MacBook Pro . . . Tragedy

[tpenfield]

My MacBook laptop of 6 years decided to go into a reboot loop all of a sudden today. I tried a bunch of things, but the situation only got worse.

I first was able to boot into safe mode and it would stay running for about a minute then crash . . . blank (black) screen no error message . . . basically shut itself off.

I tried to boot it in recovery mode . . . similar results . . . after about 1 minute it goes blank. Not sure what other boot options there are?

Now it gets into the power up screen for about 10 seconds and then just dies.

Plenty of battery . . . seems like a software or hardware issue . . . just not sure which.

The nearest Genius Bar is about 1 hour away. Not sure if it is worth getting a 6 year old laptop fixed, but sure would like to get a fresh back-up of my data. My last 'time machine' back-up was about 2 weeks ago.

Any Mac gurus out there . . . I'm open to ideas.

 

[Scott Danforth]

.45 round thru it?

 

[tpenfield]

.45 round thru it?

I should . . .

Well . . . all by itself it restarted and seemed to be stable enough to run. It appears that the 'CleanMyMacX' software, which is supposed to make it run better, caused the thing to crash.

I will see if it keeps running, and try to get a back-up of the data. I think I got to apply some updates just to be sure.

 

[tpenfield]

Well, my joy was short-lived . . . the MacBook ran all night, but this morning it went blank and cannot reboot. It gets a few seconds into the start up and then dies.

Running on a spare right now.

 

[matt167]

Could be a memory issue. Not sure if it’s soldered on a Mac. But that generation should be Intel based

 

[alex666nder]

Your MacBook might be having a hardware problem, possibly involving the logic board, graphics card, or power supply, based on the issues that you said. Given the laptop's age, it may not be cost-effective to repair it. Still, reach out at the genius bar and find how much its goin to cost, just to be sure.

 

[flashback]

Don't know nothing about it but now I know what a genius bar is.
Learn something every day..

 

[tpenfield]

I ran some disc repair ops and there are some errors. (SSD)

Probably not worth putting $$$ into a 6 year old laptop. I’m going to order a new one. About $2K configured with extra RAM and SSD space.

 

[tpenfield]

I ordered a new MacBook Pro . . . M2 processor, 13", 16 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD.

Probably will take a couple of weeks to arrive.

 

[southkogs]

Might be a little late to the party, but if you've got another Mac at hand you can create a USB Installer. Might be able to just wipe it completely and re-boot with that.

Sounds more like a hardware issue, but sometimes it works out the other way.

But ... the M2 is a nice chip

 

[tpenfield]

Might be a little late to the party, but if you've got another Mac at hand you can create a USB Installer. Might be able to just wipe it completely and re-boot with that.

Sounds more like a hardware issue, but sometimes it works out the other way.

But ... the M2 is a nice chip

Yes, getting some disc errors when I run the disc repair . . . Could be hardware related (SSD maybe or RAM). I have a 2 week old time machine back-up, so, I'll be initializing the new laptop from that (hopefully).

I have 3 laptops with me ( 1 Mac, 2 Win), and only 1 is currently working. 2 more back at home (Mac & Win) . . . I was hoping to get something as a dedicated laptop for my Diacom software, but the technology Gods have other ideas.

 

[tpenfield]

This morning, I was able to get into the recovery console and run a re-install of Big Sur . . . We shall see how that goes.

I'd like to get a more recent back-up of the data before I go over to the new MacBook (should arrive next week).

I also noted the the disc structure looks different than from my previous running of the disc utility a few years ago.
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.

.

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It seems like I have a system snapshot . . . assuming it is from all my previous efforts of trying to fix the computer, but not sure.

I ran the Disc First-Aid on all of the partitions and they were clean. Also gained about 20 GB of free space in the process.

Eyes and ears wide open for any Mac guru's commentary, insight, advice.

 

[briangcc]

Beyond the HD being suspect, might look at the cooling on the mac. I know the Dell's I service after shorter periods of times have clogged cooling fins/fans which can cause the same symptoms. Might be something to look at on the mac - might be an overheat type of situation too.

 

[tpenfield]

Thx. I have not been able to open the MacBook up, because there seems to be a non-standard size of torx screws hold the base plate, or at least none of the small/tiny size tools that I have.

 

[tpenfield]

Also a screen shot of the OS & Hardware specifics . . .
.

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I think that is the latest Big Sur version. There is an update queued up, but it is the new(est) OS (Ventura ?). . . not sure I want to do that.

 

[southkogs]

^^^ I would stay back a version for the time being. Ventura is the new one, and it's pretty good and stable ... but Big Sur was solid.

 

[tpenfield]

^^^ I would stay back a version for the time being. Ventura is the new one, and it's pretty good and stable ... but Big Sur was solid.

Yes, I assume that the new laptop will come with the latest. (Ventura ?)

My experience in upgrading the OS on older laptops is that you run into performance problems. So, I think this laptop (2017 MB Pro i7, 16 GB) is at its limits.

 

[southkogs]

Depends. I feel like after Catalina they started streamlining the OS a bit. But I like starting with an older OS on a reinstall and working my way up.

 

[Bob_VT]

Thx. I have not been able to open the MacBook up, because there seems to be a non-standard size of torx screws hold the base plate, or at least none of the small/tiny size tools that I have.

Walmart/Amazon/Haror Freight all carry multi bit tiny screwdriver set and good to have around They work fine since there are no torque specs all screws just need to be tight.

 

[tpenfield]

Yes, I figured that I just did not have the right size.

My new M2 MacBook Pro arrives tomorrow, and since I ordered a new one, old one is working fine after the recovery installation of the OS. (it figures )