Macbook Pro won't boot if external device is plugged in...

Namely, my iPod.
If I turn my macbook pro on and the iPod is plugged in, the system won't boot - it locks up on the grey screen before the apple logo even appears. Does anyone have any ideas?

Hey there,
When I restart my Macbook Pro I have to unplug my USB hub on the right hand side or my computer will just hang at the white screen when it first turns on. Once I unplug the hub the computer boots, and once it gets to the log on screen I can plug in the hub and everything works fine. Has anyone found a fix for this yet?? It's pretty annoying because it also happened randomly and hasn't worked properly since. I have replaced my USB hub just to make sure it wasn't the issue and my computer still won't boot with it plugged in.

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Macbook Pro won't boot with external HDD plugged

I have a weird problem. My late 2008 Macbook Pro won't start with external HDD plugged either FW or USB... The screen stays white until I unplug it and then the Apple logo is there.
Anyone know any solution for this? Or anyone have the same problem

yeah I had the exact same issue with one of my 750GB externals too. I just left it for a while (about an hour or so) and it was fine..
I believe its so slow because the system is indexing the drive, which can be a very slow process if the drive is big, has a complex folder-hierarchy, and/or is fragmented.
Does the hard-drive appear quite quickly in Finder once OS X has started up? if its slow it may confirm what I've just said.

My Macbook Pro won't boot from External HD

Could anyone out there, maybe Ned or Peter who helped me last time tell me why it wont boot from an image i have loaded onto the HD?
I managed to restore the image onto the HD using disk utility but when i press the power button and hold down 'Alt' i get a blank screen and a repeat of my start up chime and then all the fans activiate
any ideas?
Thanks
Danny

Hey...
I dont know if its the same problem im experiencing... But a couple of day ago i got a brand new macbook pro.. and wanted to restore my os to the state that it was in when i last backed up using superduper... i then plugged in my lacie firewire drive and rebooted pressing down the alt key.. then i was given the choice of booting my backup and i chose that.. but then nothing happened, it just hung at the gray screenn... I later tried to boot it on my girlfriends macbook and it worked fine there.. So i dont know if something is wrong with the macbook pros firewire port..
Hope this helps in some way..

Macbook pro won't boot after installing update 10.9.3

macbook pro won't boot after installing update 10.9.3

Please read this whole message before doing anything.
This procedure is a diagnostic test. It’s unlikely to solve your problem. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.
The purpose of the test is to determine whether the problem is caused by third-party software that loads automatically at startup or login, by a peripheral device, by a font conflict, or by corruption of the file system or of certain system caches.
Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed for the test, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards, if applicable. Start up in safe mode.
Note: If FileVault is enabled, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a Fusion Drive or a software RAID, you can’t do this. Ask for further instructions.
Safe mode is much slower to start up and run than normal, with limited graphics performance, and some things won’t work at all, including sound output and Wi-Fi on certain models. The next normal startup may also be somewhat slow.
The login screen appears even if you usually login 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.
Test while in safe mode. Same problem?
After testing, restart as usual (not in safe mode) and verify that you still have the problem. Post the results of the test.

My 2007 MacBook pro won't boot up beyond a White screen any ideas what to do?

My 2007 MacBook pro won't boot up beyond a White screen any ideas what to do?

Odd how this hasn't been archived yet.
I'm getting the same thing with my Macbook, but can't boot past the white screen. An Apple store in KS suggested I needed a new hard drive, but I've already put two in there and it's still doing the same thing. I really don't want to buy another motherboard like I had to a couple of years ago.
My choices are either buy a cheap drive to boot from and remove the current one to put into an external case, or save the money by not buying a new motherboard and putting it as a down payment toward a Mac mini.

MacBook Pro won't sync with other devices

My MacBook pro won't sync with other devices in the house. My iPad and iPhone sync OK but MacBook won't for some reason. Can you help?

Sign into your account in iTunes - from that page you should be able to deauthorise ALL 5 authorised computers - supposedly you can do this once a year.
Thereafter any devices you no longer have will be deauthorised, and you can reauthorise those you still have or are new.
AC

MacBook Pro won't boot at start. I get a white screen with a blinking folder with a question mark in the middle. Any ideas?

MacBook Pro won't boot at start. I get a white screen with a blinking folder with a question mark in the middle. Any ideas?

Read this article...
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1440?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

Macbook pro won't boot - how do I retrieve emails?

Hey guys
I've got a common problem that my Macbook pro won't boot. Sometimes I get stuck on the grey screen with spinning wheel, sometimes on the blue screen with spinning wheel
I've scoured the internet on another machine and tried every trick I can find with the MacBook Pro including
Disk / Permissions repair from install disk (says the HD is fine)
PRAM
Single User
Soft
It seems like my only option at the moment is an Install and Archive. I can mount the MacBook Pro on another machine with a firewire and remove files and backed up a lot on a hard drive before it died
What I am worried about is how to retrieve some emails from the machine that only exist locally because I have deleted them from the server
Is there a way of doing that?
Would Migration Assistant work?
If anyone could help me with this or suggest any other methods for bring my machine out of a coma I'd really appreciate it
d

Try a different adapter. If you don't have access to a known-good adapter any other way, make a Genius Bar appointment at an Apple Store.

