MacBook pro boots but doesn’t finish login

[sublevel4]

i think I installed an application that hosed things. Anyway I had to restore from my last backup. Now that I have I can't get past the login in normal boot or safe boot. Just sits there and spins. What do I need to do? I would rather not wipe and start clean but I need to get thing thing back up and running asap.

Thanks!

MacBook pro Mojave

 

[Fishrrman]

Have you tried a "safe boot"?
(power down, reboot with shift key held down)

 

[sublevel4]

Have you tried a "safe boot"?
(power down, reboot with shift key held down)

Yes the same thing happened with safe boot. I let it go for 20min with a normal boot and 20min with a safe boot, both just sit and spin.

 

[Honza1]

I would try to reinstall MacOS without wiping the drive. It is relatively fast and usually painless - and leaves your documents and configuration in place. Reinstall may fix the system problem.
Not sure if you can do this from Internet recovery, I believe you can... If not, you would need to create bootable usb installer for the version of MacOS you are using (you need another Mac for that).

 

[sublevel4]

Well I was getting ready to reinstall and I tried to login and had to go and I was away for like 4 hours. I came back, woke it up and logged in and it took like 3 seconds and I was at the desktop...I have no idea what the issue was or why it took so long to log in.