My MacBook Pro keeps starting up in safe mode and then just before halfway through it turns off

I shutdown my mac as it was working slowly. The startup disk was almost full so I decided to restart it. Once I restarted it it was stuck trying to start up so I restarted it in safe mode. Now the safe mode bar loads about 40% then disappears completely after which the mac turns off. I have tried PRAM reset. What is likely to be the problem?

Maximillianmann,
depending upon how full “almost full” actually is, that could be the problem.
You can try this, if you have Mac OS X 10.7 or newer installed, to see if it’s not related to your disk being almost full: boot your MacBook Pro into Recovery mode by holding down a Command key and the R key as it starts up. Once the Mac OS X Utilities menu appears, select Disk Utility. On the left-hand side of the Disk Utility window, select your internal disk’s boot partition (typically called “Macintosh HD”). On the right-hand side, press the Verify Disk button if it’s not greyed out; if it is greyed out, or if it reports that errors were found, press the Repair Disk button. Once the verification/repair is completed, exit Disk Utility and select Restart from the Apple menu to restart in normal mode. Once you hear the startup chime, try booting into Safe mode; does it let you do so now?

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MacBook Pro 13" Only boots to safe mode and running VERY slow.

Hi...
Not posted on here before, but am desperate so hoping there are some experts out there who can help...
I have 13" Macbook pro which has ceased to work properly - it runs very slowly and will only boot in safe mode.
I have installed a new hard disk, but I get the same problem whether I (try to) boot from the old HHD or the new one.
The new drive was imaged using Carbon Copy Cloner.
I have run the repair disk priorities in disk utility and verifying the disk says all OK.
I have set the startup disk to be the new hard disk, and cleared the NVRAM via cmd-option-p-r...
As things stand at the moment, rebooting (not in safe mode) leaves me with the grey screen and apple logo (and no obvious activity for 10+ mins (so far)).
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Thanks!

Domonic White,
when you ran Disk Utility, did you do so from your user account, or from Recovery mode? There are four options there: Verify Disk Permissions, Repair Disk Permissions, Verify Disk, and Repair Disk. Which of these did you do in Disk Utility?
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Have you tried logging in as your administrative user, opening the Users & Groups pane of System Preferences, creating a new standard user (e.g. “Test”), and trying to log in as the new user, to see if the slow performance affects the new user also?
There is a chance that this could be due to a faulty internal SATA cable. If you have an external disk enclosure, or a SATA-to-USB or SATA-to-FireWire adapter, try booting from one of your drives when it’s externally connected. If it works fine that way, but is sluggish when internal, that could point to your internal SATA cable as the culprit.

I just tried to wake up my 4 year-old MacBook Pro after perhaps an hour of inactivity, and it just 'pinwheels' and won't restart. HELP!!!!!!!!!

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Anyone with an idea how to help would be greatly appreciated. We have so much personal and business data on this machine!!!
Thanks!
Jim F.

Press and hold the power button for a few seconds until the power shuts off, then release, wait a few more seconds, and press it again briefly to restart.
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MacBook Pro (Mid/Late 2007 or newer)
MacBook Air (Late 2008 or newer)
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My MacBook Pro 13 inch makes a clicking noise from the hard drive and can not start up in safe mode and normal. I then ran disk utility in recovery mode and disk utility shows no problems with the hard drive. What is the problem?

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My macbook pro will only boot in safe mode

