IMac won't boot up after Lion 10.7.4 update

I made the mistake of updating my mid-2010 27" iMac earlier this week and now it won't boot up. It gets to the gray screen with the Apple logo and the progress bar to finalise the update, but the computer shuts down about 25% of the way in. Fortunately I could boot up to the recovery HD and was able to copy my files over to an external hard drive.
I have a Genius Bar appt today to get it looked at, but wanted to post this in case anyone else had this problem.

Try turning off the computer with the power button, then turn it on to allow it to restart.

Similar Messages

IMac won't boot up after latest update. Any suggestions?

I just updated my software (the latest from apple), then my iMac won't boot again.

There you go. Your HDD is failing hence its not booting. You need reformat the HDD
To reformat, same steps: Boot to the install disc > get past the language selection > You will see Welcome to Blah Blah Blah > just hit continue > There should be something there called erase and install
BUT
1. if you are absolutely sure that Time machine has BACKED-UP all of your files then proceed above
2. If not, if you have another mac: connect it via firewire then google Target Disk mode. Basically you want to copy all your files from the damaged machine to the new mac to serve as a backup
3. if yo dont have another mac: get an external HDD, install Mac os X on it, boot to it then back up your files
to do this
a) Plug external HDD
b) Boot to the CD restart and hold C
c) Get past language selection and keep hitting continue
d) when it asks you where you want to install Mac os X > select the external HDD
e) once its installed. Restart the computer and hold "Option" key. You should now see your external HDD as one of the boot drives. Select that and you'll boot into it
f) once inside the external HDD OS, you will see the internal HDD(damaged drive)browse/navigate through it and start getting your important files

IMac won't boot anymore after power cut

Thanks to the great storms in New Jersey, my iMac does not boot anymore after a power cut. Does not get past the apple logo screen with the spinning wheel and keeps rebooting every 2 minutes.
I was able to mount the HD via Firewire on a host machine and the disk seemed fine.
I booted from the Install disk and ran Disk Utility - seemed fine though I could not verify the disk permissions ?
One other thing - I seemed to remember the white light (front bottom right) was blinking before during start-up. Now it goes and stays black after couple of seconds.
Help please,
Philippe

HI Phillipe and Welcome to Apple Discussions...
If you haven't done so, try running the Apple Hardware Test.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1509
I doubt repairing disk permissions can't help this problem. It sounds like a hardware issue.
*"I booted from the Install disk and ran Disk Utility - seemed fine though I could not verify the disk permissions ?"*
When you ran Disk Utility via Firewire, did you actually Verify the hard disk for errors?
Carolyn

MacBook Pro won't boot up after Lion upgrade

I upgraded my 13" macbook pro to lion last night. I watched some movies until the battiery died. Now it won't boot up. Indicator light does not come on and it makes no noise. Battery indicator says it's full. Any suggestions?

MBP's are very finicky about RAM. Most of us here will recommend Crucial or OWC as the best source. If I were you I'd put the original RAM back in and see if the problem goes away. If so, return what you just bought and buy from one of the vendors I mentioned.

IMac won't boot up after install of latest Mountain Lion update

I installed the recommended software update to Mountain Lion last night on my 27" i3 iMac (8 GB RAM).
When I tried to boot my iMac this morning the "install updated software" pane was visible and it note that the installation would be "less than a minute" before it was completed. After half an hour I left for work.
Am I alone on this and what is a possible rememdy?

Try turning off the computer with the power button, then turn it on to allow it to restart.

IMac won't boot from/install Lion. Why?

