Solved: Booted to Single-User mode and disabled Radeon GPU.
Details of investigation:
Initially I suspected hard-drive corruption and went about trying to remedy that. Unsuccessfully, I tried the following, with each continuing to hang as described above:
- Safe boot
- Boot into recovery (including Internet Recovery)
- Boot from install media on USB drive
- Boot from OS X installation on USB drive
- Clear NVRAM
- Reset SMC
I also ran the Apple Hardware Test many times without it finding any issues.
Verbose safe boot (Cmd+Shift+V) output everything that I'd expect to see but would then hang as described above.
After coming across more posts online of GPU related problems I revisited this as the cause:
Attempting to boot Ubuntu from a USB flash drive, I could only get as far as Grub. When trying to boot Ubuntu Desktop or run the graphicstest in Grub the system would hang.
At this point, running Apple Hardware Test hung right before the end of the standard test, possibly [guessing] when doing a video test.
Based on the advice in the Apple Discussions posts above I did the following:
- Boot into Single-User mode
- Execute the following commands:
/sbin/fsck -fy /
/sbin/mount -uw /
mkdir /Disabled_System_Library_Extensions
cd /Disabled_System_Library_Extensions
mv /System/Library/Extensions/ATI* .
mv /System/Library/Extensions/AMD* .
touch /System/Library/Extensions
exit
This time the machine booted all the way through. However, graphics are extremely slow, even just transitions when minimizing windows. I will be taking my MBP to Apple to demand a replacement as the large number of reports of others facing similar issues makes it look like a recurrence of a similar GPU-related failure that resulted in them doing a recall.
Best Answer
I would say that you have a dying/dead discreet GPU, as that's a known problem with your model of MacBook Pro. Booting into safe mode may be doing something to help your GPU (I have an Xserve with a confirmed dying GPU that boots in safe mode but not without it) so it boots properly. I would highly recommend getting your MacBook Pro replaced as soon as possible via the Apple program. I would suggest you run Apple Hardware Test and verify that your GPU is dead/dying, but this may not be possible given your current state. Similarly, you can run a GPU stress test program like Unigine Heaven and see if your GPU quits.
The only thing I find interesting is your previous shutdown reason: overheating. According to this post, shutdown code -3 is temperature based. That's strange, but not impossible.
In any case, seeing if you can get your computer replaced probably isn't a bad idea since it's pretty likely your GPU is dying. Go to an Apple store, explain the issue, and they'll probably give you a new computer.