G4 not booting up

[Jude72]

Hi

Wehn I stared my mac at work this morning, all I am getting is a folder with a flashing question mark and the apple 'face'. When I have started from the software restore disk I cannot run the disk first aid on the HD as it does not appear.

The only spec I know about the mac is that it is a PowerMac G4 running on OS9, 500mhz 1M cache, 256 MB SDRAM,27G HD.

Thanks in advance!

[zarmanto]

Your problem could be caused by a hardware failure, or by a very serious software corruption of the data partitions. (MacOS 9 was always somewhat prone to those kinds of corruptions, particularly if the computer had been subjected to a few too many unexpected reboots, caused by power outages or crashes.)

Barring obvious indicators, (like weird grinding sounds or the like, that didn't always occur on that system) finding out if the source of the problem is hardware or software can sometimes be tricky -- and even more-so today, since most third-party utilities for MacOS 9 have probably been discontinued. Have you tried to use Disk Utility to view the harddrives?

[Jude72]

Your problem could be caused by a hardware failure, or by a very serious software corruption of the data partitions. (MacOS 9 was always somewhat prone to those kinds of corruptions, particularly if the computer had been subjected to a few too many unexpected reboots, caused by power outages or crashes.)

Barring obvious indicators, (like weird grinding sounds or the like, that didn't always occur on that system) finding out if the source of the problem is hardware or software can sometimes be tricky -- and even more-so today, since most third-party utilities for MacOS 9 have probably been discontinued. Have you tried to use Disk Utility to view the harddrives?

Have booted from the installation disk but the hard-drive does not appear under the disk utility/first aid :( :confused:

[zarmanto]

Well, it might well be time to take it to your nearest Apple Store Genius Bar.