Hey,
I have a macbook pro 15-inch, Early 2011 running osx 10.9.4. I have a SSD hard drive that i installed myself a year ago and hasn't shown any defects. Its a 120 gb OCZ-AGILITY3.
My problem:
My macbook will only boot in safe mode nowadays. I have done a complete erasion of my hard drive and installed osx mavericks twice already. After the installation the computer will safely go to the desktop. But if i then do a reboot it won't get further than after the first apple logo, sometime the turning wheel will pop up, before turning off and trying again. i have tried resetting PRAM, I have tried resetting SMC, i have tried avoiding SMC (with big fan rate), but all with no success.
I have done a complete hardware test (the longer one) and it showed "no troubles found".
My guess is that the problem is with the battery. My computer won't run anymore without the adapter, when i pull the adapter out it either stays on for a while before just turning off. Without having it plugged in it won't start. Is it possible that during normal start up there is some kind of communication with the battery that can cause this?
I ran a diagnostic shown in this thread (Will only boot in safe mode) and included it in this post.
Hope someone can help me out.
Thanks,
Bram
Start time: 17:07:42 08/25/14
Model Identifier: MacBookPro8,2
System Version: OS X 10.9.4 (13E28)
Kernel Version: Darwin 13.3.0
Boot Mode: Safe
Time since boot: 10 minutes
Battery
Condition: Replace Now
Diagnostic reports
2014-08-25 UserEventAgent crash
Log
Aug 26 00:41:52 Previous Shutdown Cause: -128
Aug 25 16:23:38 smb1_treeconnect_internal: Malformed tree connect with a bad word count! wc= 2
Aug 25 16:24:05 process rpcsvchost[94] thread 917 caught burning CPU! It used more than 50% CPU (Actual recent usage: 99%) over 180 seconds. thread lifetime cpu usage 100.014147 seconds, (82.533432 user, 17.480715 system) ledger info: balance: 90006319931 credit: 100003230498 debit: 9996910567 limit: 90000000000 (50%) period: 180000000000 time since last refill (ns): 90079246240
Aug 25 16:25:50 smb1_treeconnect_internal: Malformed tree connect with a bad word count! wc= 2
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): replay_journal: from: 9340928 to: 9773056 (joffset 0x37a000)
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): examining extra transactions starting @ 9773056 / 0x952000
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): txn starting at 9773056 (9773056) @ index 80 bnum 2696544 (8192) with disk cksum != blhdr cksum (0x93b69228 0xc647562)
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: 0x662b0000 0x451b0000 0x2a0001ff 0x40000000 0xd7330300 0x46001d00 0x6c006f00 0x65006400
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): restarting journal replay (9340928 - 9773056)!
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): replay_journal: from: 9340928 to: 9773056 (joffset 0x37a000)
Aug 25 16:58:05 jnl: b(1, 3): journal replay done.
Aug 25 16:58:06 Previous Shutdown Cause: -128
Aug 25 16:59:26 smb1_treeconnect_internal: Malformed tree connect with a bad word count! wc= 2
Aug 25 16:59:59 smb1_treeconnect_internal: Malformed tree connect with a bad word count! wc= 2
Activity
CPU: user 17%, system 4%
CPU per process: WindowServer (UID 0) is using 30.5 %
launchd
/System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent.plist
- com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent
Contents of /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent.plist (XML document text)
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>Label</key>
<string>com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent</string>
<key>EnableTransactions</key>
<true/>
<key>LowPriorityIO</key>
<true/>
<key>LimitLoadToSessionType</key>
<string>Aqua</string>
<key>POSIXSpawnType</key>
<string>Background</string>
<key>LaunchEvents</key>
<dict>
<key>com.apple.distnoted.matching</key>
<dict>
<key>com.apple.airport.agent.prefschanged</key>
<dict>
<key>Name</key>
<string>com.apple.airport.agent</string>
</dict>
</dict>
<key>com.apple.bonjour.events</key>
...and 21 more line(s)
Spotlight: Indexing and searching disabled
Font issues: 11
Wi-Fi
link auth: wpa-psk
Restricted files: 1
Elapsed time (s): 278

Actually it sometimes gets a little further, the display will dim and the pointer will appear and then whoop it will turn off. if i do a verbose start up, it will finish all the steps, the white screen will appear and dim and then it will turn off.

If you have problems with Yahoo, start FF4 in safe mode and see if it works. If yes, you have a problem with one of your add-ons.

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Anything?

