[mac4theblind] Weirdest thing I've ever seen! This! is bizarre!
- From: "Christopher-Mark Gilland" <cgilland1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <mac4theblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2012 02:58:36 -0400
OK, so, if this isn't totally bizarre, I don't know what is!
My best friend, who like me, is an Avid primary Mac user decided to install
Mountain Lion yesterday. So, he went to the app store with my help, and we
bought and downloaded ML with his Apple ID.
All went perfectly, from what we could see at first. I should add before we
go any further that he has identically the same model macbook that I have...
the mid 2010 stocked white 13 inch. This system is not a macbook pro.
Beware. It is just the standard mid 2010 white 13 inch.
Anyhow, he went through the install window, and the system restarted as
expected to finish the installation. We hear the startup chime, and think
all is well. We give it a few minutes, then hit command+F5. Sure enough,
Voiceover came up with the Fred voice talking perfectly. We were quite
satisfied so far. The progress indicator looked perfect, and was moving
along just fine. Once it reached 100%, the system restarted as expected. I
told him get ready, here comes ML! You're gonna love this. Huhho! Boy?
oh, boy? was I? wrong! I should a said: Get ready! Here comes disaster!
We hear the chime, and wait? and wait, and wait some more? and continue
waiting? and more waiting? and, oh, by the freaking way, did I by chance
mention, waited? LOL! So now, great as I am, not just at the mac, but in
general with trouble shooting technology, I'm going, well? sh**! Um?
Like, uh, hmm! what the! Heck? So here I am, trying to figure out, what in
the God blessid heck happened, as I swear! we didn't do anything! out of the
ordinary from anyone else. So, I had him shut down, and simply restart by
holding his power button down. I know, bad? move, but what else were we
gonna do!? He was hung! We kind a had no other choice of the matter. It
was either do that, or sit here and watch the perty apple whilst singing: I
haven't gotta clue, I don't know what to say, what the bird is wrong with
it, all the do dah day. LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL! So, it reboots, we hear the
chime, and again, we wait for all eternity. Nothing happens. Just that
stupid little apple on the grey background that shows it's loading. You
know, kind a the Darwin boot loader, I guess you'd call it, ish. No error
messages that I know a, just the blasted thing not booting. It's totally
weird, as it said! it installed correctly.
So, the next thing I had 'em do, was to go into the hidden recovery
partition by hitting command+R once he heard the startup chime. That worked
absolutely flawlessly. He did hit the ML, not the Lion, Recovery Partition
with no issue at all. So I'm going: Sh'sh'shewwwww! At least? that
worked! So, only cause I didn't feel like having him fetch an ethernet cord
from the back of his desktop windows machine out in the living room, which
would a waken his folks up, plus is way back in a cavinet which, yeah, good
luck trying to get that tower pulled out to get back there with all the
cords in the way... LOL! So, at my disgression, I had him go up to the
airport icon in the menu bar instead, and connect to his wifi network. That
worked again, perfectly. Once connected, I had him try to reinstall from
the recovery partition. That worked again perfectly. Then the system
restarted, but here's the weird thing. Then, it went again through this
stupid progression thing again. It's almost like it repeated the
installation. it didn't sho anything different it was doing. The extra
components it had to download did go through successfully, so it's not like
it got hung there. Trust me. We both watched the screen with Voiceover
very closely.
Once this all was done, the system restarted a second time. just as we
thought he would be good to go, we hear the chime, lots of hard disk
activity for about maybe 10 minutes, then no activity, and just regular fan
noise, nothing unusual sounding. It's not like his processor was over
heating, as there wasn't any fan noise out of the ordinary. I'd think the
EFI would a kicked in causing the fan to rev up to cool down had there been
an issue. OK, yeah, there is the possibility he has a bad EFI, but it's
real unlikely. Especially being what I'm gonna tell you all we did here in
just a second that proves that not to be the case.
So, you can imagine, by this point, I'm pulling my hair out trying to figure
out what the hel., parden the language, is going on!
