Gray Screen & Prohibitory Sign

[raaron1990]

This past Sunday, I was using iMovie on my late 2011 Macbook Pro (running Yosemite) to edit a video for a class. Upon exporting the video, my computer froze. I turned it off, then turned it back on, and when I tried to export the video again, it froze and the screen was off center. When I turned it off and on again, it wouldn't get past a blank gray screen. Now, yesterday and today, I get nothing but a prohibitory sign. I've tried booting it in Safe Mode, but to no avail. I've reset the PRAM, and that didn't work either. I tried making a bootable USB for Yosemite from my newer Macbook Pro, and it will let me select a drive after holding "option" upon starting up, but it goes to a blank gray screen afterward. I have tried going into Single User Mode and Verbose Mode (see image links below).

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I don't want to have to spend $500+ to fix it, but if it can be fixed by doing something at home, then I'm all for it.

Thanks!

http://imgur.com/7sfB0UI
http://imgur.com/TxAZYdu

 

[GGJstudios]

If you haven't seen this already, this may be useful: A flashing question mark or globe appears when you start your Mac

 

[raaron1990]

If you haven't seen this already, this may be useful: A flashing question mark or globe appears when you start your Mac

For some reason, when I start my computer and hold the "option" button, I don't have a Recovery HD, just my Macintosh HD. I have no idea why.

 

[Bruno09]

For some reason, when I start my computer and hold the "option" button, I don't have a Recovery HD, just my Macintosh HD. I have no idea why.

Hi,

this is normal on Yosemite : you must boot holding Cmd + r to boot up from the Recovery partition.

 

[raaron1990]

Hi,

this is normal on Yosemite : you must boot holding Cmd + r to boot up from the Recovery partition.

I'm currently at work, so I can't try it right now. If it works, should I still do a clean install of Yosemite?

I'm not worried about the files and such on the computer. It's backed up with Time Machine and on my newer computer. I just want this one to work.

 

[Bomb Bloke]

This sounds a lot like a crashing video card driver. Now why would that driver be crashing when you put your system under stress? This may or may not have something to do with it.

If you can boot into Recovery, then you may as well go for a restore of a recent Time Machine backup. If it was working then, then it should work now.

But frankly, I think the graphics card is likely on the way out.