Macbook pro won't boot, stuck on white apple screen

Noticed today, that my macbook pro won't boot . It gets to the white apple screen with the spinner under the apple logo. It stays like this for a long time without doing anything except spinning.
I've powered down and tried to boot up several times.
I have boot camp and windows on my mac and when the white screen appears, I can press Option to bring up which hard drive and the Windows partition will load without any problems.

Exacty what happens when you try to boot up from the disc that came with your computer? Are you holding down the c key? Have you tried holding down the "option key?" Are you able to run the Hardware Test - Intel-based Macs: Using Apple Hardware Test
Shut down your computer and disconnect all peripherals (keyboard & mouse if pertinent) from your computer. Now reboot.
If the Mac starts up normally, shut it down again and then plug in one of the peripherals (keyboard or mouse first) and start up your computer again. If it does so successfully repeat the process, adding one peripheral at a time until your Mac acts up. At that point, disconnect the last peripheral you added, reboot your Mac and search the peripheral vendor's website for an updated driver.
If no driver exists or the problem remain after installing the new driver, try a different cable or a different port on your Mac.
If none of the above works, again disconnect all peripherals from your Mac, hold down the "shift" key to start up in "Safe Boot" mode.
If the Mac starts up correctly, restart without pressing the "shift" key.
If your computer still does not start up properly, shut it down and restart it while holding down the Apple+Option-P-R keys; keep holding "all 4 keys" down until you hear the startup sound "twice."
If none of the above work Disconnect all peripherals from your computer. Boot from your install disc & run Repair Disk from the utility menu. To use the Install Mac OS X disc, insert the disc, and restart your computer while holding down the C key as it starts up.
Select your language.
Once on the desktop, select Utility in the menu bar.
Select Disk Utility.
Select the disk or volume in the list of disks and volumes, and then click First Aid.
Click Repair Disk.
(If Disk Utility cannot repair, you will need a stronger utility (3rd party) - Diskwarrior or Techtool PRO)
Restart your computer when done.
Repair permissions after you reach the desktop-http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25751 and restart your computer.
Remove any 3rd party ram.
Reinstall Lion - This will install a "fresh" copy of Lion without archiving old system files but leaves the rest of your files in place.
If your computer is still under warranty or you have Apple Care, take full advantage of it by letting tech support deal with your problems. It's what you're paying them for.
Out of warranty - take the computer to an Apple store or an AASP. Whichever is more convenient for you.

MacBook pro won't boot up Keeps turning off

MacBook pro won't boot up. When power button pressed the white screen w apple comes on w progress bar but shuts off before bar completed. If I move cursor or hit buttons it boots but will turn off if cursor stops Moving or stop pushing buttons. Just started happening. Ran hardware test and all shows ok. Any ideas??

Thanks for all the help; however, I still continue to have problems booting off of any other media.
I've tried the Apple CD w/ no success - I made an image of the apple cd and restored it to a USB drive, and it won't boot. I've tested both methods on another mac, and both options boot fine.
I'm going with my last restort here and am going to install OSX on a portable USB HD, and try to boot off of that (no clue if it will work given the outcomes of the other things I have tried). From there I'm going to backup the HD, and try DW as suggested.
Any thoughts as to why the mac refuses to boot off of any other media? It always boots halfway and then tells me I need to shutdown my mac.
Thanks again,

MacBook Pro won't boot after trying to install 10.7.3 update. Start up stalls at Apple logo and spinning gear.

MacBook Pro won't boot after trying to install 10.7.3 update. Start up stalls at Apple logo and spinning gear. Computer won't even start in safe mode.

My daughter's MacBook Pro was doing exactly the same thing. I don't know if it had anything to do with the latest update. She called me about a week ago saying that her MacBook began running slower by the day . She then called me Friday and told me that it wouldn't get past the gray screen and the gear just kept on spinning. I did everything I could over the phone including Safe mode which it wouldn't go into and thought maybe it was the hard drive. She took it to the Apple store. Originally, they also thought it was the hard drive. It ended up being a corrupted operating system (Lion). Apple genius simply re-installed Lion and she's back up and running. Good thing she backed up right before it crapped out. She'll be restoring everything tonight. Don't know if re-installing Lion will help your situation, but it did the trick for my daughter.

