRAM reset, RAM check, safe boot, no periphials. Nada, still grey screen, I'm at a loss.
I booted up with MAC OS disk, holding C while she starts, went to Utilities/Disk Utility to check the HDD and it shows the used space 153.3GB which is what was in the Time Machine, hmmmm. So it has the original data. Prior to the TM restore the imac was functioning like new, after the restore it cannot get past the grey screen.
Has anyone had an restore issue with the TM similar to this?
Thanks for reading.
Alex

Hi Alex
Welcome to Apple Discussions
Sounds like maybe you forgot to properly set the new drives Partition Map Scheme to GUID Partition Table and Format to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) before trying to install or restore the OS X on it.
1. Pop your install disk back in, skip the installer, go to the menu bar and select Disk Utility.
2. In Disk Utility select the Drives first icon in the list of drives and then the Partition tab.
3. Then under Volume Scheme: click on the box that say's Current and select 1 Partition.
4. Now click on the Options... button directly below the Untitled 1 box.
5. Select GUID Partition Table for Intel iMac's.
6. Hit OK and then the Apply button down in the right bottom corner.
7. Once that's done Install the OS X and Restore from your Time Machine backup.
If your OK up to that point, see > http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/14.html
Dennis

Grey screen when I try downloading something.

In Safari, when I click download, it goes to a grey screen and it does not download at all. How do I fix this problem?

I also has this same problem! The only way of downloading files such as pdf's, dmg's, etc... is by right clicking the link and saving the file. This works fine for a normal hyperlink but unfortunately many websites use flash or have agreements u must click in order to download. I have tried installing firefox to no success and have just tried to install chrome to see if it would work. Chrome however as u can see here...
http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html?hl=en&brand=CHMB&utmcampaign=en-GB&utm_source=en-GB-ha-apac-aunz-sk&utmmedium=ha
has a link that cannot be "right clicked" and here in lies the biggest problem of the "grey screen" issue.
Chrome is not the only file i have found that cannot be "right clicked" and so this is a pressing issue for me. If there is anyone who has a suggestion please post it because it seams i am not the only person with this problem.
ps: I have tried to reset safari and have no plugins

Grey screen issue

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