Resolved HELP - I seem to have bricked my 1,1 Mac Pro!

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

Hey everyone,

One problem after another...

This time, I tried putting Windows 7 on my 1,1 Mac Pro to test out my new GTX 660's strength in games. Whelp, the installation failed - it just gave me some error before long, and had to cancel it.

Upon restarting to boot back into my main partition (El Capitan), I noticed that a white cursor was flashing on my secondary screen, which means Windows. I took out the Windows 7 installation disc and tried again, but it still doesn't want to boot.

Now, I either get black screens with no response or white text saying that there is no boot disk present and that I should insert a bootable device and press any key. IDK, but my Mac seems as though it still has Windows on its breath.

So, I went on another Mac and mounted the Mac Pro's HDD onto that Mac through Target Disk Mode. I went and erased the Bootcamp partition in full, leaving just my Mac one. I even ran First Aid on the partition to make sure any possible errors could get fixed. Sadly, none of this has worked. My Mac is STILL bricked. It just won't boot! All my data is on the HDD, but it just doesn't want to boot off of it. As an extra safety measure, I even replaced the boot.efi files again (since these 1,1/2,1 Macs need that workaround in order to boot anything later than Lion), but that didn't help.

So, I'll--later--stick in my compatible 8800GT and see what the Apple boot screen looks like (as my current card doesn't support boot screens). Currently, though, I have no idea what to do. I have to be using this machine!

Any ideas? Much appreciated.

-MDD

P.S. Yes--I did a PRAM reset and pressed that little reset button by the fourth HDD bay. That didn't help.

 

[VAGDesign]

Just an idea. Remove all disks, put stock GPU inside, pull the plug for an hour or more, go for a walk, return, put plug back, insert a bootable DVD or known working HDD that boots to any OS and try again.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

Just an idea. Remove all disks, put stock GPU inside, pull the plug for an hour or more, go for a walk, return, put plug back, insert a bootable DVD or known working HDD that boots to any OS and try again.

I'll see if that works. However, I'm sure that Winblows somehow ruined my Mac partition (it has happened to someone I know before), so I may have to re-install Mac OSX onto it.

 

[VAGDesign]

If you have a spare drive, put it inside and install Lion or Mavericks and keep it somewhere safe for this kind of cases.
I have 4 different installations of OS X and Windows on my Mac Pro and are all available at will (during boot if I want I login to any of those you see on my sig).

There are 4 HDD slots + 2 SATA ports available on the DVD enclosure space. It's a shame to be unused for recovery purposes or even for nostalgia for the previous OS X versions

Good luck!

 

[MacVidCards]

If you have a spare drive, put it inside and install Lion or Mavericks and keep it somewhere safe for this kind of cases.
I have 4 different installations of OS X and Windows on my Mac Pro and are all available at will (during boot if I want I login to any of those you see on my sig).

There are 4 HDD slots + 2 SATA ports available on the DVD enclosure space. It's a shame to be unused for recovery purposes or even for nostalgia for the previous OS X versions

Good luck!

I second this. I have dozens of OSX installs on various HDs laying around. I think people forget that they can have as many as they like.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

I second this. I have dozens of OSX installs on various HDs laying around. I think people forget that they can have as many as they like.

This isn't the issue here... I am literally NOT able to boot into anything. I re-installed Mac OSX on my drive, yet I still get a panic at boot-up. It just doesn't want to boot my main partition. My machine is bricked or something.

 

[Sublime]

Zap PRAM?

 

[Rodan52]

If you "have to be using this machine" where is your bootable backup? Anyway the above suggestions are good ones, boot from an external HD. I would be preferable to have a bootable installer for your OS. So if you saved your El Capitan installer onto a thumb drive before installation that would be perfect, if not perhaps you have a friend who did. Otherwise an installer for Mavericks will do. You can use this to get up and running and hopefully gain access to the files on your old Mac HD. You will need to save these files.
Then you will need to erase, reformat, repartition and remap the drive using Disk Utility. You can then Clean Install El Capitan (or Mavericks or Yosemite) and restore your old files. Of course you will then need to download the El Capitan installer again if you did not have the installer for this. One word of warning don't attempt to restore your old files as part of the new installation. That has caused me numerous problems in the past. After install is complete you can just copy them back.
PS if you want to run Windows games just get a second hand Alienware PC that's what I did.
No matter what they say about Boot Camp and Parallels Macs are Macs not PC's.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

I happened to have my user, from when it was still Mtn. Lion, on some other HDD, and I was able to boot up FINE off that. So, I guess these Windows/Bootcamp troubles killed my main drive for some reason. I just wiped it and migrated my stuff over from my Time Machine Backups (BTW, guys, I DO have back ups. I was not worried about that, as I wasn't--at the beginning--going to wipe the drive.); now I'm replacing the boot.efis and will see how it goes.

 

[Macsonic]

I happened to have my user, from when it was still Mtn. Lion, on some other HDD, and I was able to boot up FINE off that. So, I guess these Windows/Bootcamp troubles killed my main drive for some reason. I just wiped it and migrated my stuff over from my Time Machine Backups (BTW, guys, I DO have back ups. I was not worried about that, as I wasn't--at the beginning--going to wipe the drive.); now I'm replacing the boot.efis and will see how it goes.

Hope your cMac Pro will be alive and kicking soon. There was a time I was installing Windows XP on my other 2009 Mac Pro. The installation had a problem midway and I had to restart. Upon restart, I kept on having a black screen with the message something like bootable disk could not be found. Since I have a clone backup of my main boot drive, I just replicated the clone backup to the problematic HD.