My MacBook Pro won't boot and apparently my HDD is locked

My MacBook Pro won't boot up. And it's says my HDD is locked when i try and reinstall OS. Help me please good people.

you want to check how many threads with same question first, and look in
Mac OS version forum that you have; and the notebook MacBook instead of the workstation forum for Mac Pro (non-laptop)
Not a lot of detail to go by with "won't boot" though.
Mac OS X Help
Isolating Issues in Mac OS
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1388
https://www.apple.com/support/osx/
https://www.apple.com/support/quickassist/
http://www.apple.com/support/mac101/help/
http://www.apple.com/support/mac101/tour/
Troubleshooting: My computer won't turn on
https://support.apple.com/kb/TS1367
Assume you know what your OS, how to use the Recovery Mode, and how to repair or do Safe boot and other tasks.
General purpose Mac troubleshooting guide: Isolating issues in Mac OS X
Creating a temporary user to isolate user-specific problems: Isolating an issue by using another user account
Identifying resource hogs and other tips: Using Activity Monitor to read System Memory and determine how much RAM is being used
Starting the computer in "safe mode": Mac OS X: What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode?
To identify potential hardware problems: Apple Hardware Test
General Mac maintenance: Tips to keep your Mac in top form
MacBook Pro
https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro
https://discussions.apple.com/community/mac_os?view=discussions
http://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro

My macbook pro won't turn on and it is plugged into the charger, the light doesn't even turn a color?

my macbook pro won't turn on and it is plugged into the charger, the light doesn't even turn a color?

Might be a problem with the adapter.
Help here > Apple Portables: Troubleshooting MagSafe adapters

MacBook Pro won't recognize 1TB external drive

Hey team,
My mid-2010 MacBook Pro won't recognize my WD My Passport 1TB drive. I was copying files from the drive to my computer when my computer went to sleep (didn't run out of power, just went to standby mode). Turned computer back on and now it won't recognize the drive.
It is a USB 3.0 cord (computer is only USB 2.0 and the cord works with other drives) and when plugged in, the light turns on and the disk spins but isn't recognized my this or other computers (also not in Disk Utility).
Tried a handful of disk recovery programs but nothing wants to 'see' the disk plugged in.
Thanks for any and all suggestions.

yes yes yes, I warn people about WD drives on this link:
Your dead external hard drive is likely fine! Great hope for your 'faulty' external HD
theReKleiner wrote:
What now?
Only option is to buy the SAME exact HD and swap controller boards, or pay someone a LOT more $$$ to do the same thing.
its not soldered there, its just a controller/ SATA "one piece"
They do that to save 50 cents in mfg. costs.
I mention your "issue" in that link. Which is why you do NOT buy WD ext. HD.
they make the controller board and SATA card one piece.
CURRENT MFG. THAT HAVE controller board and SATA cards as one piece are : WD USB drives, and Toshiba USB Canvio
However Toshiba didnt USED to do that, but they started doing it at the end of 2013.
avoid those 2.
To avoid that nonsense, buy Hitachi drives in USB.
Or, the best option:
Save money and invest in a bare hard drive backup and redundancy plan
Its cheaper
less fuss
more reiable, removes the nasty failure point of SATA card interfaces.
takes up lot less space.
Bare hard drives and docks. The most reliable and cheapest method of hard drive data storage, archives, and redundancies
The best method for your data archives and redundancies, which is also the least expensive, the most reliable, and the most compact option is the purchase of naked hard drives and at least one USB 3.0 HD dock ($40 roughly).
While regarding Time Machine and your Macbook or desktop, your primary backup is best saved to a conventional USB (or Firewire / thunderbolt) hard drive inside an enclosure, the most important part of your data protection begins after your 1st / primary Time Machine / backup; and these are your secondary (most important) data storage devices, archives and their redundancies.
However bare hard drives and docks (below) also work perfectly as a Time Machine backup, this is for home use, since the docking station is certainly not very portable as a notebook Time Machine backup device should be; nor should bare HD be packed around with a notebook, rather remain at home or office.
Six terabytes of 2.5" HD pictured below in a very compact space.
Bare hard drives and docks have the lowest cost, the highest reliability, and take up the smallest storage space
Drawbacks:
1. Care and knowledge in general handling of naked hard drives (how not to shock a bare HD, and how to hold them properly). Not a genuine drawback.
Advantages:
1. By far the least expensive method of mass HD storage on a personal basis. Highest quality naked HD can be purchased in bulk very cheap.
2. Eliminates the horrible failure point of SATA bridges and interfaces between external drives and the computer.
3. Per square foot you can store more terabytes of data this way than any other.
4. Fast, easy, no fuss and most simplex method of data storage on hard drives.

Macbook Pro won't boot or show partition

I have my macbook pro partitioned with leopard and tiger (for protools) . I also have a copy of leopard on an external hard drive that I boot to occasionally. While on this external drive I had to do a manual shutdown after it froze and now my macbook pro won't show the internal drive partition with leopard on it. It will only boot to the internal partition with tiger on it. Even though I can see the leopard partition on the desktop and access it through tiger it is still not showing up in startup disk. I held the option key during startup and it gave me the choice to choose the leopard partition but after it started to go through booting it would then shut down.
Any suggestions?
I ran disk permissions and repair but its said everything is okay.

I would try Diskwarrior 4.1 and see if that can repair the drive.
btw how did you get Tiger on your Macbook Pro?
My Tiger install DVD will not install on my Macbook pro even though it is a 3.1 version machine.
I need to run Protools as well.

Macbook Pro won't boot if external device is plugged in...

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