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Blue Screen – tried everything – need help please!


Shane Womer
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I cannot startup my computer. It gets stuck on a blue screen with a movable mouse pointer. It will startup successfully in safe mode by holding down shift at startup.

 

I haven’t downloading anything recent that I can think of, or made any recent updates that would have caused this. It just seemed to happen out of nowhere. My Mac has been down for 5 days now trying to fix this. I have spent hours searching the forums. This is my first post for help.

 

Computer details:

Mac Pro

2 x 3 GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon

8GB Ram

Leopard

 

So far, here’s what I’ve done:

 

I reset the PRAM by holding down Command-Option-P-R at startup. It did the double boot thing.

 

I tried holding down Command-Option-O-F at starup to reset the firmware, but it would never boot the Mac into Open Firmware.

 

I have 2 x 2GB Ram, plus 4 x 1GB Ram, and I’ve tried switching them around, only using some of them, etc… it’s not the Ram that’s causing the problem.

 

I unplugged all external devices and hard drives.

 

I took the panel off the Mac Pro and pulled out all my drive bay slots, leaving only my main drive with the OS in.

 

I created a second login, and disabled automatic login, but it never gets to the screen to let me choose, unless I startup in safe mode.

 

I did a clean install with my OS X disk on my main drive, erasing and installing fresh and new. Still sticks at the blue screen.

 

I did a fresh erase and install using my OS X disk on an external drive connected via firewire and booted from it, still sticks on blue screen.

 

I can safe boot into both, either my external, or internal drive, each with a fresh install of OS X.

 

I downloaded Combo/Software Updates, even updated to the new 10.5.7 combo. Still sticks at blue screen.

 

I pulled up Disk Utility in safe mode and repaired disk permissions, still sticks at blue screen.

 

Here is what the Console is showing happening during startup. There are a bunch of errors at the end, I don’t know what they mean, or how to fix them. I tried Google searching it with no luck:

 

4:39:54 PM com.apple.launchctl.System[2] launchctl: Please convert the following to launchd: /etc/mach_init.d/dashboardadvisoryd.plist

4:39:54 PM com.apple.launchd[1] (org.cups.cupsd) Unknown key: SHAuthorizationRight

4:39:54 PM com.apple.launchd[1] (org.ntp.ntpd) Unknown key: SHAuthorizationRight

4:39:54 PM com.apple.launchd[1] (org.x.privileged_startx) Unknown key for boolean: EnableTransactions

4:40:03 PM org.ntp.ntpd[18] Error : nodename nor servname provided, or not known

4:40:14 PM com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.UserEventAgent-LoginWindow[99]) Exited: Terminated

4:40:14 PM com.apple.launchd[89] (com.apple.AirPortBaseStationAgent) Unknown key for boolean: EnableTransactions

4:40:14 PM com.apple.launchd[89] (org.x.startx) Unknown key for boolean: EnableTransactions

4:40:15 PM com.apple.ATSServer[116] FODBCheck: New annex file created

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: Failed to create window context device

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: CGWindowContextCreate: failed to create context delegate.

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: Failed to create window context device

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: CGWindowContextCreate: failed to create context delegate.

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: Failed to create window context device

4:40:22 PM [0x0-0xb00b].com.apple.finder[121] Thu May 14 16:40:22 shane-womers-mac-pro.local Finder[121] <Error>: CGWindowContextCreate: failed to create context delegate.

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I think I figured it out.

 

I started up in safe mode, then set my iChat to automatic login.

 

I shutdown, removed the video card, and started up the computer. I waited a few minutes.

 

Then, on another Mac connected to the same network here in the house, I logged into my iChat and sent myself a message to the broken computer.

 

With no screen to see what I was doing on my broken computer, I hoped for the best and pushed the iChat hot keys to bring it to the front, typed a reply, and hit enter.

 

Whhallllaaaa! My reply showed up on my other Mac! I can type back and forth to myself, so now I know it logged in without freezing up, without the video card in.

 

Does that mean for sure that my video card is the problem? Is it possible the video card slot on my motherboard is bad? Is there anymore testing I should do before buying another video card?

 

The one I have been using now, that seems to have gone bad, is a NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT.

 

Thanks, Shane

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  • 2 weeks later...

It was the video card. I received my order in the mail today, and my computer is up and flying again!

 

I ended up going with two Nvidia 8800 cards, to prepare for Snow Leopard with OpenCL implementation, which should take advantage of all CPU and GPU resources, for hopefully, some serious ProApps performance.

 

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/12...op_of_cuda.html

 

Shane

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  • 1 year later...
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