I have a 2006-model iMac (iMac5,1 with a 2GHz Core 2 Duo processor and 2.5GB RAM; this is one of Apple's supported configurations for Lion) which has been running quite nicely for several years now. About a year or so ago I moved it to 10.6 which went smooth as silk. Last week I decided to move it to 10.7 and right about now I'm ready to throw this iMac in the effin' trash. It simply WILL NOT boot from OS X 10.7 no matter what.
I first put my 10.7 installer on the computer while it was running 10.6. I launched it, it copied a bunch of stuff, then restarted the computer. Then....nothing. I got the Apple logo with the spinner. I waited about 20 minutes for something greater to happen but nothing did so I forced a shut down. Unfortunately that attempt seems to have destroyed my previous 10.6 installation. Any further attempt to start from that hard drive yields an infinite spinner with the Apple logo but never any desktop or anything useful.
I then put my old iMac into Target Disk Mode, connected it to my newer iMac (iMac7,1 with 4GB RAM running 10.7.4), and used Disk Utility to reformat the old iMac's hard drive. That went fine. I then ran the OS X 10.7 installer on my new iMac, directing it to install onto the old iMac's hard drive. It took about 10 minutes to copy its files then directed me to restart which I did. I got the spinner-with-Apple for a few minutes followed by a spinner-with-circle-slash forever (about 15 minutes before I forced a shut down). I was able to reboot my newer iMac from its internal hard drive without any issues but every time I tried booting the newer iMac from the older iMac's hard drive I would get the spinner-with-Apple for a few minutes followed by a spinner-with-circle-slash forever thing. The same thing happened when I took the older iMac out of TDM and tried to boot it from its own hard drive. Trying that in verbose mode shows "Waiting for DSMOS" as the final line before the machine stalls. It is important to note that (a) this is a legitimately purchased Lion license that I bought last year, and (b) I'm trying to install it on an Apple iMac, not a Hackintosh.
Next, I ran the Recovery Disk Assistant to create a bootable 10.7 recovery USB drive. The creation of the drive went fine and I'm able to boot my newer iMac from the drive — but I cannot boot the older iMac from it, again getting the spinner-with-Apple for a few minutes followed by a spinner-with-circle-slash forever thing. Verbose mode shows the DSMOS error again.
My next step was to extract the "InstallESD.dmg" bootable system image from the installer app and clone that onto a USB drive. That went fine and I was able to boot my newer iMac from that drive but I was unable to boot the older iMac from that drive, again getting the spinner-with-Apple for a few minutes followed by a spinner-with-circle-slash forever thing with verbose mode showing the DSMOS error.
Next I tried to reverse things. I put my newer iMac into TDM, connected it to the older iMac, and tried to boot the older iMac from the newer iMac's hard drive. This failed too. I never got the circle-slash thing, only the Apple logo forever. Verbose mode shows the last line being "BootCacheControl: Unable to open /var/db/BootCache.playlist: 2 No such file or directory".
Finally, I pulled out a spare external hard drive. From my new iMac I booted from my USB drive (the one I cloned "InstallESD.dmg" onto), installed Lion onto the external drive, and booted successfully from the external drive. Everything was running perfectly. I ran System Update until everything was fully updated, then connected that external drive to the old iMac and tried to boot. Again, Apple logo forever with verbose mode showing the BootCacheControl error.
To ensure that the older iMac was fully operational I dug out the old OS install discs and ran the "extended" diagnostic. Everything came up perfect with no errors.
I then pulled out my OS X 10.6 DVD and tried booting the older iMac from it. That worked perfectly, and I was able to format and install 10.6 without any hiccups or issues whatsoever. The iMac is perfectly operational under 10.6.
So why the phargl can't I get 10.7 on this bloody machine?!?!?

In addition to MGW's suggestion...........
See the following Articles:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25497 Older versions of Mac OS than what comes with your computer
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25517 Mac OS: Versions, builds included with PowerPC Macs (since 1998)
==========
Without the original System DVDs that came w/the iMac, all you have is a glorified doorstop. You need the System DVDs to troubleshoot. *Especially Install Disc #1.*
You can get replacement System Install & Restore CD/DVDs from Apple's Customer Support - in the US, (800) 767-2775 - for a nominal S&H fee. You'll need to have the model and/or serial number of your Mac available.
If you're not in the US, you may need to go through the regional Apple Store that serves your location to find the contact number. Here's a list of links to all of those -
http://store.apple.com/Catalog/US/Images/intlstoreroutingpage.html

