Urgent Help: My Mac Is &(*@$(@$!!

try unplugging all your gear and restarting.

hold down mouse button during startup to force cd tray to open

hold down shift during startup to force FSCK this will load "safe mode" if problem still happens here (with all devices minus keyboard and mouse unplugged) then the OS/hardware is at fault and you will need to reformat/reinstall/send in to apple (not necessarily in that order)... but i doubt it would go that far...

<insert witty comment about his computer going into a coma like that girl in NYC>

Sup.

Aight so I unplugged all my stuff and did what Paul suggested and I still get the same blue screen. So I took the original Mac OS X install disk that came with my machine, booted off of that and went into disk utility.

I then verified disk and clicked repair. This is the result:

Repairing disk "untitled"
Checking HFS Plus volume
Ivalid sibling link
Repair completed

In the information, here is what it says:

Information

Mount Point: Not Mounted
Format: HFS+
Capacity: 74.53 GB (80,025,996,288 Bytes)

Obviously something is wrong with the hard drive and it is not mounting, but I am wondering why because before I restarted the computer everything worked perfectly.



Sir LoCash- Your comment will be forwarded to an admin. I dont appreciate it and the forum doesnt need it. [which means they find it amusing]

So, it still doesn't work? Or did that disk utility thingy fix it?

I don't think that 'not mounted' part is of any concern... when you boot up off of the Installer disk, it doesn't mount your disks, does it?

This happened to my roommate, exactly like this. He called AppleCare, and it turned out to be a corrupted Login Preference file. They fixed it by guiding him through single user mode (command-s at startup), and renaming several of his preferences so they were re-created.

I wouldn't be able to tell you which ones, but hopefully someone else can use this as a jump point

Have you got any PCI cards in your machine? I've had that startup trouble a few times with my DP1Ghz, and once it was so bad I pulled all the PCI cards and re-seated them in different slots. It worked. Why or how I couldn't tell you, but it did.

And, don't be too hard on Jack...he's been in the sauna with a bunch of squirrels a little too much lately... ...and who's gonna listen to a newbie with only 1 post?

[edit:] and while you're in there, pull your RAM and switch them around too. I know it sounds like voodoo, but, well...it is. \

Ok, you can find my email address in my profile. Forward away.

Check tha sig yo, I aint a newbie w/1 post.

Im gonna try and take out all my PCI cards since I tried command line ish and that stuff didnt even work. Plus I called Apple they told me I couldnt even be helped because I didnt purchase Apple Care.

I know. Just f**kin with ya while you're way out on that limb....


[edit:] Let me know if the PCI stuff works...I know it's a long-shot, but it worked for me.

Also, have you tested your RAM at all? Bad RAM=machine having nightmares (literally).

Oh, and if you have a red eraser around, clean the contacts of the RAM with that. No, I'm not kidding.

You thought that the days of sacrificing chickens and whirling like a dervish were limited to getting your SCSI chain to work, didn't you?

I switched the RAM to a different slot, took out all of my PCI cards...still the same problem that persists.

I also tried something that I found that is supposed to fix it.

started up in single user mode with Command-S
typed: mount -uw /
then hit return
typed: mv /var/db/SystemConfiguration/preferences.xml preferences.old
then hit return
typed: reboot
then hit return

machine still booted as before

tried this too

start up in single user mode
typed: mount -uw /
typed: mv /Library/Preferences/com.apple.loginwindow.plist preferences2.old
typed: mv /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver.plist preferences3.old
typed: reboot

same thing


finally try
startup in single user mode
type mount -uw /
chmod 1775 /
reboot

nada

I've tried resetting the pram (same thing as "zapping" ?), resetting the Open Firmware, resetting the nvram....nothing has helped. Unplugged all my gear from the computer, taken out all the pci cards, removed RAM and reinstalled it in different slot.

I dont know what the hell to do...Mac works perfectly for a year and a half then all of a sudden after I restart it the other day...all hell breaks loose. I called Apple, and they arent allowed to help me over the phone because I dont have Apple Care and I purchased the machine a year and a half ago. The guy told me to look online at their support and I did and thats the only really relevent thing I saw was going into single user mode and typing those commands out.

booting into safe mode...everything else...didnt work. same thing.

Oh...after I type the ish in single user mode...after each command I type it says "No file found" or something of that nature....

Jesus...once you start talking 'Terminal' you've gone far deeper than I would ever dare. I'm sorry, I got nothin else.

Good Luck TW, I wish I could help more.

RED FLAG

umm your disk isn't named untitled is it...

i'd recommend buying disk warrior and running that...

do you have a backup?

you will probably have to reformat unless DW works some magic on your HD...

No it's not....thats why I was wondering about that...Disk Warrior? What is the version? I will ask my dad if he can get it tomorrow.\

Dont have a backup...

3 it just came out a few weeks ago, works great

do you have OS 9 installed?

have you tried booting from that?

hold option when you boot to choose the OS you want

you may have a corrupted font file in the os9 system folder.

to check this, restart in os9 (as per above) and open it's system folder (not the folder called system) drag the fonts folder to the desktop. restart in osX. if it starts up ok you know you've got a damaged font file in that fonts folder.

