Chosen Solution
Hi This one has me beat. I bought a used iMac a mb950b/a. the story I got was it was all ok but after a fresh os install it stopped working, he has pics of it running an old os. it will start but I get the folder with ? icon. so before I tried anything I ran a AHT and no issues. its running 4GB of ram and I tried to enter startup recovery but it will not open, I just get the apple logo, the status bar will fill but nothing. I created a bootable version of high Sierra, this showed up ok at start up, it will try and open but again after hours the apple logo and the status bar fills but nothing. I opened up the Mac and found a SSD installed, so I removed and installed a new SSD I had. again I tried to install a new os and the same, just the apple logo and a full status bar, I cannot get to startup recovery I fitted a SSD from another Mac and it showed up ok when starting via the alt key. it showed up but nothing, still cannot get to startup recovery I have tried loads of resets, swapping drives anything I can find, but nothing will work. so in short all i’m a getting is the apple logo and a status bar, I can’t access startup recovery, Im lost with this one, any help please. Update (06/29/2021) Hi Dan and Mayer, Sorry I messed up with the speeds on the SSD, GENUINE THANKS ! :) Right, I had a Samsung SSD 840 in my MacBook, lucky!Its specs are SATA 6Gb/s (Compatible with SATA 3Gb/s and SATA 1.5Gb/s) So I think Im good? I backed up MacBook to my time capsule and fitted the WD SSD and did a reinstall and all is now good with MacBook, Mid 2012 good with the 6Gb/s I formatting the Samsung to GUID on my MacBook and then put it into the iMac. just trowing this out, when I do boot via Option (⌥) the only drive I see is the USB, right? I ran it in single user mode, the new SSD is listed here and used fsck -fy, twice and “got appears to be OK” then a root out of single user mode and Option (⌥), same. I was using El Capitan just to get the thing working on some level. but I’m afraid same results. but serious guys, the help so far is fantastic, any more ideas please. again thank you! regards Robbie
Check to make sure these SSDs you are using are backward compatible to SATA II 3.0 GHz.
