[Solved] Sierra no longer boots from SSD or USB after attempts to install Nvidea

[CraigDenham]

My build is as follows


i7 6700K -CPU
Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD5 TH Motherboard
Gigabyte GTX 950 OC 2GB Windforce - GPU
16GB RAM Crucial Ballistix
Samsung 850 Evo SSD
HDD Seagate Barracuda 7200, 3.5", SATA III, 3TB
Arctic Cooling Freezer 13
LG Blue-ray
Dell P2415Q 4K screen
Fenvi 802.11AC Wifi Bluetooth card - NOT YET INSTALLED. Still waiting for it

I am a complete newbie at this. The last time I was inside a computer was installing a Digi 001 soundcard in a Pentium 3 laptop in the 90s. Have been on macbook pros ever since. This is my first build. I managed to succesfully install sierra and get it to boot off my SSD drive. The next day I managed to get the audio working following the instructions on this website. When I first booted up I needed to unplug my GPU and plug my screen into the onboard graphics of the motherboard. Once the installation was complete I could restore power to the GPU and didnt interfere with subsequent boots. Today I have been trying to get the GPU working. I used text edit to edit the config plist with the suggested edit, I also ticked the relevant boxes in the Clover Configurator and saved them. When I restarting I get passed the initial clover screen with options and such and OSX starts booting automatically. However the boot doesnt complete. I tried unplugging the GPU. No change. I tried booting from recovery. No change. I tried booting from USB. No change. I went into BIOS and noted that XHCI Handoff was somehow disabled {whatever that is}so I enabled it again. I loaded Optimized defaults again. Nothing else has changed. Still no change. I cant finish booting. Help me please!! I cant seem to find this issue on the forum here and I've spent about 2 hours on youtube on my gf's pc with no luck. Thanks. P.S. This site is awesome so thanks to everyone for contributing.

 

[AM0207xx]

My build is as follows


i7 6700K -CPU
Gigabyte GA-Z170X-UD5 TH Motherboard
Gigabyte GTX 950 OC 2GB Windforce - GPU
16GB RAM Crucial Ballistix
Samsung 850 Evo SSD
HDD Seagate Barracuda 7200, 3.5", SATA III, 3TB
Arctic Cooling Freezer 13
LG Blue-ray
Dell P2415Q 4K screen
Fenvi 802.11AC Wifi Bluetooth card - NOT YET INSTALLED. Still waiting for it

I am a complete newbie at this. The last time I was inside a computer was installing a Digi 001 soundcard in a Pentium 3 laptop in the 90s. Have been on macbook pros ever since. This is my first build. I managed to succesfully install sierra and get it to boot off my SSD drive. The next day I managed to get the audio working following the instructions on this website. When I first booted up I needed to unplug my GPU and plug my screen into the onboard graphics of the motherboard. Once the installation was complete I could restore power to the GPU and didnt interfere with subsequent boots. Today I have been trying to get the GPU working. I used text edit to edit the config plist with the suggested edit, I also ticked the relevant boxes in the Clover Configurator and saved them. When I restarting I get passed the initial clover screen with options and such and OSX starts booting automatically. However the boot doesnt complete. I tried unplugging the GPU. No change. I tried booting from recovery. No change. I tried booting from USB. No change. I went into BIOS and noted that XHCI Handoff was somehow disabled {whatever that is}so I enabled it again. I loaded Optimized defaults again. Nothing else has changed. Still no change. I cant finish booting. Help me please!! I cant seem to find this issue on the forum here and I've spent about 2 hours on youtube on my gf's pc with no luck. Thanks. P.S. This site is awesome so thanks to everyone for contributing.

Upload your Clover folder ( delete themes folder ) and compress it as zip.
When you can´t boot from your USB, your Clover configuration is wrong.

 

[CraigDenham]

Upload your Clover folder ( delete themes folder ) and compress it as zip.
When you can´t boot from your USB, your Clover configuration is wrong.

How do I do that and to where do I upload it

 

[AM0207xx]

How do I do that and to where do I upload it

You can make a zip file with the inbuild mac OS function.
Then you click on "Upload a file" under the text field where you can insert replys.

 

[CraigDenham]

Upload your Clover folder ( delete themes folder ) and compress it as zip.
When you can´t boot from your USB, your Clover configuration is wrong.

You can make a zip file with the inbuild mac OS function.
Then you click on "Upload a file" under the text field where you can insert replys.

OK. Problem is I only have my girlfriends PC. My faithful 2009 Macbook Pro died 2 weeks ago and is in get serviced. Are you saying that the Clover Configuration will be wrong on the bootable USB drive as well as on my SSD. As far as I am aware the changes I made were only on the SSD. How can I even get Clover off there. Sorry but Im really not that smart at all this stuff. Thanks in advance fpr your patience.

 

[CraigDenham]

Do you think if I "remove all Clover boot options" that might work. P.S. sorry for the lack of question marks. My gfs PC is Czech and I cant for the life of me figure out how to get a question mark.

 

[AM0207xx]

Do you think if I "remove all Clover boot options" that might work. P.S. sorry for the lack of question marks. My gfs PC is Czech and I cant for the life of me figure out how to get a question mark.

The only thing you need to do is to use a config.plist that works and boot up. In EFI/Clover/other kexts make sure that there are all essential kexts, essential kexts are your ethernet kext, FakeSMC.kext and SATA-100-series-unsupported.kext.

I haven´t much experience with Nvidia cards, but I think you should unplug your card or set nvdisable=1 in Clover as boot argument.

 

[CraigDenham]

I cant get into EFI/Clover/other kexts as the system wont boot. Can they somehow be accessed pre boot? I only have BIOS or the initial Clover Options to play with. I think I might need to somehow start again from scratch. Totally stuck at this point. Have tried booting in safe mode, tried your suggestion nvdisable=1 in that initial Clover screen (pre boot) even though the card is unplugged now, tried removing all clover boot options. Still boots for a few seconds then stops and screen goes blank. Maybe its not actually related to the card. Thats just what I was trying to get going at the time. Thanks for your help by the way. Is there a way to completely start again? P.S. I found the question mark!

 

[CraigDenham]

So I booted in verbose mode. Here is a pic of where it gets stuck.

 

[CraigDenham]

UPDATE. So I physically unplugged my SSD then booted from USB and it didnt get stuck. Powered down, plugged the SSD back in, powered up again and booted from USB again. Was successful again so Ive erased the SSD and am starting again from scratch. Better luck this time.