can't boot to login screen

[senior]

Hey,
A few days ago I upgraded the hard drive in my MBP (3, 1: mid 2007, 2.4Ghz) to a Seagate Momentus Gforce 500GB. I restored my system from a time machine backup and everything was running fine.

Last night the OS entered a weird state where I couldn't force quit anything, or interact with any of the apps, yet could drag the windows around. The same thing happened again this morning.

I installed the latest software updates (graphics driver fixes, security fix and iLife update) while I did a disk utility check, which came up fine. I rebooted and got to the login screen, but couldn't click on a name. Then I rebooted and now it won't reach the login screen, it just cycles between a blue screen and the default OS wallpaper with a mouse cursor.

I've tried running disk utility, repairing permissions, doing a hardware test and flashing the PRAM. All diagnostics come up fine, including the HD and RAM.

What is the likely problem?
- new HD?
- software updates?
- problem when restoring from time machine?

Is there anything else I can try before I restore from Time Machine again? Is it worth doing a clean install and migrating my old system over manually?

 

[TopHatPlus]

I've tried running disk utility, repairing permissions, doing a hardware test and flashing the PRAM. All diagnostics come up fine, including the HD and RAM.

What is the likely problem?
- new HD? - most likely
- software updates? - doubt it
- problem when restoring from time machine? no this would have been an instant problem

Is there anything else I can try before I restore from Time Machine again? Is it worth doing a clean install and migrating my old system over manually?


sounds to me like a faulty hard drive, or something else has gone of your computer, and it definitely sounds like a hardware issue and not a software issue

 

[senior]

I've seen reports of people having problems with the Momentus Gforce drives. Apparently the acceleration sensor built into the drive might conflict with the sensor built into the MBP. I may also try the firmware update for the drive.