Macbook Pro won't boot into safe mode or via bootable USB key

Hi,
Am running OSX Lion latest version on my Macbook Pro 4,1 and can't get the thing to boot from any source. Always get's stuck at the grey screen with apple logo. Have tried all the following...
- Straight Boot (power on)
- Boot via Recovery HD (hold option on bootup then select)
- Boot via Safe Mode (Holding Shift on bootup)
- Boot via Safe Mode Verbose (Shift, Command, V)
- Boot via bootable Lion USB Key (Hold option, and choose the USB drive - not the same USB key works on my other macbook pro)
On every one (except verbose) it just get's stuck on the grey screen with spinning timer thingie.
I have done PVRAM reset, SMC reset and have reseated the RAM and all to no avail. I'm pretty sure the problem was caused by removing battery at wrong time (device not responding after sleep mode started and I plugged in power - should have been more patient!)
I have a Time Machine backup but it's a bit older than I thought and very much want to get my newer photos off it before rebuilding - not that Time Machine would work in current state anyway.
So what are my remaining options? Will I have to open it up and remove the HD as next step or is there anything else left to try? Can I remove the HD and connect it via a USB caddy to my existing Mac to recover info (hardrive spins and sounds ok to me)?
Any advice appreciated...

ds store wrote:
Yes, once the data is off you can use Disk Utility to Erase the entire drive (Lion + Recovery) with the Zero option (one selection below 7x) then use the Lion USB to install it fresh and stick it back into the machine.
Thanks for the info - I removed the HD and data is all ok on there so very happy about that. Before I wipe the data (all backed up now) I thought I would try booting the mac without any harddrive installed - using a OSX Lion bootable USB. However, still can't get past the grey apple screen and circle icon whirling away. I know the USB works ok, as tried it in my 2011 Macbook Pro and it boots absolutely fine.
I am happy to wipe the HD now and start again, but seeing as the DVD Drive is broken I'll probably need a USB drive boot to install OSX onto the wiped HD anyway. I'm a bit lost as to what to try now.

Macbook Pro 2009 has gray screen, safe mode won't work

I have a Macbook Pro 2009, with a new hard drive installed in August of 2013. I opened my computer a couple days ago to a gray screen with a prohibitory sign and a spinning gear that will not disappear. I have no backup and tried to backup my hard drive to an external drive in Recovery Mode, but I got an error message and the backup did not work: the image could not be created. So I decided to try Safe Mode, but the Macbook will not enter safe mode. Is there any way to get onto the computer just to backup a handful of files onto an external drive before I format my drive and start over? Am I doing something wrong by trying to enter safe mode? (I held down the Shift key after the chime and released it when the Apple logo and the gear appeared) Any help is appreciated. I've read all the topics in the forums I could find on this issue, but none of the directions seem to help. Thank you.

LisaLoParo,
no, you’re not doing anything wrong in trying to boot into Safe mode.
I can think of three possible alternatives to Safe mode to try:
If you have an external disk, you could boot from the grey Mac OS X Install DVD which came in the box with your MacBook Pro, and try copying files from your internal disk to the external disk;
If you have a bootable external disk, you could boot from it using Startup Manager, and try copying files from your internal disk to the external disk;
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My Macbook Pro is powering on in Safe Boot and will not accept the correct password

My Macbook Pro is only powering on in Safe Boot and will not accept the correct password. What do I do to get it out of Safe Mode?

MBP = Macbook Pro (My shorthand)
I think I now understand what you are describing. This is the Apple support article on a Safe Boot:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1564
Note this excerpt:
How are you starting your MBP. Do you see a progress bar on startup?
Ciao.

My MacBook pro will only load in safe mode with blue screen then freeze, but I can boot windows up fine and access all info on the mac side. Can anyone help?

Hi all,
My MacBook pro was running fine then it went very slow, I got the spinning world but it would not do anything. I tried to restart but it had frozen, so I turned off the computer by the power buttton. Now it won't boot up, it justmfreezes with a blue screen in safe mode. I have tried booting isank blue user mod and running /sbin/fsck -fy and a couple of other suggestions from various discussion boards but nothing works. I just tried booting up in windows and it works fine, with access to the mackintosh HD.
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Thanks in advance!

Sorry rubbish predictive text.i meant to say I tried booting in single user and running /sbin/fsck -fy

My MacBook Pro keeps starting up in safe mode and then just before halfway through it turns off

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