A real nut cracker... Mac Pro won't boot after all options.

[midgetsoccerbuddy]

My MacPro, 2011 I believe, not a macbook pro, if I could get on, I would tell you all the specifics, memory, etc.. but since all I get is the white screen of death I thought I would ask for any ideas for help. The main issue no matter what method I've tried is I see the boot screen with the apple and then when the loading bar is about half way thru, the screen just goes to the white screen and does nothing for an hour + at which point I force shut down. Below is what I have tried and the results.

I've unplugged and re-plugged the Mac Pro (power cycle), checked all the cables and connections, monitor
I had a 1.5 TB hard drive with OS X El Capitan installed... have been using it for a quite a while.. didn't do any recent updates that would have made it go to the white screen upon a reboot.

I tried booting in safe mode and in Verbose mode, I see the boot screen with the apple and then when the loading bar is about half way thru, the screen just goes white.

I've tried the Command + R for Recovery Mode and it just goes into the white screen.. while I'm still holding down Cmd+R. So I don't even get the option to run disk utility, reinstall Mac OS, time machine,etc.. I've tried resetting the PRAM/NVRAM, same results, loads half way on the apple screen and then switches to the white screen. I've tried to check the file system by holding down Cmd+S

I've installed Mac OS Sierra clean copy on an external drive, tested the booting process from my other mac and it had no issues so I put attached it to the Mac Pro and held down the option key during start up.. I CAN SEE the drives and I select the external drive, and it goes through the same process... loads half way on the apple screen and then half way thru it goes to white screen. So I feel like it can't be the hard drives?

I've removed the original drive and connected it to another mac, did first aid, no issues...It did ask me to initialize the drive so I opted not to, just ran the first aid. I've installed a fresh copy of el capitan on another new 3.5 hard disk and inserted that to the Mac Pro so it would boot from there and it just pulls up the file folder with the "?"...

The only thing I seem to be able to get to is selecting the drive I want it to boot from but no matter what it goes to a white screen. I've been at this for almost a week now off and on and am out of options... this is my main workhorse so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Any other methods I am missing to figure out why my Mac Pro won't boot? Has anyone else had similar problems.. Most people that I've seen can at least get to recovery mode... I can't afford to pay $300 for an apple genius appt. so just looking for any help...

Thanks for your ideas in Advance...

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello and welcome.

Sounds like you did some pretty exhaustive troubleshooting there. Nicely done.

Since it happens with the internal hard drive, and an external, it is sounding more like a hardware issue with the video card, since OS X loads the video drives at about the point that your progress bar gets to.

Why would you have to pay an Apple Store for a Genius Bar appointment - they are free?

Do you know which video card is in your Mac Pro? Or, can you check the serial number/description, which should be on a gray sticker with white writing on the ledge just below the connections and above the fan on the back.

C

 

[midgetsoccerbuddy]

from what I had read online(not a direct apple source), unless you are under apple care warranty it was a $99 Genius Bar charge... well that would be helpful then if they are free.. thanks for the info.

As far the little gray sticker, Serial No: G87110RYUPZ, that helped me look up the model no, year, etc..2008 not 2011 as I had thought. Mac Pro Specs here but It says it was suppose to come with the NVIDIA GeForce 7300GT, but I had upgraded to a ATI Radeon HD 5870, Mfr P/N: MC743ZM/A MacSales.com SKU: APLMC743ZMA 1GB of GDDR5 memory, PCI Express 2.0, two Mini DisplayPort outputs, and one dual-link DVI port. Up to 2560 x 1600 resolution. I also upgraded the ram years ago to about 12GB if I remember right...

Could this be the issue, and if I do have to replace it, what would be a good one to replace it with?

Thank you very much for your help Cory.

 

[midgetsoccerbuddy]

Just an update... I was able to get another working ATI Radeon HD 5870 card and swapped them out and seemed to have the same issues, half way through the boot it went to the white screen, so I've been able to rule out the graphics card....unless it's maybe the slot it's plugged into, not sure if that would make any difference?

any other ideas?

 

[Cory Cooper]

Thanks for the follow-up.

Yeah, the Genius Bar appointments at all actual Apple Stores are free. Third-party vendors may charge though.

Glad you found the model/specs. Great you found another video card to test with. It could be the slot and/or the logic board itself. The "bottom" slot where the ATI card is installed is a double-wide PCI Express graphics slot. The video card won't fit/work in the other three slots above.

Just curious - do the date & time stay correct if you power off the Mac Pro and unplug it for a few minutes, then start it back up?

C

 

[midgetsoccerbuddy]

I am not sure as I don't see the date and time when I power it on.