You may also try booting from the supported OSX like Lion or Snow Leopard temporarily for troubleshooting purposes than later upgrade to a newer OSX. As a side note, I have no plans yet of going to El Capitan though I know it is working fine for other users. The disk utility functions has been changed in El Capitan and other bugs reported. Though the bugs are not affecting your workflow should be okay for you to use El Capitan.

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...ont-show-up-in-el-capitan-unresolved.1891746/
http://macperformanceguide.com/blog/2015/20151009_1348-OSX_ElCapitan-bugs.html
http://www.zdnet.com/article/os-x-10-11-el-capitan-bugs-bugs-and-more-bugs/

 

[ActionableMango]

I'll see if that works. However, I'm sure that Winblows somehow ruined my Mac partition (it has happened to someone I know before), so I may have to re-install Mac OSX onto it.

First time I installed Windows 7, it hosed OS X on a completely separate drive. Now whenever I install Windows, I always pull all of the other drives out first.

Apparently it is unreasonable to expect the Windows installer to only modify the drive you specify.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

Hope your cMac Pro will be alive and kicking soon. There was a time I was installing Windows XP on my other 2009 Mac Pro. The installation had a problem midway and I had to restart. Upon restart, I kept on having a black screen with the message something like bootable disk could not be found. Since I have a clone backup of my main boot drive, I just replicated the clone backup to the problematic HD.

You may also try booting from the supported OSX like Lion or Snow Leopard temporarily for troubleshooting purposes than later upgrade to a newer OSX. As a side note, I have no plans yet of going to El Capitan though I know it is working fine for other users. The disk utility functions has been changed in El Capitan and other bugs reported. Though the bugs are not affecting your workflow should be okay for you to use El Capitan.

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...ont-show-up-in-el-capitan-unresolved.1891746/
http://macperformanceguide.com/blog/2015/20151009_1348-OSX_ElCapitan-bugs.html
http://www.zdnet.com/article/os-x-10-11-el-capitan-bugs-bugs-and-more-bugs/

Thanks for your well-wishes! It's now all back on track. I'm gonna try Winblows again on a SEPARATE disk this time.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

First time I installed Windows 7, it hosed OS X on a completely separate drive. Now whenever I install Windows, I always pull all of the other drives out first.

Apparently it is unreasonable to expect the Windows installer to only modify the drive you specify.

That's a good plan. I'm gonna go ahead and just get a separate drive to use and pull out all my other drives. In fact, you sort of HAVE to do that when installing Windows, or else you get an error. It hates when other drivers (besides the one on which it is being installed) are present.

BTW, I had to wipe my HDD completely and restore from my Time Machine backups (thank God and Apple for them). I'm now back on track!

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

If you have a spare drive, put it inside and install Lion or Mavericks and keep it somewhere safe for this kind of cases.
I have 4 different installations of OS X and Windows on my Mac Pro and are all available at will (during boot if I want I login to any of those you see on my sig).

There are 4 HDD slots + 2 SATA ports available on the DVD enclosure space. It's a shame to be unused for recovery purposes or even for nostalgia for the previous OS X versions

Good luck!

Al

If you have a spare drive, put it inside and install Lion or Mavericks and keep it somewhere safe for this kind of cases.
I have 4 different installations of OS X and Windows on my Mac Pro and are all available at will (during boot if I want I login to any of those you see on my sig).

There are 4 HDD slots + 2 SATA ports available on the DVD enclosure space. It's a shame to be unused for recovery purposes or even for nostalgia for the previous OS X versions

Good luck!

Turns out that Windows just screwed my Mac partition up upon giving its error during installation. (I should try a flash drive instead of a disc...) An archive install didn't even work - I had to completely WIPE my Mac OSX partition (for which I thankfully had backups from the day before) and re-intsall cleanly before transferring my info back. What a scary nightmare!



I will try it again... but, this time, it will be on a separate HDD altogether. I don't want the sick patient (Windoze) near my Mac OSX ever again!



Thanks for your kind efforts, as well as others'.

 

[Demigod Mac]

Thanks for your well-wishes! It's now all back on track. I'm gonna try Winblows again on a SEPARATE disk this time.

This. In fact, yank all Mac drives from the machine before installing Windows, put them back in after it's safely installed.

 

[G4DPII]

Always good to keep an external DVD drive to hand? I learned this the hard way, doing the same as OP. Being able to boot from an installation disk of Mac OS saves a lot of headaches and undue worry.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

This. In fact, yank all Mac drives from the machine before installing Windows, put them back in after it's safely installed.

Yeah, will-do. And, anyway, the Windows installation won't even work unless all of the other drives are out; it normally gives you an error before any installation has begun. I did just that, but my mistake was partitioning my main HDD and using that.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

Always good to keep an external DVD drive to hand? I learned this the hard way, doing the same as OP. Being able to boot from an installation disk of Mac OS saves a lot of headaches and undue worry.

I was able to just put in another drive that happened to have my old Mtn. Lion user on it. All that did, though, was tell me that it was simply my main HDD that was messed up. I had to wipe my main user completely, reformat the SSD, and put migrate my backups onto it. It was a bit annoying.

 

[Demigod Mac]

Get Carbon Copy Cloner and a sufficiently large USB flash drive. Make a clone of your boot drive on it before installing an update or performing some risky maneuver, so you can restore it if something goes wrong.

Also get an 8GB USB flash drive and make an OS X install/repair drive out of it using Diskmaker X.

 

[PowerMac G4 MDD]

Get Carbon Copy Cloner and a sufficiently large USB flash drive. Make a clone of your boot drive on it before installing an update or performing some risky maneuver, so you can restore it if something goes wrong.

Also get an 8GB USB flash drive and make an OS X install/repair drive out of it using Diskmaker X.

I have backups of my drive already, but I may consider doing something similar. Really, it was all Windows' fault that this happened. I didn't update anything; I was trying to install Winblows and it screwed up my entire disk.