What would cause a MacBook Pro to freeze on the login screen?
September 29, 2018 9:02 PM Subscribe
I have a 2014 MacBook Pro running Sierra. Today, when I went to turn it on, it got to the login screen and the trackpad and keyboard weren’t working. I tried restarting a number of times - nothing. What else can I try.
I connected with Apple chat and tried resetting the SCM and NVRAM. That did not help. I also booted into the Disk Utility and ran First Aid. When I booted into the Disk Utility, the trackpad was working fine. I have tried turning the computer on and off a couple of times, and sometimes it will be responsive very briefly - the keyboard and trackpad work for 2 or 3 seconds. I am currently traveling, and finding a time to visit an Apple store and see a genius in person will be difficult. Is there anything else I can try? I appreciate any suggestions.
I connected with Apple chat and tried resetting the SCM and NVRAM. That did not help. I also booted into the Disk Utility and ran First Aid. When I booted into the Disk Utility, the trackpad was working fine. I have tried turning the computer on and off a couple of times, and sometimes it will be responsive very briefly - the keyboard and trackpad work for 2 or 3 seconds. I am currently traveling, and finding a time to visit an Apple store and see a genius in person will be difficult. Is there anything else I can try? I appreciate any suggestions.
A few suggestions:
When turning your MBP on, press D. This will load Apple Diagnostics, which should then diagnose your computer and check all hardware components. Report back what happens. (You may need to be on WiFi to make this happen.)
Also, try booting into Safe Mode by pressing the SHIFT key as the computer turns on. Does the same problem occur?
You may have to do a reinstall of Sierra by booting to Recovery, then reinstalling. An in-place install (which is what will happen) will not erase any data/settings/applications, but should hopefully cure the problem. (This will require a fast WiFi connection to download the installer within Recovery.)
But yeah, start with Apple Diagnostics and see what it says. I suspect it's software as the keyboard/mouse worked fine in Disk Utility/Recovery.
posted by dubious_dude at 11:55 PM on September 29, 2018 [1 favorite]
When turning your MBP on, press D. This will load Apple Diagnostics, which should then diagnose your computer and check all hardware components. Report back what happens. (You may need to be on WiFi to make this happen.)
Also, try booting into Safe Mode by pressing the SHIFT key as the computer turns on. Does the same problem occur?
You may have to do a reinstall of Sierra by booting to Recovery, then reinstalling. An in-place install (which is what will happen) will not erase any data/settings/applications, but should hopefully cure the problem. (This will require a fast WiFi connection to download the installer within Recovery.)
But yeah, start with Apple Diagnostics and see what it says. I suspect it's software as the keyboard/mouse worked fine in Disk Utility/Recovery.
posted by dubious_dude at 11:55 PM on September 29, 2018 [1 favorite]
This happened to my husband's macbook and we were able to resucitate it a couple times but it was an indicator that it was on its way to macbook heaven, which it finally did. Call Apple, they were very helpful in getting it back on the couple times we did.
posted by Mysticalchick at 2:31 PM on October 2, 2018
posted by Mysticalchick at 2:31 PM on October 2, 2018
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The main difference to your experience is that the freeze happened *after* I reset the SCM and PRAM. I did this because I thought it might stop the fan spinning up abnormally high for no reason. The freeze didn't happen immediately after resetting SCM and PRAM, but later that day.
Like you, when I booted into Disk Utility the trackpad and keyboard were unfrozen. When I booted into Safe Mode they were frozen. Plugging in a mouse didn't work. Booting from a clone of the system on an external drive didn't work.
A possible clue to the problem was that after resetting the SCM and PRAM I had gotten a warning saying I should disable SIP (System Integrity Protection) because it could cause USB issues and other problems. SIP had previously been disabled by the hack I mentioned that allowed Sierra to run on this old laptop and it must have been re-enabled when I reset SCM and PRAM.
Anyway, I didn't get a chance to disable SIP before the freeze happened and trying to disable SIP in recovery mode didn't work. I wasn't able to find an overall solution to the freeze. Eventually I wiped the drive and reinstalled an older OS appropriate for that model.
posted by theory at 10:59 PM on September 29, 2018