Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Bricked MacPro (2008) after failed Windows 7 installation.

G

G4DP

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Mar 28, 2007
1,451
3
Need some serious help please guys. My Mac Pro has bricked itself after a failed Windows 10 installation through BootCamp.

Went through all of the correct steps within BootCamp. Process appeared to be going well until the very last moment when a pop up box appeared stating that the installation had failed due to Error XXXXXXXXXXXXX.

Both internal drives have been f'd. There is no sign of OSX on either of them. Cannnot boot from DVD or USB. Time machine back ups are not GUID based so no recovery partition to work from on them.

I have tried all the possible keyboard short cuts, Cmd C, Cmd X, Cmd Alt R, Cmd R etc. Nohing is working. Cannot see the startup manager either.

It appears that all evidence of Mac OS X has been erased from the computer.

After spending all night trying various methods I have managed to get XP installed on one of the drives. Have installed all of the boot camp drivers etc required for that to work. Sadly, BootCamp 3 cannot boot to external copies of Mac OSX.

Cannot force BootCamp to start into Mac OS as it cannot detect and Boot drive to go from.

All I get is a white screen. or grey screen with flashing white cursor. Depending on which key combination is pressed.

Going to an Apple Store in the morning see if they can dump Mavericks or Yosemite onto a hard drive for me.

Would appreciate any advice before hand though.
 
Apple is also late to actually support a new Windows OS.

Anytime I install Wndows I do so with only one drive present to avoid GPT error and 'cause it is safer.

Then even with that, clone your drives.

If your system won't boot when you return and plug a system drive that you have "on the shelf" and after resetting SMC and NVRAM then look further.

Windows 10 can install in UEFI mode or legacy.

Windows would not install on any drive if it sees that the system uses EFI and sees drives using GPT.

Slap a blank drive inside.

And the drives you had, use something like WD Lifeguard for Windows to remove all partitioning so that they can have a fresh format.
 
I hope you didnt format the wrong drive by mistake when you installed windows.

When I loaded windows 8.1 in efi mode on my mac pro, I unplugged all the other drives first. I also dont boot windows off the same hard disk as yosemite.
 
Surrat said:
I hope you didnt format the wrong drive by mistake when you installed windows.

When I loaded windows 8.1 in efi mode on my mac pro, I unplugged all the other drives first. I also dont boot windows off the same hard disk as yosemite.
Click to expand...

Didn't do anything by mistake. BootCamp had a hissy fit and farked the whole system.

Luckily found a helpful Genius at the Apple Store in Plymouth. Understood the issue as others have been in as with it. They reformatted the drive and installed 10.9.5 on it for me and am slowly rebuilding.

Having had to be in an Apple Store for an actual issue, I now understand why they appear over staffed. 90% of Apple customers are thick as poo and as lazy as screw. Everyone who came up to the Genius bar had an iPhone or iPad, asking how to do the most basic of thinks, like sending iMessages to other iDevices.

Everything that can be easily found out with a quick look at Apple's own website. Poor buggers working in those Stores.
 
The partition ID numbers got changed. BCA doesn't (get) know about the TP 10 and it is barely even ready beyond testing stage. I never trust BCA. Even a new version of OS X can mess with partition numbers.

A VM is more suitable for pre-release, or another computer, definitely it's own bed or SSD

In any case nothing here was bricked and a little terminal tricks or reformatting and a clone to fix. Always essential along with a copy of and flash drive for clean install that is bootable.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back