Also, I can kill you with my brain.

River ,'Trash'


Buffistechnology 3: "Press Some Buttons, See What Happens."

Got a question about technology? Ask it here. Discussion of hardware, software, TiVos, multi-region DVDs, Windows, Macs, LINUX, hand-helds, iPods, anything tech related. Better than any helpdesk!


tommyrot - Aug 30, 2012 2:44:21 pm PDT #20800 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Weird. I can't get my MacBook Pro to boot from a Snow Leopard intall DVD nor from a USB drive.

I tried booting from the DVD while holding down the 'c' key and tried booting from a USB drive by holding down the 'd' key.

eta: Tried booting into single user mode so I could use the command line to mount the DVD. But I don't get a command prompt, even after the attempt to mount the HD times out.


tommyrot - Aug 30, 2012 2:48:18 pm PDT #20801 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

If Apple's webpage won't let me make an appointment for the Genius Bar tonight, would it pay to go to the store anyway? I wouldn't get there until 8:00 and they close at 9:00.


le nubian - Aug 30, 2012 2:52:30 pm PDT #20802 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."

Tommy,

Only do it if you are prepared for them to send your computer away for a week.


tommyrot - Aug 30, 2012 2:55:11 pm PDT #20803 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Ugh. There's a Mac repair place in Evanston I might take it to instead.

Now I have my doubts that it's the HD, even though the HD sometimes make weird noises when I try to start it. A bad HD shouldn't stop it from booting off a DVD or USB drive, right? I fear it may be some disk controller issue that would be beyond my ability to fix.

Thoughts?


le nubian - Aug 30, 2012 2:58:08 pm PDT #20804 of 25501
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."

My 2008 MacBook pro had the motherboard go out last year. Took them about 90 minutes to diagnose tho.


tommyrot - Aug 30, 2012 3:02:00 pm PDT #20805 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

My 2008 MacBook pro had the motherboard go out last year.

Did you have it fixed? If so, how much did it cost?

Darn. I was thinking of replacing my MacBook Pro with one of the new 13" MacBook Pros with retina display and SSD (that comes out later this year, right?) So I don't wanna stick a lot of money into it, as it's 3 years old.


NoiseDesign - Aug 30, 2012 4:55:05 pm PDT #20806 of 25501
Our wings are not tired

Sorry things have taken a long time at Apple stores for you. They have turned repairs around for me in 24 hours many times. Rarely more than 48. The last time I walked in with a bad computer I walked out with a brand new one 60 minutes later.


tommyrot - Aug 30, 2012 5:05:55 pm PDT #20807 of 25501
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

Do you think the Apple store would be a better option than a reputable independent repair place?


meara - Aug 30, 2012 5:25:57 pm PDT #20808 of 25501

Do you think the Apple store would be a better option than a reputable independent repair place?

Well, you could take it to the Geniuses and try to figure out what's wrong, and then see if it's cheaper at an independent place...


§ ita § - Aug 30, 2012 6:03:25 pm PDT #20809 of 25501
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.

I felt better treated by the Genius encounter I had. Not least of all because they replaced my water damaged thingummy for free even after my warranty expired. But they were nice and focussed and businesslike. There's no use extrapolating from my independent repair experience to what's available to you, but I felt there was a degree of sketch there--possibly because I used to run a tech support department, except it was Compaq and IBM instead of Apple.