Hey all,
I recently inherited a mid 2009 13" MacBook Pro. I wanted to install Ubuntu 14.10 on the machine rather than OS X. I've previously had success with Ubuntu 13.10 on a 2006 MacBook by booting to live USB and installing over the current OS, so I tried this method again with admittedly limited research.
While installing 64-bit Ubuntu 14.10 on the MacBook Pro 2009, everything seemed to go fine. However, when I rebooted the machine in an attempt to launch Ubuntu for the first time, I was greeted by GRUB, selected Ubuntu, and then dropped to a purple screen. Nothing changed after 30 minutes -- still a purple screen. Repeated attempts to boot into Ubuntu 14.10 produce the same results.
In hindsight, it looks like I probably should have installed rEFIt or rEFInd on the machine prior to installing Ubuntu, as the 2009 MacBook uses EFI rather than BIOS. Is this required even when you're not setting up a dual boot?
Thus far, I have tried two routes to solve the issue. First, I tried to boot back to Ubuntu live USB, but to no avail. The GRUB menu appears as usual, but when I select either "Try Ubuntu" or "Install Ubuntu", the screen goes black and hangs there.
My second attempt was to create a bootable USB of OS X Yosemite. This too is getting hung up. When I select the option to load from USB, the Apple symbol appears on the screen with a progress bar. The progress bar has been hung at ~25% for the last 45 minutes or so. I have yet to have the option of installing the OS.
What is the best way to get my machine running again? I would be happy to have either OS X or Ubuntu installed at this point.
Thanks for any tips, tricks, or flames.
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