I'm new to my old MAC mini device. When I power on the box, the apple icon shows with a white line across the screen and it continues slowly, till almost to the right hand side end of the line - but then the screen goes black and nothing will make it finish. Nothing else will wake up the screen - nothing happens, Have tried some internet suggestions like reboot to safe and other multiple keys strokes. Cannot get to safe boot. Nothing seems to work. Is there a solution I should try.
SOLVED My MAC Mini does not get through a reboot - screen goes black and never comes back
- Thread starter debfortin
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We need some more details regarding the mini. The 2018 model introduced the T2 chip, which was a big change compared to all the previous models. And of course, the introduction of Silicon brought about even more changes into running and troubleshooting. Please try and find out more about it, starting with the model year. And the kind of monitor attached to it can make a difference as well.
Some basic resets you can try are:
SMC - simply unplug the mini and wait about half a minute before plugging it back in.
Parameter Ram - reboot and immediately hold down ⌘-⌥-P-R and keep holding down until the startup chime sounds twice.
Safe Boot - reboot and immediately hold down the Shift key until it brings you to the login screen.
If you are able to bring up the system in Safe Boot, restart and see if you get a normal startup. If there are still problems, it would be time to go to the next level—Recovery/macOS reinstallation. Let me know. Good luck.
Thanks for the info.
the device is a MAC MINI - and I think it is a 2014 device (I don't have any paperwork to confirm the year of purchase, only my memories)
it is supposed to be running OS 10.13
monitor = SAMSUNG S24C300HL
keyboard = Logitech K400R
I did try the variety of basic resets - with no luck
directly after the power button is pushed ON, the chime sound is heard and the screen with the apple icon shows with a white line across the screen and it continues slowly, till almost the end of the line - and it never finishes or moves on to the next screen
the device is a MAC MINI - and I think it is a 2014 device (I don't have any paperwork to confirm the year of purchase, only my memories)
it is supposed to be running OS 10.13
monitor = SAMSUNG S24C300HL
keyboard = Logitech K400R
I did try the variety of basic resets - with no luck
directly after the power button is pushed ON, the chime sound is heard and the screen with the apple icon shows with a white line across the screen and it continues slowly, till almost the end of the line - and it never finishes or moves on to the next screen
I did try that startup recovery, but only the the apple icon shows with a white line across the screen and it continues slowly, till almost to the right hand side end of the line - but then the screen goes black and nothing will make it finish. No selection of reinstalling the OS appears at all.
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By the looks of it, there is something wrong either with the system software on your drive, or with the drive itself. Are you able to create or borrow an external drive with macOS loaded? If your mini is a 2014 model (Macmini7,1), it would have come with Yosemite but it should be able to run up to Monterey. So if you know someone with a bootable external drive with macOS Yosemite up to Monterey, you could try to boot from it, and if it does, you can go into Recovery to see if you can reinstall macOS on the mini’s internal drive. If the mini runs okay on the external and you can’t figure out a way to use Recovery, you can just download the macOS Monterey installer and install it from the external.
I hope you have a Time Machine backup.
I hope you have a Time Machine backup.
No luck at all with my attempts to get this running, so I took the MAC MINI to a local computer shop. They did diagnose a failed system software issue. They plan to remove the drive from the box and get it hooked up to one of their devices to extract my data. Then I will decide on what my next step is.... I think that next step is a purchase of a new device and load it up with the recovered data files. Thanx for the help!!
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Good luck. If you decide to get a Silicon Mac mini, I think you will be very happy with it. I urge you to get AT LEAST 16 gibibytes of memory and a half terabyte of storage, if not more. And a couple of attached Time Machine drives. I was quite happy with my 2018 mini except for the heat, but the M1 and M2 minis have made that issue moot.