Mac/Tiger question

BryceC

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Mar 23, 2006
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I know this isn't really the place for this, but I really don't know waht to do at all.

I'm not totally proficient with Macs, but my wife loves them and it has been our home computer for several years now. Yesterday it reached critical mass.

Basically, I was the last one to use the computer at about 2:30 in the afternoon, and I watched some YouTube videos which were running a bit slower than normal but that happens sometimes so I didn't think much of it. I then went to work.

My wife got home about 5:00, tried to open Safari, and the icon changed in the dock to an applescript icon and it just kept bouncing. She then tried firefox and that icon changed and just kept bouncing. So then she tried to restart and things got really wacky.

Basically, the computer will start up, and it will be the plain white screen with the gray apple in the middle, and the OS will never load. It just has that little circle thing that continually rotates. My concern is losing some pictures that are only on the harddrive but it sounds like an OS problem to me since the icons were changing to applescript icons, like it was just trying to open the program as code.

I didn't do anything out of the ordinary that I haven't done over the last 6 years with it and this happened. Is there a way to just force the OS to reinstall? Do I have to take this to get fixed? I really don't know where to go from here and I'd rather not spend the money in an iStore.

I would really appreciate any help.
 

ColoradoClone

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Apr 6, 2006
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I had the same thing happen with our iMac, and the same concern of losing pictures. Just set up an appointment with a Mac Genius and bring it in to the apple store and explain the problem. They were able to go into mine and move all the pictures onto an external hard drive to ensure they were saved, and then went to work fixing the OS. I don't remember what exactly caused the problem, but they reloaded the OS, and saved all the data. The best part was, the guy worked on my computer for about 2 hours (mixing in some other customers along the way) and stayed after closing to fix the machine, and because there were no hardware issues it didn't cost me a dime.
 

CompCy

Active Member
Apr 7, 2006
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Ames
I know this isn't really the place for this, but I really don't know waht to do at all.

I'm not totally proficient with Macs, but my wife loves them and it has been our home computer for several years now. Yesterday it reached critical mass.

Basically, I was the last one to use the computer at about 2:30 in the afternoon, and I watched some YouTube videos which were running a bit slower than normal but that happens sometimes so I didn't think much of it. I then went to work.

My wife got home about 5:00, tried to open Safari, and the icon changed in the dock to an applescript icon and it just kept bouncing. She then tried firefox and that icon changed and just kept bouncing. So then she tried to restart and things got really wacky.

Basically, the computer will start up, and it will be the plain white screen with the gray apple in the middle, and the OS will never load. It just has that little circle thing that continually rotates. My concern is losing some pictures that are only on the harddrive but it sounds like an OS problem to me since the icons were changing to applescript icons, like it was just trying to open the program as code.

I didn't do anything out of the ordinary that I haven't done over the last 6 years with it and this happened. Is there a way to just force the OS to reinstall? Do I have to take this to get fixed? I really don't know where to go from here and I'd rather not spend the money in an iStore.

I would really appreciate any help.

It sounds like a bunch of stuff was deleted or can't be read from the filesystem.

Should be able to reinstall a clean system with the install cd. Once it starts up there is an options button, and then a checkbox that says "Clean install" or something. This will copy your old system and user directories to a "Previous Systems" directory. Then it will install the operating system again.

When it's done you should be able to get all your stuff out of your old user folder.

Note: If it is a hardware problem, such as not being able to read the data from the hard drive it will be more difficult.
 

BryceC

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Mar 23, 2006
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It sounds like a bunch of stuff was deleted or can't be read from the filesystem.

Should be able to reinstall a clean system with the install cd. Once it starts up there is an options button, and then a checkbox that says "Clean install" or something. This will copy your old system and user directories to a "Previous Systems" directory. Then it will install the operating system again.

When it's done you should be able to get all your stuff out of your old user folder.

Note: If it is a hardware problem, such as not being able to read the data from the hard drive it will be more difficult.

I put the OS cd in the system tray, but it won't load anything it all. Just that initial screen and since there isn't a DOS thing that I know of with Macs I don't know how to make it load the OS off the CD.
 

BryceC

Well-Known Member
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Mar 23, 2006
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I had the same thing happen with our iMac, and the same concern of losing pictures. Just set up an appointment with a Mac Genius and bring it in to the apple store and explain the problem. They were able to go into mine and move all the pictures onto an external hard drive to ensure they were saved, and then went to work fixing the OS. I don't remember what exactly caused the problem, but they reloaded the OS, and saved all the data. The best part was, the guy worked on my computer for about 2 hours (mixing in some other customers along the way) and stayed after closing to fix the machine, and because there were no hardware issues it didn't cost me a dime.

Which store did you bring it to? The one in Jordan Creek? That's the only one I knew of. Thanks for the help guys, I just about crapped my pants.
 

ColoradoClone

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Apr 6, 2006
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Which store did you bring it to? The one in Jordan Creek? That's the only one I knew of. Thanks for the help guys, I just about crapped my pants.

I went to the Apple Store in Park Meadows Mall here in Lone Tree, Colorado but I would assume any Apple Store will be able to take care of you. I freaked when I was just staring at that white screen and it wouldn't turn on. Not because I cared about the computer, but I knew my wife would kill me for losing her photos.

Just let the guy know the issue, and tell him what files you're most concerned about. He may charge you for an OS upgrade to Leopard... I'm not sure, but they should be able to get your data.
 

Ciclone

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May 5, 2008
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Clive
What I would do is the following:

- Restart the computer and hold down Command-Option-P-R (all four keys) until you hear the startup chime sound three separate times. Let go. This resets the PRAM and can occasionally be all you need.

if that doesn't help:

- Run the OS from the original Tiger disk(s) (you may need to hold down the "c" key with the disk in while you restart until you see the OS loading). Go to the menus at the top and select Disk Utility, choose your drive name then "Repair Permissions" on the disk. "Repair Disk" next just to be sure. Repairing permissions is something that should be done fairly regularly to keep things working smoothly. Repair the disk if you run into big problems. These shouldn't take a tremendous amount of time. If it takes an extremely long time, then it could in fact be a hard drive issue as it's not reading from the drive very quickly. Try rebooting and see if things are back to normal. (One thing to keep in mind is to make sure you haven't loaded up your main disk totally full as the computer can act strangely then as well.)

if that doesn't help:

- Run the OS from the original Tiger disk(s) again and reinstall the OS. I'd do an "Archive and Install." This saves the old filesystem on the disk (in case you find you needed something from it at some point later) and creates a new one. You can then erase the old filesystem after the new one works for a while - say, a few weeks to be safe.
 

ColoradoClone

Well-Known Member
Apr 6, 2006
1,049
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Or just go to the Apple Store... lol

:smile:

I would recommend doing this before trying anything yourself. It's free, and you don't have to incurr the rath of a wife who may believe that it could have been fixed if you hadn't tried screwing with it.
 

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