IMac won't boot up after latest update

Hi
I'm a newbie to this forum but any help would be greatly appreciated please
We've had our iMac for 2yrs now no issues but when I went to do the latest update today it's gone a bit weird!
I did the install and relaunch like I always do but when rebooting it got stuck on the white start up page with the apple logo and a circular timer
Ive rebooted it several times and performed a PRAM and SMC reset but still same issue. The fan started to run fast but the resets seem to have solved that?
Any ideas what's wrong and how to fix it please?
Thanks in advance

The reason Allan was asking what update is this will affect how it's handled. However without knowing I believe the most wise thing to do it take the machine into an Apple Store or AASP where they can help you. One of the most recent updates was a EFI update for 2011 iMacs. If your iMac is a 2011 machine (released after May 2011) and that is the update in question then the only recourse is taking it in as mentioned.
There are a couple of things you can try though, first is restart using the Install Disk or if you are on Lion restart and when you hear the startup tone hold down the Option Key. Then choose Disk Utilities and run Repair Disk Permissions, do this 2x. Then exit DU and try to restart normally. If that doesn't work then try rebooting in Safe Mode, this will clear some caches. It's possible one or more has become corrupt. If neither of these work then definetely take it in.
Finally please please please complete your profile, use Your Stuff in the upper right of this page then click Profile and complete. This is vital to helping you. At this point we know nothing about your system, what version of OS X, which iMac, etc...

IMac won't boot up, after Disk Utility

I was running onyx and it said to run my osx install disk and use disk utility and the repair disk function, so I did. There was an error message like node error and wouldn't get past checking catalogues before stopping. So I quit that and just tried to reboot, but it wouldn't work, just stuck at the apple logo and spinning circle. Is there anyway to fix this?
21.5" iMac Mac osx 10.6.5

Reinstall OS X which will not erase your drive.
Reinstall Snow Leopard
Booting From Snow Leopard Installer Disc
1. Insert OS X Installer Disc into the optical drive.
2. Restart the computer.
3. Immediately after the chime press and hold down the "C" key.
4. Release the key when the spinning gear below the dark gray Apple logo appears.
5. Wait for installer to finish loading.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions then Reinstall
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. Complete the OS X installation. If you have a good Time Machine backup then select the option to Restore from a TM backup in the installer's Utilities menu.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall Snow Leopard from scratch.

HT3964 my iMac won't boot up. I hear the chime and the Apple symbol appears but there is no whirling indicator that appears and after a while the computer screen goes black and the whole cycle starts again. There have been occasions when it has actually s

my iMac won't boot up. I hear the chime and the Apple symbol appears but there is no whirling indicator that appears and after a while the computer screen goes black and the whole cycle starts again. There have been occasions when it has actually started and I have the dashboard appear but then the screen freezes

Since you have Lion v10.7.4 installed, use Lion Recovery to repair the startup disk if necessary, or reinstall the Mac OS X.

My 2006 iMac running Snow Leopard won't boot even after erasing and re-installing Snow Leopard (via my MacBookPro), either from the HD or DVD drive. Can't get it to run Hardware Test. Disk Utility says disk OK - files are there. What can I do?

My 2006 iMac running Snow Leopard won't boot even after erasing and re-installing Snow Leopard. I erased and re-installed by putting the iMac in Target Disk mode and usin my MacBookPro as the host. But after numerous attempts I still can't get it to boot either from the HD or DVD drive. I just get the white screen after the wheel stops spinning. I can't get it to run Hardware Test - just get the white screen. If I use Disk Utility via my MBP it says the disk appears OK. All the Snow Leopad files appear to have been installed. What can I do?

