No entry sign at boot, no ideas left

[Floradora]

Hello,

I was using chrome on my MacBook when it suddenly crashed and rebooted to a no entry sign.

I've since tried to restart in safe and recovery mode, but I get the same again.

I've searched the forums, and can't figure out how I could find out more.

Do you have any ideas I could try? I'm really hoping it's a software issue and not the hard drive.

Flora

 

[DeltaMac]

Do you get the same "prohibited" sign when booting to recovery mode (Command-R)?

Try booting to Internet Recovery (Option-Command-R). You will see a spinning globe instead of the familiar Apple icon.
You should then get a menu page (which might take a couple of minutes to see, be patient), with Reinstall OS X, and some other choices. Choose Disk Utility. You should be able to choose your hard drive, then click First Aid, which will run a short scan and repair of the disk directory.
If you DON'T see your hard drive in Disk Utility (the partition with the name of your drive), then that's likely a sign that your hard drive has failed. However, the fact that you can't boot into the Recovery system is another sign of that, too.
Hope you can come back with some good news when you try the Internet Recovery.

BTW, if you can repair the hard drive in Internet Recovery, you COULD try a reinstall of OS X, but ONLY if the system offered is the same as what you should have installed already. Internet Recovery will offer to install only the original OS X system that your MacBook shipped with, new out of the box.

 

[Floradora]

Do you get the same "prohibited" sign when booting to recovery mode (Command-R)?

Try booting to Internet Recovery (Option-Command-R). You will see a spinning globe instead of the familiar Apple icon.
You should then get a menu page (which might take a couple of minutes to see, be patient), with Reinstall OS X, and some other choices. Choose Disk Utility. You should be able to choose your hard drive, then click First Aid, which will run a short scan and repair of the disk directory.
If you DON'T see your hard drive in Disk Utility (the partition with the name of your drive), then that's likely a sign that your hard drive has failed. However, the fact that you can't boot into the Recovery system is another sign of that, too.
Hope you can come back with some good news when you try the Internet Recovery.

BTW, if you can repair the hard drive in Internet Recovery, you COULD try a reinstall of OS X, but ONLY if the system offered is the same as what you should have installed already. Internet Recovery will offer to install only the original OS X system that your MacBook shipped with, new out of the box.

Ah thank you for your help, but I've just tried Internet Recovery mode and no luck there either!

I just get the apple logo again, and a bar underneath it whilst it loads... then back to the prohibited sign, damn.

Perhaps another sign of hard drive death?

 

[DeltaMac]

Which MacBook do you have? If older than 2010, then Internet Recovery won't work.

Do a PRAM reset:
Hold Option-Command-P-R as you restart. You should get a boot chime. Keep holding the same 4 keys until you hear the boot chime 2 more times. Release while the chime is sounding, and immediately press and hold Option-Command-R.
If you get the Apple icon instead of a world icon, then something else is wrong, or your MacBook is too old for that to work.
(Common mistake - Don't swap Control for Option. The Control key won't do anything here.)

 

[Floradora]

Hello,

Ah thanks for your help... but having tried all these things I eventually gave up and took it to the Mac shop near me.
Turns out that it was the hard-drive cable failure - so they put in a new cable for me. Just incase anyone has the same problem!