[Ze_pwn_zor]

I was on iChat when my computer froze. I held down the power button to shut it off. When I try to turn it back on it just stays at the screen with the apple and the rotating circle for ever.

[seanc]

How long is forever? Can you hear any strange, abnormal noises coming from the hard drive?
If you boot from the restore disc and launch disk utility, what is the SMART status on the hard drive?

There were some Seagate hard drives in MacBooks that will suddenly fail, as per this link MacNN | Failing Seagate drives haunt MacBook owners
If you go into System Profiler when booted from the restore disc, can you check to see if a) you have a Seagate and b) if it has firmware 7.01 as described in the article?

Good luck

[Ze_pwn_zor]

is the restore disc the disc that came with the macbook that says mac osx install disc?

[seanc]

Yeah, that's the one.

[Ze_pwn_zor]

K I'll try it

[Ze_pwn_zor]

Should I archive and install ( makes previous system folder and new system folder) or erase and install

[seanc]

Have you checked the SMART status, checked the manufacturer and firmware version of your hard drive? If these check out OK, then continue, otherwise STOP and try backing up your data.

If SMART etc are OK then:
Boot in single user mode by holding command (apple key) + s? If you can, type [codex]fsck -fy[/codex] and press enter
This should fix any issues with permissions etc. Then try rebooting normally.

Next would be to do an Archive and Install, this would create a new system folder and should hopefully fix any issues that may be preventing you from booting with the current system folder.

[Ze_pwn_zor]

how do I check that stuff

[seanc]

I explained it in my first reply.
System Profiler is in the installer menu at the top of the screen. Your hard drive should be under Serial-ATA.