Finally it dawned on me, maybe, just? maybe, it's the PRam having issues.
Again, it's really doubtful, I completely agree with you all, but at this
point, we really had nothing to lose. If you're wonderring, well D*** it,
Chris? why didn't you think to have him go to disk utility and run a
disk/permission verification and repair the disk/permissions, if needed.
The only reason I didn't have him yet do that, is because not even a week
ago literally! not even 7 days ago literally speaking, I myself had his
macbook literally in my hand, as he came down here for 3 weeks to visit with
me, and I ran a disk repair/permission repair at that point, as his finder
kept saying busy busy busy almost constantly, and so we thought maybe
something with the drive was screwed. Sure enough, it was, and I repaired,
and according to the log, it was fixed 100% of the way. So, I didn't really
think yet to have him try that, as why! He only just did it and fixed
things not even a week before. So, it just kind a seemed thus, pointless.
I did however finally have him do this, and nothing at all came back with
errors. The drive appears to be completely 100% fine.
Finally, in disk utility, I had him go to the macintosh HD volume, not? the
actual disk, but just? the partition/volume. Then on the erase tab, I had
him erase the disk entirely. I don't mean erase free space, I mean just the
full erase. Once done, I had him quite disk utility. Obviously, we were
doing this from the ML recovery partition.
I had him do it this way, and not literally set the partition scheme from
current back to 1 partition, as for one thing, I knew if we did that, it
wouldn't a worked, as files were in use from the hidden recovery partition,
which we were currently booted into, so even had! we done it, it wouldn't a
worked. Plus, hypothetically, had! it been technically possible, I knew it
would a been a real stupid move, as that! would a not only! wiped his
macintosh hd volume with the supposedly installed OS, it also would a licked
his hidden recovery partition clean, so, yeah, that was out of the question.
What my goal ultimately was, was to have 'em erase the macintosh hd, and
reformat it, just in case something really was going totally wackid. Once
he did this, I had him try, without first restarting to reinstall. At this
point, he did get the option to not only reinstall, but to install a new
copy, which we didn't see before. He clicked it, but then the install
button was dimmed. I had him reclick the new copy just in case we'd some
how toggled that option off. Still, no good.
I wondered if it had somehow again decided to be a thing, so I had him
restart. Worst? choice, I ever? could a haddem make! Once that happened,
we hear the chime, he holds command+R down, and no? dice! It didn't even
let 'em go into recovery any longer! I'm going, what the blue flying
blankity blank! I didn't even touch! his hidden partition! I couldn't!
it's so hidden, even had I wanted to! I couldn't. I didn't have him wipe
the partition scheme, and again, even had I, it wouldn't a worked since
that partition was mounted, as was in use running the recovery, to start
with.
So, I had him plug his external Seagate go flex USB 500gb drive in which has
a Super Dooper backup on it of his Lion install which was quite recent. I
had him boot, while holding down the option key, to see if we could boot to
it. No good.
Finally, right as he said he was going to take the b***ard into the Apple
Store in his area, I told him to try in despiration one? last thing. I had
him leave the drive plugged in, and reboot, this time, without! holding down
the option key. Guess what folks!? Boom! Drive wirreled up, we waited
about a minute or two, and boom! Voiceover came right the heck up talking
with his Lion bootted Super Doop drive from the Go Flex drive. I had him
doop it back over to the macintosh hd.
That too, worked perfectly. I had him then shut down, then remove, only!
then, the go flex drive from the USB port, then restart.
Guess what? Again: Boom! it booted like gold! Flawlessly!
So, what in the cotton blessed heavens gives here! I am beside myself!
This is totally! killing me! I hardly ever stump at this kind a thing, but
I'm totally cluelessly baffled! When we called Apple today, he spoke to a
senior advisor, who was pretty well just, if not more, as stumped as I am!
He set up a mac genious appointment at 10 tomorrow Arizona time to have them
look at the thing and try to install it themselves, but I'd still! love to
know if you all know what in the heck! caused this!
This is totally perplexing the heck outta me!
Chris.
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