(taken from the trouble shooting section of david poque's osx the missing manuel.)

I had a same problem several months ago. I ended up reinstalling OSX. Once I did, all the other/old volumes and files reappeared. I then backed up everything I really needed. I reformated the disc and did a clean install. If you have a slow / dial up connection like I do, go to one of the Apple stores to get everything updated. 10.2 -10.6 combo is like 80 meg and with everything else I was sitting there at the genius bar for about 2 hours to get everything back to where it was before the crash.. I never figured out what caused the problem but it happened after I was trying out VCD players.

reg

OK, so what did it say after you typed 'mount -uw /'? These are exactly the commands that my roommate received from the AppleCare support tech, and that fixed his problem.

I'm afraid I'm thinking that your HD crashed. And Disk Warrior would be your best option. \

Didnt say anything, just went to the next line.

This ****ing sucks...

Suggestion for data recovery since this is what seems to be at stake here:

Grab multiple disk utilitie programs, thats what we do here at the institution which I work at. We've typically had good luck with Nortons Utitlies and Tech Tool Pro. Never tried DIskWarrior or DataRescue X, so I can't say for those.

Try hooking up your station to another and booting it through target disk mode. Something tells me your harddrive is "blech" for a lack of a better word.

Finally, buy another drive and throw it in your station, and install X on it and then hook up your previous drive see if you can recover you -ish.

Best of luck, I do a lot of drive recovery here and seeing a fellow students work go kaputz knowing they haven't backed up makes me feel bad its like seeing someone losing a child or something...

norton is evil... i cannot believe you haven't used diskwarrior... it is a great program...

other then that, good advice

tiger, do you have any other firewire computers? you could try target mode (hold t on startup) which would turn your computer into an external hard drive...

as per backups... ive seen someone who only saved one copy of their final term papers onto a FLOPPY because they thought the hard drive wasn't safe enough...

of course, when the floppy got stuck in the computer she came to the help desk at 1 in the morning for us to fix it... it all worked out tho... she was luckey

Looks pretty much like a harddisk crash, and, sadly enough, that happens quite often in this world. Diskwarrior comes highly recommended. They're at version 3 right now. Try it, it should work miracles. Oh, stop repairing your disk with Apple's disk utility. Every iteration will only **** your disk up a little more.

Today I booted up my machine just for the hell of it to see if things magically started to work....and it actually showed the log in screen so I logged in....machine seemed to start up and loaded up my desktop with everything there....almost....until it just became all blue again. So I booted up with the command to choose which OS you want and the only choice it gave me was to boot up in OS X. I do have OS 9 installed on the machine ...so I have NO CLUE why I couldnt boot in OS 9 with this ....I have done it before, full OS 9 not none of that Classic ish either. Sooo...I boot off the OS 9 CD and I am in there right, but I cant move anything to the desktop or open anything up because it says the disk is locked.

Basically Ive almost given up and am about ready to break down and cry for real. This is some bull, I dont have backups or disk utility programs on my Mac because its a Mac...I dont expect it to suddenly not be able to start up, especially after going 2 years without having any problems whatsoever. There is no way I can lose ANY of that data either...I have business documents (yes, I do have a start up business venture), a HUGE music collection which I've worked hard to gain (I dont have that many cds...and I have an extremely slow connection here at home..some of my stuff is ripped from cds I borrowed off friends and stuff that I wont be able to get again etc), tons of programs I need that I got through education....just everything. That thing is like my precious baby..I love it. The worst part is I have been planning on getting a 120 GB hard drive to add....

****!

No, I dont have any either Firewire computers. ****in Dell is only USB.

stop ****ing with it. get DW, boot off that CD and repair the HD... hds crash, shit happens.

after you run DW... BACKUP your important data...

Did you reset the CUDA switch on the mobo next to the battery?

That's the only thing I can think of.

However, to save your data you'd need to see if the disk will mount from another computer. Firewire is the best way to go here.

Second the advice about DiskWarrior. DFA and especially Norton are useless in severe corruption. Diskwarrior rebuilds the directory from scratch.

You must have access to another mac, at least one. Just plop yours down next to it, get a 6pin to 6pin,...boot up the working mac and then hold down the letter "T" as you boot your mac to set it in target disk mode. Now go, there has GOT TO be another mac around somewhere!

Yea there are several Macs around, just not with Firewire. What is a 6pin or what does it look like?

And how do I reset the CUDA switch on the mobo next to the battery?

The 6 pin is just the normal large-ish style firewire connector. I got one free with the computer.
Good luck

DiskWarrior has worked excellently for me in the past, if it's any consolation my computer in the past has also just suddenly given up the ghost. There is maintenence work that needs to be carried out on computers, running disk checks etc, they help things tick along

"and render things just because it can"

I'm gonna hold you to that,...send me some of your stuff.
I have a lot of dreams that I don't carrry out, maybe you'll be my inspiration to stay awake and really lose my sanity...