Hi-NRG Bwoy wrote:
I erased and re-installed by putting the iMac in Target Disk mode and using my MacBookPro as the host.
Reet the SMC and the PRAM
 Cheat sheet to help diagnose and fix your Mac
Perhaps you installed the wrong version OS X onto the iMac, you can't use the disk from another Mac.
clean the disk.
If it's not working then use this method to create a bootable 10.6 USB from the iMac machine specific 10.6 disk or the 10.6.3 retail disk on your other Mac, use it to boot the iMac with.
http://www.maciverse.com/install-os-x-snow-leopard-from-usb-flash-drive.html
How to erase and install Snow Leopard 10.6

Imac has white screen and spinning wheel and will not boot up---after lion install

imac has white screen and spinning wheel and will not boot up---after lion install

Please read Gray screen appears during startup.

My iMac won't boot up fully. It stays stuck in the gray screen with the pinwheel spinning, then after about 5 minutes just shuts itself off.

My iMac won't boot up fully. It stays stuck in the gray screen with the pinwheel spinning, then after about 5 minutes just shuts itself off.

Try SMC Reset (unplug it from the back of the computer for 10 seconds then plug it back. in)
Try PRAM Reset Cmd + OPtion + P + R on start up.
Try safe boot - hold down shift on start up.
Try booting to install dvd (C on start up) or recovery hd (CMD + R) and using disk utility to run a verify and repair. If you still can't boot after that reinstall the operating system. If you can't find the disc or it wont boot to the disc.
Try single mode which is cmd+S on start up. It will open with a terminal looking window in the terminal. type in /sbin/fsck -TL. If it returns *system has been modified* continue to type that command in until it comes back with macintosh hd seems to be ok. If after 5 tries it still gives you system has been modified. You may have to replace the hard drive.

IMac won't boot after power outage

I got a power outage a couple of hours ago. And now my iMac won't boot. When I power it up, it gets pass the white screen with the apple logo. The screen than turns blue with a spinning cursor. The cursor spins for about 10-15 minutes and stops but the normal login screen never appear and it won't boot into the desktop either. I just got a blue screen.
I have boot into the install Disc1 and did the disk repair and premission repair but it didn't help.
Any idea?
Sidney

Oh man, what a disaster!
I tried to do an Archive and Install but the installation hanged at the end of disc 2 after running an iWeb script (according to the install log) with about one minute left. I have waited for two hours but it just hanged there with all the drives spin down.
To make the problem worse. There was no way to quit the install at that point because all the menu items were disabled. The only way out was to power off. But when I powered it back on, it booted right into install directly asking for the disc 2. If I put the disc in it will install again and hang at the same spot.
Disc 2 contains iLife. I know Apple wanted to make things simple but why can't they give me an option to skip it? After all, iLife was already installed.
I finally got it working by booting from disc 1 and did a clean install. It took me all night to re-download all the updates and reinstall many applications. Fortunately, I have my address book, calendar, and most of my works backed up to .Mac so it wasn't a total lost.
On the bright side. Now my iMac is working better than before. I used to have problem getting auto sleep to work but now it works perfectly. Safari also had problem accessing charts (but Camino was fine) in a few web sites like schwab.com. Now everything works.
Lenn and David. Thanks for all your helps.
Now I am looking for a better backup solution so that the recovery won't be this painful if disaster strikes again. Any suggestions?
Sidney

IMac won't boot after trying to migrate files to macbook?

While trying to migrate info from my IMAC to my Macbookpro all work froze on both puters. Macbook starts and runs alright. But my IMAC won't boot at all. Tried startup disc and it won't get past picking a destination because it doesn't list one. I made a boo boo hear and need help fixing this.

Drive Preparation
1. Boot from your OS X 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.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Quit DU and return to the installer. Install OS X.

IMac won't boot after power failure during 10.5.6 update

Help!
Tried to update last night and at something like 80% install, we had a power cut. iMac won't boot at all now - get to a grey screen which tells me to restart. Don't have a wired keyboard. If I did - what are the steps to get this working again.
I believe I have a good backup, but don't want to risk as all the family photos are on the iMac.
Thanks in advance.

Thanks for the help, but can't even get to a screen where I could type anything! I know I'm being dumb here.

IMac won't boot up after Lion 10.7.4 update

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