Is my MacBook Pro (2009) bricked?

My wife got the old MacBook Pro of her dad so she can work on it. I wanted to clean it. So I booted it from a El Capitain USB stick, removed the partitions and created a new one and then installed El Capitain. It crashed during the installation so after a few hours of doing nothing I forced a shutdown.

Then it started to do funky things, sometimes it would boot to a gray screen with an X in the middle and sometimes it would show a black screen and beep 3x short, 3x long, 3x short. So I downloaded the proper recovery CD, burned it to a DVD. While shutdown I held the power button until the LED would start blinking rapidly, then it went to what I assume was a firmware upgrade or recovery. It showed a gray screen with a progress bar and it completed, it rebooted and then it was completely dead. It powers on, even tries to read the DVD (you can hear it spinning up) but no chime and no screen. I inserted the Recovery DVD hoping it would do something, but now I can't even get it out anymore. I've tried everything.

So in short this is what happened:

- Cleaned out mac, re-installed OSX
- It crashed during the installation
- After reboot it started beeping, 3x short, 3x long, 3x short
- Sometimes it would show a gray screen with an X in the middle
- I downloaded and burned the Firmware Recovery DVD and put it in the MacBook
- It then installed the Firmware, it rebooted and then it did nothing, just a black screen, no startup chime

It's a MacBook Pro 17 inch early 2009 (EMC 2272). Any ideas? I ordered a Bus Pirate and want to try re-flashing it. I opened another topic here asking for an EFI dump: ghostlyhaks.com/forum/efi-firmware-dumps-requests/491-a1297-emc-2272-efi-dump-request

Those beeps usually mean memory problems. Could be 1 stick is bad or could be bad RAM slot. Try using only 1 slot

I doubt you need to reflash any firmware.

Hi, Ive tried removing the RAM or fitting 1 module, both do nothing. The MacBook no longer beeps after the recovery firmware update. So even booting without RAM does nothing, not even any beeping.

Try holding down the power button for 10-15 seconds ..see if it turns on

If I do that it will power on as usual (fans spin) and then shutdown after about 10 seconds and then power on again with fans on. But no chime, no boot, no beeps, nothing really.

Hey, thanks. I thought so too, I've tried everything but to no avail. I'm trying to get the EFI ROM but with no luck so far. I've bought a Bus Pirate and will try and read out the chip. Is there anything I can do without having the proper EFI ROM?

Awesome I need to buy a clip and cable to read out the chip. When that's done I'll post the dump here.

Not sure if you can solder but ...EFI chip $20 pre-programmed

www.ebay.ca/itm/PROGRAMMED-EFI-CHIP-17IN-2009-APPLE-MACBOOK-PRO-820-2390-A-BIOS-2-93GHz-/291388246462?hash=item43d817c9be:g:5BIAAOSw7ThUodmU

Thanks for that! If restoring the ME region fails and the EFI rom is nowhere to be found I'll definitely buy that chip. I could even simply read that one out for the EFI rom and flash the existing one without soldering. I've never soldered anything in my life so it's a last resort for me.

OK, so I bought a clip so I can read/flash the chip it while it's on the board. It should arrive within a couple of days, I'll post the dump then. Thanks guys!

I received the clip and tried reading out the chip but I am failing to. I have a Bus Pirate V4. Does anyone have experience with hooking up a SPI chip to a Bus Pirate? I have all connectors hooked up, but according to Flashrom you need 3 connectors with 3.3v (pin 3, 7 and 8 ), Bus Pirate only has 1 connector that has 3.3v. www.flashrom.org/Bus_Pirate i890.photobucket.com/albums/ac102/piccyman/BusPirate4-ProbeKitColours_zps6d1add70.jpg

This is the output from flashrom:


Pardon my lack of knowledge!

I think I need to bridge connector 3, 7 and 8 on the chip so they all get 3.3v. Is that correct?

It looks like the clip I bought isn't working so well. It's unable to stay gripped on to the chip. I'm going to a buy a new one. I also saw connectors WP and HOLD don't need to be connected, so I'll try that. To be continued..

connect WP and HOLD to 3v3 also. i use my bus pirate for all sorts of fun stuff, but i couldn't get flashrom to work for some reason. i ended up going to fry's and grabbing an RBP for $20 and it worked like a charm.

Thanks, I may just do that!

I see.. I thought it could simply not read the clip. I tried connecting the Bus Pirate without any chip connected to it and I got the same results. I'll try updating the firmware. Thanks!